"I really believe you would do as you say, Fräulein von Osternau," he said, "but it is out of the question. I never could look any one in the face again if I allowed you to go. I will go for the doctor, and bring him back with me as soon as may be."
"You have just got home," Elise remonstrated.
"All the more reason why I should be the one to go out again,--I could not possibly be wetter than I am. I shall bring the doctor back with me."
He was so evidently resolved to go that Elise did not gainsay him, but quietly declared her intention to stay beside the wounded man until the doctor arrived. Wangen suggested that, since the poor fellow was unconscious, the housekeeper or one of the maids might just as well relieve her of this duty; but Elise was firm, and Bertha supported her in her decision, although in a mocking way that was very irritating. "Let her do as she wishes," she said to her husband, quite loud enough to be heard by the self-constituted nurse. "It will be a comfort to her. Do you remember her enthusiasm for her music-teacher when she was but seventeen? She preserved his image faithfully in her heart and recognized him immediately. We ought not to interfere with her."
Elise blushed painfully, but she suppressed the bitter retort that rose to her lips. Clara threw her arms round her and whispered to her, "Don't let her distress you, darling Elise. She grows worse and worse; you must not mind her."
Wangen, too, was grieved by Bertha's tone and manner, reminding him as it did of his late interview with her, and his voice was not so cordial as usual as he rejoined, "This is no time for jesting, Bertha. Come, let us leave Fräulein Lieschen to her work of mercy. The poor man could not be in better hands."
CHAPTER XXII.
[AN OLD ACQUAINTANCE].
Egon awakened as from a long, deep slumber. He opened his eyes, and was conscious of a dull pain in his head, and of a burning, pricking sensation in his forehead; he raised his hand to it, and his fingers encountered a wet linen bandage, while he observed that the place in which he was was entirely strange to him. He had never before seen the blue and white draperies of this room, nor had he any recollection of its rather quaint but comfortable furniture.
How had he come here? and why was his head bandaged? He closed his eyes again and tried to collect himself, finding that, in spite of the pain in his head, he was able to think connectedly. He had certainly arrived shortly before at Station R----. He had asked a porter to get him a conveyance to take him to Plagnitz. The man had been eager to serve him; but had not some one warned him against driving along so rough a road in such a storm? Yes; he remembered this quite well, and that he had laughed at the speaker's warning, and had driven off in the pouring rain, and in a pitchy darkness which was illuminated every moment or two by vivid flashes of lightning. The driver had grumbled and sworn in a mixture of Polish and German, and the vehicle had dragged on at a snail's pace, because its one horse scarcely sufficed to pull it through the mud that came up to the hubs of the wheels.