by turns, strangely savage and strangely sorrowful. He had to go home at
once, he said. He could not tell them now what the matter was, but he
would write to them, as soon as he could pluck up the courage to do so.
He packed his luggage, and Kallem went to see him off.

A few days afterwards, Ragni received a letter from Karl. He was going
to Berlin, he said, to take up the study of music seriously. And then,
for four pages, he talked about his prospects. But there was another
page, a loose one, on which was written in red ink: "Read this when you
are alone."

"I have decided, Ragni," Karl wrote, "that it would be wisest to tell
you why I left so suddenly. Someone has started a dreadful slander
against us. If I do not now tell you, you will hear it from the lips of
some enemy. Ah, God! that I should have brought this upon you! Love you?
Of course I love you. How could I help doing so, after all your kindness
to me? And as for Edward, I worship the ground he treads on. He is the
noblest man I have ever met. But do not show him this letter. Spare him
the evil news as long as possible. Now that I have gone away, it may all
blow over."

Kallem did not get home from the hospital that night until eight
o'clock. When he came home his wife was lying in bed with a headache.
She did not get up the next morning. She was in bed several days. When
at last she got up, her husband noticed that she had grown very thin;
her face had a tired, delicate expression; there were dark rings around
her sweet eyes, and she was troubled with a cough.


_III.--The Fell Work of Slander_