"And I know more than that," he continued, after a pause. "I ought not to tell, because aunt warned me against letting anybody know; but now I think she was not in earnest when she said so."
"What was that?" asked Oswald, with assumed indifference.
"I will tell you," said Bruno. "Last Saturday, in the afternoon, when you were writing letters, I had gone into the forest towards Berkow, because that is my favorite walk. Suddenly aunt comes riding up, quite alone, not even Boncœur with her. She rode Brownlock, whom she always takes when she wants to go fast, and she must have been riding fast then, for Brownlock's neck and chest, and even her riding-habit, were all covered with white foam. Why, Bruno! she said, offering me her hand, where are you going to? Nowhere, aunt, as usually, said I, but where are you going to!--Nowhere, like yourself, she answered, laughing; so we can continue on our way together.--If you will walk your horse, I said, not otherwise. And thus we went for half an hour or more through the forest, and the whole time we talked of nothing but of yourself, and aunt asked me if I was fond of you, to which I replied, of course, No! How you looked and if you were cheerful? Whether you studied much? and a hundred other things, which I have forgotten. At last she charged me to give you her regards, and to ask you if you still had the engravings you had been speaking of, and if you would not send them to her--and then she called me back, and said I had better not remind you of them, and not tell you that she had spoken of you--but, as I told you, now I do not think she meant exactly what she said."
"Why not now, Bruno?"
"Because----" the boy was silent; suddenly he said in a low tone, as if he feared the dark bushes would hear it:
"Tell me, Oswald, how is it, when people are in love?"
"How do you mean?" asked Oswald, not a little embarrassed by the boy's question.
"I mean, what kind of love is that of which the books have so much to say? I love you, love you very much, but I think there must be some other kind of love. Thus I never understood why we should not love anybody we choose to love. Now, I love my Aunt Berkow above all things. I could do anything for her! I sometimes wish she would fall into the water and I could jump after her; or, as it happened the other day, Brownlock would be rearing and I would seize the reins and struggle with him, and not let him go again, although he should trample upon me with his hoofs.--Now, such wishes never occur to me when I am near you, Oswald, or when I think of you at a distance."
"Because I am a man, Bruno, and you know that I could and would help myself, without aid from others. But the love we feel for a woman partakes of the consciousness that we must protect her who cannot defend herself with our superior strength and courage, and that makes our love deeper, and fuller of sympathy. And then there is still another feeling mixed up with it, of which I can only tell you that it is pure as nature itself, but also as chaste, and which therefore must not be awakened before the right time, if it is not to become as fatal to rash man as the boldness of the youth, whom the thirst for knowledge drove to Saïs and to the temple where she dwelt, hid in close veils, Isis, the chaste, holy goddess of nature."
"I do not quite understand you, Oswald."