"Why not? It is the simple truth."
"May be so; but it hurts good little Cilli to hear such things, especially from your mouth."
"Why especially from my mouth?"
"Because she sees in you her ideal."
"In you, I should think."
"Don't talk such nonsense, Justus!"
"Not at all. She fairly raves about you; she talks about nothing but you. Only yesterday she said to me that she hoped to live to see you as happy as you deserved to be, on which I ventured to observe that I considered you as one of the happiest men under the sun, notwithstanding your temporary want of employment, whereupon she shook her pretty head and said, 'The best indeed, but happy?' and shook her head again. Now I only ask you! You not happy!" And Justus whistled the tune of "Happy only is the soul that loves," and exclaimed, "There, now I have got rid of the wrinkles in your forehead, and now we will stop for today, or we shall make a mess of it again, as we did yesterday evening." He sprinkled his figures with water, wrapped Reinhold's half-finished head in wet cloths, and wiped his hands.
"There, I am ready!"
"Won't you at least shut your desk?" said Reinhold, pointing to a worm-eaten old piece of furniture, on and in which Justus's letters and other papers were wont to lie about.
"What for?" said Justus. "No one is likely to touch the rubbish. Antonio will put it all in order; Antonio is order itself. Antonio!" The other workmen had already left the studio; only Antonio was still busying himself in the twilight.