"Certainly," answered Marie; "you should have heard how the old man swore yesterday, when the confederates entered! Well, he is devoted to his Duke, heart and soul, so he may go, with all my heart. As soon as war is declared, he intends taking his departure with her."
Herr Dieterick appeared very thoughtful; he rested his head upon his hand, and listened to his cousin in silence.
"And only think," she continued, "yesterday, after the entrance of the leaguists into the town, she wept more than ever. You know she was always serious and melancholy; but as if that circumstance were to decide the fate of the war, she is now quite disconsolate, I don't believe it is the idea of leaving Ulm that affects her; but I suspect," she added, mysteriously, "she has some secret attachment at heart."
"Yes, I have long remarked that," sighed Herr Dieterick; "but how can I help it?"
"You! how can you help it?" laughed Marie, all signs of sorrow on Bertha's account vanishing from her face at these words. "No, indeed, you need not flatter yourself that you are the cause of her suffering. She was in this state long before you ever saw her."
The worthy secretary was very much put out by this assurance. He thought in his heart that a farewell from him was the real cause of Bertha's state, and her care-worn countenance at this moment almost regained the preponderance in his changeable heart. Marie went on to deride his conceitedness, when all of a sudden he recollected the main object of his visit, which he had lost sight of during the conversation. Marie sprang up with a scream of joy, as her cousin imparted to her the news of the ball.
"Bertha, Bertha!" she cried out, at the height of her voice, so that her cousin, startled, and fearing lest some accident had happened, hastened to her assistance. But before she had scarcely had time to enter the room, Marie said again, "Bertha, a ball at the town-hall this evening!"
This news was a happy surprise to her also. "When? are the strangers invited also?" were her rapid questions, whilst a deep red covered her cheeks, and a ray of joy shot from her sorrowful eyes, scarcely able to contain their tears.
Marie and her cousin Kraft were both astonished at Bertha's rapid change from depression of spirits to sudden joy, and Dieterick could not help remarking, that he supposed she must be passionately fond of dancing. But he was equally mistaken in this instance, as he was when he mistook Albert von Sturmfeder for a connoisseur of wine.
Herr Kraft, supposing his cousins would now wish to occupy themselves with the important preparation of dress, rather than listen to anything else he might have to say, took his departure, to fulfil the rest of his weighty duties. He hastened to give the requisite orders, and to invite, in person, the principal guests, and higher families. He was received everywhere as the messenger of good news; for tradition says, that the pleasure of dancing is not the passion of the present day only.