satisfaction, in giving up everything for her Jew lover--a satisfaction
which was the more intense, the more absolute was the rejection and the
more crushing the scorn which she encountered on his behalf from her
own people. But to encounter this rejection and scorn, and then to be
thrown over by the Jew, was more than she could endure. And would it,
could it, be so? She sat down to think of it; and as she thought of it
terrible fears came upon her. Old Trendellsohn had told her that such a
marriage on his son's part would bring him into great trouble; and old
Trendellsohn was not harsh with her as her aunt was harsh. The old
man, in his own communications with her, had always been kind and
forbearing. And then Anton himself was severe to her. Though he would
now and again say some dear, well-to-be-remembered happy word, as when
he told her that she was his sun, and that he looked to her for warmth
and light, such soft speakings were few with him and far between.
And then he never mentioned any time as the probable date of their
marriage. If only a time could be fixed, let it be ever so distant,
Nina thought that she could still endure all the cutting taunts of her
enemies. But what would she do if Anton were to announce to her some
day that he found himself, as a Jew, unable to marry with her as a
Christian? In such a case she thought that she must drown herself, as
Lotta had suggested to her.

As she sat thinking of this, her eyes suddenly fell upon the one key
which she herself possessed, and which, with a woman's acuteness of
memory, she perceived to have been moved from the spot on which she had
left it. It was the key of the little desk which stood in the corner of
the parlour, and in which, on the top of all the papers, was deposited
the necklace with which she intended to relieve the immediate
necessities of their household. She at once remembered that Lotta
had been left for a long time in the room, and with anxious, quick