Ella, especially, made him many reproaches, for he had promised her to be very gay; she beset him unceasingly with her sympathizing questions, to which he usually returned no answer.
"Are you ill again?" she asked one day, after having exhausted all possible conjectures, to which a dry "No" had been the sole response.
"Ah, yes indeed! ill, ill!" replied Theodore, so quickly that one might easily see how glad he was to have found any explanation for his strange conduct. "Yes, dear Ella, believe me, I am indeed ill. But leave me now. I shall soon be better."
The deep sigh which accompanied these words betrayed that he himself placed no confidence in his improvement. From this time forward the child persecuted Doctor Heller with prayers to make her poor Theodore well again. The Doctor felt the young man's pulse, and, after a significant shake of the head, he ordered him a quantity of bitter drugs, which the patient regularly threw out of the window. The physician, however, remarked, after a few days, that his medicine had done wonders, and Theodore already looked much better; an opinion in which Ella and her mother did not coincide.
CHAPTER III.
THE VISIT.
Early in the spring, Madame von Herbart had received an invitation from Madame von Carly, a friend of her youth, who owned a beautiful country-seat several miles distant from the city, to bring Ella, and spend a few days with her in the country. Madame von Herbart had declined the invitation, because she was averse to leaving her home and her aged father, who, during her absence, would be entirely alone. In the month of October, when but few fine days could still be hoped for, Madame von Carly came herself to the city, to carry away her friend, and would listen to no excuses.
"You must go with me, Maria," she said; "there is no use to say anything; I will dine with you, and immediately after dinner you will drive out with me. Here, Ella! come here, my child! How tall you grow! And always in your little white dresses! They would look well upon my children! I believe five minutes would be long enough to change them into many-colored garments. Come now, talk a little; you are as dumb as a fish!" She continued, rapidly: "Will you not be glad to go to Sergow, and see my Louisa, and Freddy, and William? Both the wild boys long to see you; they call you always their white rose, and made me solemnly promise not to return without you."