"Is it possible? And why?"
"Did you ever know old Blue-coat to give any 'why'? And did you ever ask him 'But why, father?' He didn't say so, but I know why it has to come to an end with me and Beate. I've been expecting it the whole week; whenever he raised his hand I thought he was pointing to the little garden and was ready to follow him like a poor sinner. That is the place where he gives his cabinet orders. The collector is said not to be in very good circumstances. There is some gossip about his spending more than his pay. And—well, you are a quill-driver, too, like old Blue-coat. But what can the girl do? Or I? Well, the affair must stop—but I'm sorry about the girl, and I must see how I can forget her. I must drink or get another one."
Our hero was accustomed to his brother's manner; he knew that the words were not intended to be as wild as they sounded, and his brother was showing his love and respect for their father by the fact of his obedience; still our hero would have liked to see them shown in speech as well as in action. It seemed to Apollonius as if there were something unclean on his brother's soul and involuntarily he stroked the other's coat collar several times with his hand as if he could brush it off him from outside. Dust had collected on the collar during the dance; when he had removed it he felt as if he had really removed what had troubled him.
The subject of their conversation changed. They began to speak of the girl who had just been out, fanning herself to get cool; Apollonius certainly did not know that he was responsible for this. Just as the girl was the goal to which all his lines of thought led, so, too, when once he began to speak of her he could not escape from his theme. He forgot his brother so completely that at last he was really talking to himself. His brother now seemed for the first time to perceive all the beautiful and good things in her that the hero lauded with unconscious eloquence. He agreed with more and more enthusiasm until he broke into a wild laugh which roused the hero from his self-forgetfulness and dyed his cheeks as red as those of the girl had been a short time before.
"And so you slink about round the hall where she is dancing with others, and if she shows herself you haven't the heart to draw her into conversation. Wait, I will be your ambassador. From now on she shall dance no turn except with me, so that no one else shall cross your plans. I know how to get on with girls. Let me take your part for you."
Our hero was frightened at the thought that the girl should learn that very day what he felt for her. Besides, he was ashamed of his own embarrassed and awkward behavior to her, and of what she must think of him when she knew that he needed a mediator. He had already raised his hand to stop his brother when the appearance of the girl herself caused everything else to grow dark to him. Quietly and alone, as before, she stepped out of the door. Beneath the scarf with which she had fanned herself she seemed to glance furtively about her. Again he saw her cheeks grow redder. Had she seen him? But she turned her face in the opposite direction. She seemed to be looking for something in the grass in front of her. He saw her pick a little flower, lay it on a bench and, after she had stood for a time as if in doubt whether she should pick it up again or not, with quick decision turn again to the door. A half involuntary movement of her arm seemed to tell him to take it, that it was picked for him. Once more a wave of red rushed up over her face to her dark brown hair, and the haste with which she disappeared in the door seemed intended to prevent a regret which might give rise to anxiety as to how her conduct would be understood.
The brother, who seemed not to have noticed anything of all this, had continued to speak in his lively, vehement fashion; his words were lost; our hero would have had to have had two lives in order to hear them, for all the one he possessed was in his eyes. Now he saw his brother rushing away toward the hall. He thought of detaining him, but it was too late. In vain he hurried after him up to the door. There the flower absorbed him again which the girl had left lying for some finder, for a happy one, if he found it for whom it was intended. And while his lips continued to call softly and mechanically to his brother, who no longer heard him, to keep silence, he was inwardly asking himself: "Was it really I for whom she laid the flower here? Did she lay it here for any one?" His heart answered both questions with a happy "Yes," while at the same time the thing that his brother intended to do troubled him.
If it was a sign of love from her and for him, then it was the last.
Twice he glanced surreptitiously into the hall when the door was opened; he saw her dancing with his brother and then, when they were resting after the dance, he saw his brother talking persuasively to her in his hasty way. "Now he is talking of me," he thought, his whole face burning. He rushed into the shade of the bushes when she left the hall. His brother took her home. He followed them at as great a distance as he thought necessary to prevent her seeing him. When his brother came back from accompanying her he stepped away from the door. He felt naked with shame. His brother had noticed him nevertheless. He said: "She won't hear of you yet; I don't know whether she means it, or whether it is just airs. I shall meet her again. No tree falls at one stroke. But I must confess, you have good taste. I don't know where my eyes have been up to now. She's away ahead of Beate; and that's saying a good deal!"
From then on his brother had danced untiringly with Walter's Christiane and spoken for Apollonius and always, after he had taken her home, he came and gave our hero an account of his efforts on his behalf. For a long time he was uncertain whether it was only affectation, or whether she really looked with disfavor on our hero. He repeated conscientiously what he had said in our hero's praise, and how she had answered his questions and assurances. He still had hope after our hero had already given it up. And her behavior toward the latter would have compelled him to realize that he could expect no return of his affection, even if he had not known what answers she gave his brother. She avoided him wherever she saw him as assiduously as she had formerly seemed to seek him. And had it really been he whom she had sought before, if indeed she had sought any one?