'But I have known him such a long time, and have travelled such a long way with him!'
'You dreamed it, I tell you. Where are the rose bush and the little key, hey? But you are not dreaming now. Do you feel that?'
'Oh!' cried Johannes, for Pluizer nipped him.
It was by this time dark, and the bats flew close over their heads and piped shrilly. The air was black and heavy, not a leaf was stirring in the wood.
'May I go home?' asked Johannes,—'home to my father?'
'To your father! What to do there?' said Pluizer. 'A warm reception you will get from him after staying away so long.'
'I want to get home,' said Johannes, and he thought of the snug room with the bright lamp light where he would sit so often by his father's side, listening to the scratching of his pen. It was quiet there, and not lonely.
'Well then, you would have done better not to come away, and stayed so long for the sake of that senseless jackanapes who has not even any existence. Now it is too late, but it does not matter in the least; I will take care of you. And whether I do it or your father, comes to precisely the same in the end. Such a father—it is a mere matter of education. Did you choose your own father? Do you suppose that there is no one so good or so clever as he? I am just as good, and cleverer—much cleverer.'
Johannes had no heart to answer; he shut his eyes and nodded feebly.
'And it would be of no use to look for anything from Robinetta,' the little man went on. He laid his hands on Johannes's shoulders and spoke close into his ear. That child thought you just as much a fool as the others did. Did you not observe that she sat in the corner and never spoke a word when they all laughed at you? She is no better than the rest. She thought you a nice little boy, and was ready to play with you—as she would have played with a cockchafer. She will not care that you are gone away. And she knows nothing of that Book. But I do; I know where it is, and I will help you to find it. I know almost everything.'