"Have you slept well?" inquired the queen. Walpurga was glad that the queen had asked a question, for now she could answer. Casting a hurried glance at Mademoiselle Kramer, she said:
"Yes, indeed! Sleep's the first, the last, and the best thing in the world."
"She's clever," said the queen, addressing Doctor Gunther in French.
Walpurga's heart sank within her. Whenever she heard them speak French, she felt as if they were betraying her; as if they had put on an invisible cap, like that worn by the goblins in the fairy tale, and could thus speak without being seen.
"Did the prince sleep well?" asked the queen.
Walpurga passed her hand over her face, as if to brush away a spider that had been creeping there. The queen doesn't speak of her "child" or her "son," but only of "the crown prince."
Walpurga answered:
"Yes, quite well, thank God! That is, I couldn't hear him, and I only wanted to say that I'd like to act toward the--" she could not say "the prince"--"that is, toward him, as I'd do with my own child. We began right on the very first day. My mother taught me that. Such a child has a will of its own from the very start, and it won't do to give way to it. It won't do to take it from the cradle, or to feed it, whenever it pleases; there ought to be regular times for all those things. It'll soon get used to that, and it won't harm it either, to let it cry once in a while. On the contrary, that expands the chest."
"Does he cry?" asked the queen.
The infant answered the question for itself, for it at once began to cry most lustily.