“Oh, Dora, you are so silly! Why can’t you understand? I see I shall have to tell you everything. But do give me a drink of lemonade first. I shan’t get worse, that is certain. They never do; Olaf says so.”
“Let Trischl fetch you a cup of coffee.”
“Bah! Do you want to make me sick? I want lemonade, and you might—yes, I wish you would get me some vodki to put in it.”
“Vodki! Is the child crazy?”
“No, I’m not crazy. But I think you must be, or else you would understand that it’s just the Katzenjammer that’s the matter with me.”
“Katzenjammer! What a queer complaint. I hope it isn’t catching.”
But at this point Feo suddenly became convulsed with laughter, provoked thereto, I think, by the comical aspect of Trischl, who had all this time remained in the room, and who had thrown her hands up in horror at the name of the mysterious disease. The sight of Feo’s mirth began to make me feel angry, for it struck me that she had been hoaxing me a little. But all at once the laughter ceased, and was replaced by sobs, amid which I heard an occasional protest to the effect that she would “never do it again—no, never!”
I now deemed it wisest to keep silent for a while, and presently Feo raised a repentant and shamefaced countenance to mine.
“I’ll tell you all about it,” she said. “But you must promise not to tell mother.”
“If it is nothing very bad.”