CHAPTER IX.
GROWTH DURING ILLNESS.
"He is saved!" said the doctor, and "He is saved," was repeated by voice after voice through the whole city.
The doctor enjoined double care in guarding Roland from the least excitement of any kind, and when the boy complained of the horrible tedium of his sick-room, both Eric and the doctor laughingly reminded him that he had his good time in the first place, and that ennui was the first sure step towards recovery. Roland complained also of being kept hungry, and then added, his face seeming to grow fuller and fairer as he spoke:—
"Hiawatha voluntarily suffered hunger, and do you remember, Eric, my thinking then that man was the only creature that could voluntarily hunger? Now I must practice what I preached."
Roland showed himself particularly full of affection toward Eric's mother. He maintained that she was the only person he had recognized during his delirium, and that it had caused him the greatest distress not to be able to say so at the time, but the wrong words would keep coming from his mouth. Even the Mother did not stay with him long at a time.
He rejoiced to see lilies of the valley in his room, and remembered that he had dreamed of them.
"Was not Manna with me too? I was always seeing her black eyes."
Heimchen's illness, they told him, prevented her leaving the convent.
He wanted to see the photograph taken of him in his page's dress, and said to Eric:
"You were right, it will be a pleasant recollection to me by and by. Indeed the by and by is already here; it seems to me two years ago. Do give me a glass, for I must know how I look."
"Not now," returned Eric; "not for a week yet."
Roland was as obedient as a little child, and as grateful as an appreciative man. The second day, he begged Eric to let him relieve his mind by speaking out what was in it.
"If you will speak calmly I will hear you."
"Listen to me then, and warn me when I speak too excitedly. I was on the sea, and dolphins were playing about the ship, when suddenly there was nothing to be seen but black men's heads, and in the midst of them a pulpit swimming, in which stood Theodore Parker preaching with a mighty voice, louder than the roaring of the sea; and the pulpit kept swimming on and on with the ship-—-"
"You are speaking excitedly already," interposed Eric. Roland went on more quietly, in a low tone, but every word perfectly distinct:—
"Now comes the most beautiful part of all. I told you how as I lay in the forest that time when I was journeying after you—nearly a year ago now—there came a child with long, bright, wavy hair, and said, 'This is the German forest;' and I gave her mayflowers, and she was taken up in a carriage and disappeared; you remember it all, don't you? But in my dream it was even more bright and beautiful. 'This is the German forest,' was sung by hundreds and hundreds of voices, just as it was at the musical festival, oh, so beautifully, so beautifully!"
"That will do," interrupted Eric; "you have told enough, and must be left alone awhile."
Eric told his mother of the strange fairy story, which that decisive journey had given rise to in Eric's mind—he had heard of it before from Claus—and mentioned as a singular circumstance, that this second revolution in the boy's nature resulting in his illness, should have recalled to him this story.
The Mother was of opinion that something similar to the story must actually have happened, but warned Eric not to refer to the subject again, for every recollection of past events retarded recovery and a return to a natural state of mind.
The first time Roland could stand up, they were all surprised to see how much he had grown during his illness. The down too, on his lip and chin, to his great delight, had increased perceptibly. When he saw, for the first time, the straw spread before the house, he said,—
"So the whole city has known of my illness, and I have every one to thank. That is the best of all. How many I owe gratitude to! Whoever shall come to me now, for the rest of my life will have a claim upon me."
Eric and his mother exchanged glances as Roland spoke, and then cast their eyes to the ground. Wonderful was the awakening to life displayed before them in this young soul.
"Did Eric tell you that I had seen Pranken? asked Roland.
"Yes. Now lie down to sleep."
"No," he cried; "one thing more!"
He called for his pocket-book, in which he had written the name of the groom whom he had suspected of robbing him on his night journey. Reproaching himself for having hitherto neglected to inquire about him, he charged Eric to find the man, who was now a soldier in his regiment here, and bring him to his room.
The soldier came, and received from Roland a sum of money very nearly as large as that in the purse at the time. Eric had no need to have given such strict injunctions to the man not to excite Roland by much talking, and vehement expressions of gratitude, for the soldier had no power to speak a word. He felt as if he were in fairy land, at being thus summoned into a great hotel, before a beautiful sick boy, and presented with such a sum of money; it was like being transported into another world.
Contented and happy, Roland lay in bed again. He begged his father, when next he came to his bedside, to give away all his clothes, for he would wear none of them again.
"Do you want to put on your uniform at once?" asked Sonnenkamp.
"No, not now; but I want to go home soon, as soon as we can, back to the villa; home, home!"
Sonnenkamp promised all should be as he desired.
The Professorin soon fell in with some young people whom Roland's clothes just fitted, and he exclaimed with delight when, he heard it.—
"That is good; now my clothes will go about the streets until I am there again myself; I shall be represented sevenfold."
He desired his father to express his thanks to all the persons who had so kindly shown an interest in him, a duty which Sonnenkamp would readily have performed without this admonition. It afforded the best possible way, better than the most brilliant entertainment, of coming in contact with the aristocracy.
With his handsomest carriage and horses, Sonnenkamp drove through the whole city. His wife had refused all his entreaties that she would accompany him; but he succeeded in inducing the Professorin to be his companion. She, also, refused at first, but yielded to Roland's persuasions. It was the first request, as he said, that he had asked of her since his return to life, and she should and must gratify him by going with his father.
In proportion to the pain it cost the noble lady to make her reappearance before the world in such companionship, was the ease with which all doors flew open, as if by magic, wherever Lootz showed the cards of the Professorin and Sonnenkamp.
The lady herself was often unconscious that this was the effect of her presence; she only knew that she was tightening between herself and Sonnenkamp the bonds from which she would gladly be free, and, whenever she returned to the carriage, she begged him not to say so much about her motherly care of Roland. Sonnenkamp, who was looked upon as of quite secondary importance by the persons visited, skilfully contrived to make himself the central point of the conversation by praising the Professorin's nobleness of spirit, and enlarging upon his own great happiness in being allowed connection with such a family.
On this excursion Sonnenkamp tasted the best pleasure of which he was capable; for his highest pleasure was in hypocrisy, and in the luxury of its exercise, he forgot his deep-rooted indignation at the pride of the resident families, who were now obliged to receive him as an equal. Where he hitherto had been permitted only a few hasty and unmeaning words, he was now allowed comfortably to display his manifold experiences, around all of which a softening halo was cast by the genuine sentiment that served as their setting, the sentiment of fatherly affection. His manner, also, of confessing that he had not always thought as favorably as he should of human nature, but had been taught by the Dournays to honor true nobility of mind, won for him the reluctant interest of all. He laughed to himself, as he went down the steps, at the thought of persons saying, as he knew they would, "We really never knew the man before; he has a vast deal of character and great sensibility."
He treated with especial consideration the members of the committee upon orders, knowing himself, and having had particularly enjoined upon him by Pranken, the importance of gaining them over to his plan.
Thus had Roland's illness given a fresh impulse to the nobility project; and the Professorin had, against her will, co-operated to the same end.
Sonnenkamp could not do enough to testify his respect for the lady who, after all, had gained him his greatest triumph. In spite of her refusal to come to his fête, and help in furthering his plan, she had now become his tool. He never grew tired of rejoicing in the conviction that all mankind could be used like puppets; some were to be bought by the ringing of gold, and some by the ringing of their own praises.