"To-day--to-morrow--just as it pleases the new owner. By his charity only
we are still here, and, if it pleased him, we might have to lodge in the
streets this very night."

"It won't be as bad as that, Max," she said, painfully striving to keep her
composure, "if he hears that, only a few days ago, a little one arrived--"

"Oh, I suppose I shall have to beg of him--shall I?"

"Oh no; he will do it without that. Who is it?"

"Douglas, he is called. He comes from Insterburg. He seemed to swagger very
much, this gentleman--very much. I should have liked to have driven him
from the premises."

"Is anything left us?" she asked, softly, looking hesitatingly down on
the new-born child, for his young, tender life might be depending on the
answer.

He broke out into a hard laugh. "Yes; a wretched pittance: full two
thousand thalers."

She sighed with relief, for she almost felt as if she had already heard
that terrible "Nothing" hissed from his lips.

"What good are two thousand thalers to us?" he continued, "after we have
thrown fifty thousand into the swamp? Perhaps I shall open a public-house
in the town, or trade in buttons and ribbons. Perhaps you might help me,
if you were to do the sewing in some aristocratic houses; and the children
might sell matches in the streets. Ha, ha, ha!"