"Ah, Manna, he is so awfully learned! My father says so too, and he sees people through and through. Don't you sometimes feel afraid of him?"
Without making any reply, Manna took Lina's arm and went with her through the garden, Lina chatting, joking, and singing incessantly, like a nightingale in the shrubbery.
After Manna had gone to her room, it seemed to her there that the pictures on the wall looked at her and asked: Who can this be? She shut out the dumb pictures by closing her eyes, threw herself upon her knees, and a voice within her seemed to say: It must be thus; thou art to become acquainted with the world, and all the vain delights of life, in order to gain the victory over them. Yet she felt down-hearted, for in the midst of her contrite prayer she seemed to hear the lively waltzes sounding in her ears, and she heard a burst of laughter. Could it have been she herself who had so laughed?
The next day she had to enter into fresh gaieties.
In the afternoon they drove to the castle, and there the Architect contrived a new delight. He was a genuine priest of the May-bowl, and with a sort of solemnity he mixed the various ingredients of the fragrant beverage. The whole company sat upon a projecting wall of the castle, and looked out upon the broadly-extending landscape, while Lina, in her exuberant joyousness, sang and caroled without intermission. She sang in the open air, as a general thing, better than in a room; and she had a good accompaniment, for she sang a duett with the Architect.
Eric was again asked to sing, and again he declined.
Lina induced Manna to drink a whole glass of May-wine, and said, in joke, that if she could only get Manna once a little intoxicated, the old Manna, or, more properly, the young Manna, would again show herself. She seemed ready to make her appearance, but Manna had strength enough to hold herself in restraint, though she laughed to-day at Lina's most trifling jokes.
Roland nodded to Eric, but he whispered to him that he must not call attention to Manna's cheerfulness, as that would put an end to it.
Wreaths were woven, and Lina recalled the time when Eric first came to Wolfsgarten; with wreaths on their heads they all drove from the castle back to the villa.
At the last declivity. Manna bounded lightly down the hill and Lina after her; at the foot the latter embraced her old schoolmate, saying to her:—