Hélène laughed gleefully at the idea of cake being good for a broken eye.
"Good gracious, how did the eye fall out?" said Dr. Poons, shaking his head gravely.
"She fell down and I kicked it," lisped the little one. "I kicked it," she laughed, unconscious that she had committed an unprovoked assault on her plaything. "Mend it; oh, please mend it!"
Poons shook his head gravely. The child mistook this for a confession of his inability to do what she wished.
"Mamma 'll fix it when she comes home. She won't be long, will she?" said the child, somewhat tearfully. She had asked the question many times, and her father seemed unable to answer her.
"I am trying to make her forget," said Anton savagely to Poons, in answer to his look of painful inquiry. "She must forget soon; I've been with her ever since you left me this morning." His arm stole around the child's neck, and drawing her to him gently, he kissed her again and again with such sad, lingering tenderness that the ever-ready tears welled up into Poons's eyes, and he turned his head to conceal them. The child struggled to free herself.
"Papa so rough, eh? Well, he won't be, or Herr Poons will beat him, eh?"
"Surely," assented Poons.
"Papa will be so gentle and so kind," went on Von Barwig tenderly. "He'll love his little girl as no little girl in this wide, wide world was ever loved before, eh?"
Little Hélène did not understand, and as she had nothing at this precise moment to occupy her attention, she answered him by asking the one question that absorbed her mind, "Where's mamma?"