s to him."

Apollonie broke out into such lamentations and complaints after these
words that Maezli could not bear it.

"But he has the water long ago, Apollonie. I am sure Mr. Trius gave it
to him. Please don't go on so," she said a trifle impatiently. But this
was only oil poured on the flames.

"Yes, no one knows what he does and what he doesn't do," Apollonie
lamented, louder than ever. "The poor master is sick, and all his
servant does is to stumble about the place, not asking after his needs
and letting everything go to rack and ruin. Not a cabbage-head or a
pea-plant is to be seen. Not one strawberry or raspberry, no golden
apricots on the wall or a single little dainty peach. The disorder
everywhere is frightful. When I think how wonderfully it used to be
managed by the Baroness!" Apollonie kept on wiping her eyes because
present conditions worried her dreadfully. "You can't understand it,
Maezli," she continued, when she had calmed down a trifle. "You see,
child, I should be glad to give a finger of my right hand if I could go
up there one day a week in order to arrange things for the master as they
should be and fix the garden and the vegetables. The stuff the old
soldier is giving him to eat is perfectly horrid, I know."

Maezli hated to hear complaints, so she always looked for a remedy.

"You don't need to be so unhappy," she said. "Just cook some nice
milk-pudding for him and I'll take it up to him. Then he'll have
something good to eat, something much better than vegetables; oh, yes, a
thousand times better."

"You little innocent! Oh, when I think of forty years ago!" Apollonie
cried out, but she complained no further. Maezli's answers had clearly
given her the conviction that the child could not possibly understand the
difficult situation she was in.

Maezli chattered gaily by Apollonie's side, and as soon as she reached
home, wanted to tell her mother what had happened. But the child was to
have no opportunity for that day. The mother had been very careful in
keeping the contents of Miss Remke's letter from the children in order
not to spoil their last two weeks together. Unfortunately Bruno had that
day received a letter from Salo, in which he wrote that in ten days one
of the ladies was coming to fetch Leonore home, as she was completely
well. Salo remarked quite frankly that he himself hardly looked forward
to Leonore's coming, as he saw in each of her letters how happy she was
in Aunt Maxa'