“Thank God, yes!” she replied. “Mamma is always rather delicate, but that is all.” A shadow passed over her face, but disappeared again the next moment, and then she chatted on: “I have been in town--oh dear, what I have gone through there! I must tell you about it at the first opportunity. I have had dancing lessons. I have also had admirers--you can fancy that! They serenaded me under my windows, sent me anonymous bouquets, and verses, too--original verses! There was a student, among others, with a white-braided coat, and a green, white, and red cap; oh, he understood it! The things he would say to you! Afterwards he engaged himself to Betty Schirrmacher, one of my friends, but quite in secret--nobody knows it but myself.” Paul breathed freely again, for the student had already begun to make him uncomfortable. “And were you not vexed?” he asked. “Why?” “At his being fickle to you.” “No; we are above such things,” she replied, shugging her shoulders. “Oh, you know--they are all stupid boys in comparison with you!” He felt quite frightened at the idea of calling a student a stupid boy, and, above all, in comparison with him. “My brother is no stupid boy,” he retorted. “I don’t know your brother,” she said, with philosophic calmness; “perhaps he is not. Oh, I have grown ever so much older,” she went on. “I took literature lessons, and from that I learned many beautiful things.” Tormenting envy awoke in him. “Do pick up that book.” He did so. “Do you know that?” In gold letters he read on the red cover the words, “Heine’s Buch der Lieder” (Heine’s Book of Songs), and shook his head sadly. “Ah, then you don’t know anything! Oh, how much there is in that book! I must lend it to you. There, read that; it teaches one a great deal. And after reading it for a little while one generally begins to cry.” “Is it so sad, then?” he asked, looking at the cover with shy curiosity. “Yes, very sad; as beautiful and as sad as--as--It only speaks of love, of nothing else; but you feel such a great longing overpower you, and that you would like to fly off to the Ganges, where the lotus blossoms, and where--” She stopped, and then she laughed merrily and said, “Oh, that is too stupid; is it not?” “What?” “What I am chattering about.” “No; I could listen to you for my whole life.” “No! could you? Oh, you know--it is so cosey here; I feel so secure when you are near me,” and she stretched herself out in the net-work as if she wanted to lean her head on his shoulder. A strange feeling of happiness and peace came over him, such as he had not felt for a long time. “Why do you look away?” she asked. “I don’t look away.” “Yes, you do.... You must look at me. I like that.... You have such earnest, faithful eyes. Oh, I know now what to compare those poems with!” “Well, with what?” “With your whistling. That is also so--so--well, you know what I mean.... Do you still whistle sometimes?” “Very seldom.”