"But this merry mood of his did not last. Next day he grew quiet and thoughtful, avoided all my questions, and shut himself up in his room at an unusually early hour; and then I heard him playing the flute for ever so long after. He could not get this girl out of his head--I saw that. At first he had felt no more than a pleasant smart, as it were, and could joke about it; but the fever followed. He could not hold out four-and-twenty hours, but he ordered his horse and rode out alone, returning at night quite cast down. It was plain that he had not seen his flame, and had been too shy to find her out and pay her a visit. And so he rode to X several times over, with more or less good luck. One night, when his heart was full, he could not refrain from telling me his adventure, as I was lighting him upstairs to bed. His face was radiant; but Good Lord! to any other man, it would not have been worth the telling; Count Henry would only have said, 'Pshaw!'--but to him it was a rare delight. Just at the gates he had met her, out walking with two of her young companions, and all three of them had roses in their hands. Just as he rode by, and bowed, his horse had given a jump, and the young lady had been so startled that she dropped a rose: 'I saw it,' said Master Ernest, 'and in a moment I was out of my saddle, and had picked it up and given it her; and she thanked me very kindly, and walked away towards the woods.'"
"'And you rode on, and the lady did not even give you a rose for your reward? Any other man would have picked up the flower, and stuck it in his buttonhole, and galloped off in triumph.'
"He looked at me, and seemed quite struck; 'Flor,' says he; 'I do believe you know more of these things than I, although you are a woman.'
"'More likely, because I am a woman. Master Ernest,' I said. 'Well, well, I see, the young lady is badly off for mother-wit, or else she can't abide you.'
"Of course I was only joking; for how could I think the girl existed who would not like him? But for all that, it made him silent, and I saw that he really thought she did dislike him.
"Only once again did he ride over to X, and after that he stayed at home, and was quite downhearted; he spoke to nobody, but sat in his room writing--verses, as I believe,--and played the flute, and pined away so, that when Count Henry came back, he was quite angry about his looks, and scolded him, and told him he did not take exercise enough, and he asked me if Count Ernest had been ailing? That he had a heartache I did not like to say--he never would have forgiven me, and Count Henry would have laughed. At last it was decided that our young count was to travel for a time with Mr. Leclerc, and both of them seemed to like the plan. 'Flor,' said my boy, 'it is well that I leave this place. Life is become wearisome to me.'
"'God bless you, my dearest boy,' I said; 'the world is so beautiful, they say, that I suppose one can't long be sad in travelling.'
"He looked at me with an unbelieving smile; but afterwards he wrote to me from Vienna, that he was well, and often thought of me. God knows! I thought of him, day and night.
"I did not get a sight of him again for three long years, and when he wrote to me from the great cities where he went to court, among all the fine folks--he will get properly spoiled, I thought, as befits his rank. I shall not know him again. But just the contrary; when he came back at last in his twentieth year, without Mr. Leclerc, who had died in Russia of the climate, the very first word he spoke: 'Flor,' says he, 'and how is Miss Mimi?'--That was a cat I had, Sir, of whom he used to be almost jealous, as a child.
"'Returns thanks for kind enquiries. Master Ernest,' I said; 'she has just kittened, and will be delighted, as we all are, to see your honour back again.'