"Oh, child, how could I forget it?" Aunt Thekla interrupted her. "Of course it can help us. But you have no Johann Leopold who will redeem it," she added, less hopefully. And Otto rising, said, "No, thank you, Johanna; I cannot accept such a sacrifice from you."
Johanna, too, rose. "You must!" she cried, and her eyes sparkled. "Tell him, Aunt Thekla, that he must. If I am not a near enough relative to help him, he must reflect that it is the right of all of us to help to avert a family misfortune——" She paused, and hurried from the room.
"How good she is!" said Aunt Thekla.
"More than good,—magnanimous!" murmured Otto, who was pacing the room with folded arms, and Magelone once more marvelled at 'this girl's extraordinary luck; everything redounded to her honour and glory.'
CHAPTER XIV.
AN UNEXPECTED RETURN.
Johanna brought the parure to her aunt. "He will not refuse to accept aid from you," she said. Then they sat at table conversing upon indifferent subjects, and the same talk went on in the drawing-room while they were drinking coffee. When at last Magelone sat down at the piano, and Aunt Thekla, wearied with the exertions of the day, dropped asleep in the corner of her sofa, Johanna slipped out into the park.
Her heart was heavy. Otto's words, 'I cannot accept such a sacrifice from you,' had wounded her, in proving to her that she was not as near to him as she had thought. "I wish grandpapa were at home again; he is the only one who really cares for me," she said to herself. And, as she leaned against the wall of the park at the end of the linden avenue and listlessly plucked some monthly roses from the marble vase beside her, she thought that the tears that filled her eyes were shed for her grandfather's absence.
A quick, firm step upon the gravel startled her from her revery. She hastily wiped her eyes, but did not look around until Otto's voice said close beside her, "Forgive me, dear Johanna. I hear, it is true, that you do not like to be interrupted in your evening strolls; nevertheless you must allow me to thank you before I leave here again to-morrow morning."