"Easily said, Paula! How am I to begin? Benno knows more French, geography, and mathematics than I, and he is only eleven years old, and next month I am twenty."
Paula pushed the drawing-board away from her upon the table, and leaned her head upon her hand, apparently in order better to ponder over so desperate a case. Suddenly she raised her head and said:
"You must speak to my father."
"What shall I tell him?"
"All that you have told me."
"He will not be able to help me either."
"He will, be sure. You do not know how much my father knows. He knows everything--understands everything."
"That I well believe, Paula; but how can that help me? He can give me no part of his knowledge, even if he were so kind as to wish it."
"True, he cannot do that; you must work yourself; but how to work the best, and how to succeed the soonest, he knows, and will tell you if you ask him. Will you?"
"Yes, I will; but----"