"I don't know. She didn't say anything. But I think that perhaps she saw him."
"That is so. That's it. I know about that.... But now shut the window and draw down the blinds.... Some people believe in camphor and Hoffmann's drops, but camphor is so weakening and is really only fit for moths. No, dear Frau Nimptsch, nature must help itself, and especially when one is so young, and so I believe in sweating. But thoroughly. And what makes all the trouble? The men. And yet we need them and must have them.... There, her color is coming back."
"Hadn't we better send for a doctor?"
"Heaven forbid! They are all out going their rounds now and before one of them would get here she might die and come to life again three times over."
[CHAPTER XVII]
Two and a half years had passed since this meeting, during which time many things had changed in our circle of friends and acquaintances, but not among those of the Landgrafenstrasse.
The same good humor continued there, the gayety of the honeymoon still remained, and Katherine continued to laugh as of old. What might perhaps have troubled other young women, that they had no children, did not disturb Katherine for a moment. She enjoyed life so much and found such complete satisfaction in dressing and small-talk, in riding and driving, that she shrank from any change in her way of life rather than desired it. The feeling for family life, to say nothing of any real longing for it, had not yet awakened in her and when her mother made some remark in a letter about such matters, Katherine answered somewhat heretically: "Don't trouble yourself, mamma. Botho's brother has just become engaged, and in six months he will be married and I shall gladly leave to my future sister-in-law the care of providing for the continuance of the house of Rienäcker."
Botho did not take exactly this view, but even his happiness was not seriously disturbed by the lack of children, and if from time to time he had a discontented mood, it was chiefly because, as he had already found out on his wedding journey to Dresden, he could perhaps talk somewhat reasonably with Katherine, but any really serious speech with her was wholly out of the question. She was talkative and sometimes even had bright ideas, but the best things she ever said were but superficial and trivial, as if she were unable to distinguish between important and unimportant things. And what was the worst of all, she considered all this as a merit, and plumed herself on it, and never thought of correcting the habit. "But, Katherine, Katherine," Botho would exclaim sometimes, and the tone of his voice would show some displeasure, but her happy nature could always disarm him again, so completely, indeed, that his own expectations seemed almost pedantic to him.
Lena with her simplicity, genuineness, and directness of speech often recurred to his mind, but vanished again as quickly; and only when chance recalled some special incident very vividly did her image come to him with greater distinctness, and perhaps a stronger feeling with which some embarrassment was mingled.
Such an incident happened during the first summer, when the young couple, who had returned from dining with Count Alten, were sitting on the balcony taking tea. Katherine was leaning back in her chair listening to a newspaper article which was profusely interspersed with figures, and dealt with the subject of minister's salaries and surplice fees. She actually understood very little of the subject, and all the less because the many figures troubled her, but she listened rather attentively, because all the young girls of her province spend half their youth "with the minister" and so they retain a certain sympathy with the affairs of the parsonage. This was the case to-day. Finally evening came on and just as it was growing dark the concert at the Zoological Garden began and the tones of a ravishing Strauss Waltz reached them.