"Improve me, my friend!" he sighed with a comical pathos in his look and tone. "In case you should ever want a faithful husband, let me warn you to beware of doctors in choosing one. We really ought to take a vow of celibacy, like the Catholic priests. The man to whom you confess, must be either a stone or a saint, to escape the contagion of your sins. And yet I'd rather listen to the symptoms of an ailing heart, than hear of a contusion on the knee. Why do you move away from me?"
"Because you're a very frivolous fellow and have had too much champagne. Besides, it's late."
"Too late--to go. I left word at home that my servant needn't expect me. As I fortunately have no wife, I'll for once be as comfortable as other married men and sleep for one night without being disturbed by domestic troubles or by other people's. Here I'm no doctor, here I'm a man and may be permitted to act like one." He threw away his cigar and tenderly approaching the young girl, took both hands in his and swung them to and fro.
At this moment Adèle's maid entered, holding a card in her hand. "The gentleman's in the ante-room and earnestly begs to see the Herr Doctor."
"Tell him he may go--Why did you say I was here?"
"He didn't ask me. He gave me the card at once, in spite of my denial--"
"Mohr! Good Heavens, what brings him here at this hour! If Balder--excuse me, Adèle, but I must see what the trouble is." He rushed out of the door so hastily, that he upset the basket in which Adèle's little terrier was quietly sleeping. While she tried to still the loud barking of the frightened animal, Marquard had hurried into the ante-room with the question about Balder on his lips.
"I believe all is going on well at the tun," said Mohr. "But you must come with me at once: some one has met with an accident--we've not a moment to lose."
"Holloa, my friend!" replied Marquard, suddenly relapsing into his usual indifferent tone. "If that's all, four houses beyond, on the right hand side as you go out of the door, lives a very worthy colleague of mine, who has little practice as yet and probably will be more inclined at this moment to obey your philanthropic summons--"
"You'll come with me, Marquard," said Mohr in a hollow voice, which trembled with a terrible anxiety. "Christiane has drowned herself; we've just taken her out of the river; God only knows whether it's not already too late--" He tottered as he wearily gasped out the words; his powerful frame seemed ready to sink, yet he did not take the chair Marquard pushed toward him.