Monsieur Maurice | Page 6

and how the ornamental part thereof had been of my choosing.
"I don't know who the ladies are," I said, referring to the portraits. "I only chose them for their pretty faces."
"Their lovers probably did the same, petite, a hundred years ago," replied Monsieur Maurice. "And the clock--did you choose that also?"
"Yes; but the clock doesn't go."
"So much the better. I would that time might stand still also--till I am free! till I am free!"
The tears rushed to my eyes. It was the tone more than the words that touched my heart. He stooped and kissed me on the forehead.
"Come to the window, little one," said he, "and I will show you something very beautiful. Do you know what this is?"
"A telescope!"
"No; a solar microscope. Now look down into this tube, and tell me what you see. A piece of Persian carpet? No--a butterfly's wing magnified hundreds and hundreds of times. And this which looks like an aigrette of jewels? Will you believe that it is just the tiny plume which waves on the head of every little gnat that buzzes round you on a Summer's evening?"
I uttered exclamation after exclamation of delight. Every fresh object seemed more wonderful and beautiful than the last, and I felt as if I could go on looking down that magic tube for ever. Meanwhile Monsieur Maurice, whose good-nature was at least as inexhaustible as my curiosity, went on changing the slides till we had gone through a whole boxfull.
By this time it was getting rapidly dusk, and I could see no longer.
"You will show me some more another day?" said I, giving up reluctantly.
"That I will, petite, I have at least a dozen more boxes full of slides."
"And--and you said I should see your sketches, Monsieur Maurice."
"All in good time, little Gretchen," he said, smiling. "All in good time. See--those are the sketches, in yonder folio; that mahogany case under the couch contains a collection of gems in glass and paste; those red books in the bookcase are full of pictures. You shall see them all by degrees; but only by degrees. For if I did not keep something back to tempt my little guest, she would not care to visit the solitary prisoner."
I felt myself colour crimson.
"But--but indeed I would care to come, Monsieur Maurice, if you had nothing at all to show me," I said, half hurt, half angry.
He gave me a strange look that I could not understand, and stroked my hair caressingly.
"Come often, then, little one," he said. "Come very often; and when we are tired of pictures and microscopes, we will sit upon the floor, and tell sad stories of the deaths of kings."
Then, seeing my look puzzled, he laughed and added:--
"'Tis a great English poet says that, Gretchen, in one of his plays."
Here a shrill trumpet-call in the court-yard, followed by the prolonged roll of many drums, warned me that evening parade was called, and that as soon as it was over my father would be home and looking for me. So I started up, and put out my hand to say good-bye.
Monsieur Maurice took it between both his own.
"I don't like parting from you so soon, little M?dchen," he said. "Will you come again to-morrow?"
"Every day, if you like!" I replied eagerly.
"Then every day it shall be; and--let me see--you shall improve my bad German, and I will teach you French."
I could have clapped my hands for joy. I was longing to learn French, and I knew how much it would also please my father; so I thanked Monsieur Maurice again and again, and ran home with a light heart to tell of all the wonders I had seen.

4
From this time forth, I saw him always once, and sometimes twice a day--in the afternoons, when he regularly gave me the promised French lesson; and occasionally in the mornings, provided the weather was neither too cold nor too damp for him to join me in the grounds. For Monsieur Maurice was not strong. He could not with impunity face snow, and rain, and our keen Rhenish north-east winds; and it was only when the wintry sun shone out at noon and the air came tempered from the south, that he dared venture from his own fire-side. When, however, there shone a sunny day, with what delight I used to summon him for a walk, take him to my favourite points of view, and show him the woodland nooks that had been my chosen haunts in summer! Then, too, the unwonted colour would come back to his pale cheek, and the smile to his lips, and while the ramble and the sunshine lasted he would be all jest and gaiety, pelting me with dead leaves, chasing me in and out of the plantations, and telling me strange stories, half