The Geheimrath was up in a moment; without losing time by a single word, he dressed himself, mounted the groom's horse, and rushed off to the scene of the disaster.
Before the door of the house, awaiting his arrival, stood the village barber-surgeon, who received him with the deepest reverence. "Herr Geheimrath, I pray you to excuse me,--but, as I knew you were in the neighbourhood, I conceived it my duty to entreat your assistance before sending for the physician, who lives three leagues off. The case seems to me a serious one."
"Never excuse yourself," said Heim, taking off his hat and coat in the hall; "it is my duty to aid wherever I can. But, in Heaven's name, how did it happen? Where is the child injured?"
"She has a wound in her head, and I fear the skull is fractured," replied the barber, opening the door of the room leading to Hartwich's apartment. The Geheimrath heard a loud sobbing as soon as the door was opened. He entered, and before him lay the invalid, weeping and wailing like a maniac, with the child stretched out stiff and corpse-like upon the bed; her eyes were closed and deep-sunk in their large sockets; her pale lips were slightly parted,--it was a sorry sight. Hartwich supported her bandaged head upon his arm, and, weeping loudly, pressed kiss after kiss upon her white brow.
"Ah, Herr Geheimrath!" he shrieked, "come here! I am a wicked, miserable father. I have killed my child! I am a man given over to the worst of all vices,--drunkenness; it is my only excuse. Accuse me; have me sent, crippled as I am, to jail,--I care not; but bring my child to life, or the sting of conscience will drive me mad!"
The Geheimrath took the passive hand of the child and felt the pulse. "It is greatly to be regretted that your conscience was not as active before the deed as it appears to be now that it is committed," he said coldly and sternly, as he removed the bandage from the child's head.
"Oh, oh," wailed Hartwich, shutting his eyes, "do not do that here! I cannot see the blood; I cannot see the wound; it will kill me!"
"What! you could make the wound and cannot look at it!" said the Geheimrath inexorably, beginning to probe the wound. "It is a most serious case," he said. "Has the child moved at all?"
"Yes, yes; oh, heavens, yes; until she grew so rigid!" gasped Hartwich, seizing Ernestine's hand to kiss it. Then he looked up at the physician in mortal terror. "How is it? must she--oh, Christ! must she die?" And again he broke out into the loud childish weeping peculiar to persons unnerved by sickness or drink.
"Control yourself," ordered the Geheimrath. "I cannot come to any decision yet. The injury to the skull is not fatal; what the effect of the concussion will be, I cannot tell. But, with the child's delicate constitution----" He shrugged his shoulders.