“Oh, yes.”

“You promise?”

“Oh, anything.”

“Anything? take care.  I may fill up a check for thousands, if you give a blank.”

“I didn’t give a blank; anything about German’s what I meant.”

“Ah, that’s safer, but not half so generous.  And yet you’re one who might be generous, I think.”

“But tell me about the German class.”

“I’ve nothing to tell you about it,” he answered, “only that you’ve promised to learn.”

“But where are we to say our lessons, and what books are we to Study?”

“Would you like to say a lesson now and get one step in advance of all the others?”

“O yes!  I shall need at least as much grace as that.”

“Then say this after me:  ’ICH WILL ALLES LERNEN, WAS SIE MICH LEHREN.’  Begin.  ’ICH WILL ALLES LERNEN’—­”

“’ICH WILL ALLES LERNEN’—­but what does it mean?”

“Oh, that is not important.  Learn it first.  Can you not trust me?  ’ICH WILL ALLES LERNEN, WAS SIE MICH LEHREN.’”

“’ICH WILL ALLES LERNEN’—­ah, you look as if my pronunciation were not good.”

“I was not thinking of that; you pronounce very well.  ’ICH WILL ALLES LERNEN—­’”

“ICH WILL ALLES LERNEN, WAS SIE MICH LEHREN:—­there now, tell me what it means.”

“Not until you learn it; encore une fois.”

I said it after him again and again, but when I attempted it alone, I made invariably some error.

“Let me write it for you,” he said, and pulling a book from his pocket, tore out a leaf and wrote the sentence on it.  “There—­keep the paper and study it, and say it to me in the morning.”

I have the paper still; long years have passed:  it is only a crumpled little yellow fragment; but the world would be poorer and emptier to me if it were destroyed.

I had quite mastered the sentence, saying it after him word for word, and held the slip of paper in my hand, when I heard steps in the hall.  I knew Richard’s step very well, and gave a little start.  Mr. Langenau frowned, and his manner changed, as I half rose from my seat, and as quickly sank back in it again.

“Is it that you lack courage?” he said, looking at me keenly.

“I don’t know what I lack,” I cried, bending down my head to hide my flushed face; “but I hate to be scolded and have scenes.”

“But who has a right to scold you and to make a scene?”

“Nobody:  only everybody does it all the same.”

“Everybody, I suppose, means Mr. Richard Vandermarck, who is frowning at you this moment from the hall.”

“And it means you—­who are frowning at me this moment from your seat.”

All this time Richard had been standing in the hall; but now he walked slowly away.  I felt sure he had given me up.  The people began to come out of the parlor, and I felt ready to cry with vexation, when I thought that they would again be talking about me.  It was true, I am afraid, that I lacked courage.