bore her off and soon made her forget herself in the happiness of
being drifted in his strong arm upon the rhythmic billows of the
waltz. At the end he led her to a seat and fell to complimenting
her--his eyes eloquent, his voice, it seemed to her, as
entrancing as the waltz music. When he spoke in German it was
without the harsh sputtering and growling, the slovenly slurring
and clipping to which she had been accustomed. She could answer
only with monosyllables or appreciative looks, though usually she
was a great talker and, as she had much common sense and not a
little wit, a good talker. But her awe of him, which increased
when she learned that he was on the stage, did not prevent her
from getting the two main impressions he wished to make upon
her--that Mr. Feuerstein was a very grand person indeed, and that
he was condescending to be profoundly smitten of her charms.

She was the ``catch'' of Avenue A, taking prospects and looks
together, and the men she knew had let her rule them. In Mr.
Feuerstein she had found what she had been unconsciously seeking
with the Idealismus of genuine youth--a man who compelled her to
look far up to him, a man who seemed to her to embody those
vague dreams of a life grand and beautiful, away off somewhere,
which are dreamed by all young people, and by not a few older
ones, who have less excuse for not knowing where happiness is to
be found. He spent the whole evening with her; Mrs. Liebers and
Sophie, with whom she had come, did not dare interrupt her
pleasure, but had to stay, yawning and cross, until the last
strain of Home, Sweet Home.

At parting he pressed her hand. ``I have been happy,'' he
murmured in a tone which said, ``Mine is a sorrow-shadowed soul