"Happy! why it was a blessing for everybody."

I said no more. It was plain that the count had not committed, and could
not have committed, a crime. I was obliged to yield to evidence. But,
then, what was the meaning of that scene at night, that strange
connection with the Black Pest, that fearful acting, that remorse in
a dream, which impelled the guilty to betray their past atrocities?

I lost myself in vain conjectures.

Knapwurst relighted his pipe, and handed me one, which I accepted.

By that time the icy numbness which had laid hold of me had nearly passed
away, and I was enjoying that pleasant sense of relief which follows
great fatigue when by the chimney-corner in a comfortable easy-chair,
veiled in wreaths of tobacco-smoke, you yield to the luxury of repose,
and listen idly to the duet between the chirping of a cricket on the
hearth and the hissing of the burning log.

So we sat for a quarter of an hour.

At last I ventured to remark--

"But sometimes the count gets angry with his daughter?"

Knapwurst started, and fixing a sinister, almost a fierce and hostile eye
upon me, answered--

"I know, I know!"