The wounded Russian could scarcely be recognized in the young man who now approached the widow with a light tread, had it not been for the bandage which was still wound about his brow, and the sling in which his left hand rested. Although his wounds were not yet entirely healed, the short time had produced a wonderful change in his appearance. Instead of the deathly pallor, a healthy red tinged his youthful cheeks, his dull, sunken eyes had regained their fire; in short, a change had taken place in his whole exterior, similar to that we may often perceive when the caterpillar, after an apparent death, suddenly throws off his ugly shell and flutters around us as a beautiful butterfly.
"May I hope for your pardon, my gracious lady?" asked the young man, in fluent but slightly foreign German, while he reverentially lifted Madame von Herbart's hand to his lips. "May I hope that you will pardon my boldness in having interrupted you?"
Madame von Herbart signed to him to be seated upon an arm-chair which Ella had just left, and said kindly: "Your unexpected appearance gives great pleasure. I congratulate you upon the happy termination of your tedious captivity. You have not disturbed us, for Ella's school-hours are just ended."
"You teach your daughter yourself?" asked the young Russian, somewhat surprised.
"I am too jealous of the love of my only child," replied Madame von Herbart, "to trust any stranger with so important a share of my maternal duties. I often feel the insufficiency of my own acquirements, but I shun no labor in learning all myself which I judge necessary for my child; and thus, while forming her mind, I can at the same time influence her heart. It is said," she added, smiling, "that all mothers think their own children prodigies of loveliness; but though I flatter myself this is not my case, for I know my Ella's faults, yet I venture to hope that she will correct them all, through love for a mother who, since her beloved husband's death, has found her purest and highest happiness in the education of her daughter."
A dark shadow, a painful contraction, apparently caused by the remembrance of past days, passed over Theodore's features. He endeavored to conceal the depth of his inward emotion, and cried out: "What is higher and holier in the world than a mother's love?" After a moment's pause, he added, as if speaking to himself: "And what can be more painful than to be forced to part with this heavenly affection early in life?"
Madame von Herbart laid her hand upon the young man's head, as if in the act of blessing him, and said tenderly: "Poor boy! you must have been very young when you were torn from the protection of a loving home, and thrust into the world. Scarcely yet a man, you have already used the bloody sword which your feeble hands could hardly lift. Your compatriots have deeply injured my country, and you, too, came as an enemy upon the soil so dear to me; your wounds show that you wore your arms as no idle ornaments, and yet I cannot hate you, for he who needs our aid is no longer an enemy. You are a Russian, and you weep?" she continued, gently raising the young man's head, which had fallen upon his breast. "I have often heard that the Russians were all rough and cruel, and yet you weep. O, do not be ashamed of your tears! they prove the goodness of your heart, and justify the sympathy you have excited within my soul."
"O my dear benefactress!" exclaimed Theodore, "where shall I find words to thank you? Could you read my heart,—could you see how the thought of the priceless benefits you have showered upon me fills my whole soul,—how all my feelings are fused into an overwhelming sense of gratitude, which I struggle in vain to express,—you would not wonder at my silence. What true nobility did it not require to take an enemy of your country into your own house, and nurse and treat him with such kindness as you have shown to me!"
Theodore was in the highest state of excitement, and again pressed his lips upon the lady's hand. She gently drew it from his clasp, and said, mildly: "But how excited you are! What would Doctor Heller say, were he to see you now? He would think that the fever, which during so many weeks sent the blood seething through your veins, had again seized upon you, and he would quickly withdraw his permission for you to leave your chamber. Away with all thoughts which could be injurious to your health! And now avail yourself of the Doctor's leave to take a stroll in the garden; your little nurse, to whom you owe much more than to me, shall accompany you."
"Ah, my little Ella!" cried Theodore, making an effort to appear more calm than he really was, "if you will be my guide, the garden, which as yet I have only seen from my windows, will seem to me doubly beautiful."