When she was a fairy,
Ulrich was obliged to be a magician; if she was the queen, he was king.

When, to give vent to his animal spirits, Ulrich played with the
Richtberg boys, he always led them, but allowed himself to be guided by
little Ruth. He knew that the doctor was a despised Jew, that she was a
Jewish child; but his father honored the Hebrew, and the foreign
atmosphere, the aristocratic, secluded repose that pervaded the solitary
scholar's house, exerted a strange influence over him.

When he entered it, a thrill ran through his frame; it seemed as if he
were penetrating into some forbidden sanctuary. He was the only one of
all his playfellows, who was permitted to cross this threshold, and he
felt it as a distinction, for, in spite of his youth, he realized that
the quiet doctor, who knew everything that existed in heaven and on
earth, and yet was as mild and gentle as a child, stood far, far above
the miserable drudges, who struggled with sinewy hands for mere existence
on the Richtberg. He expected everything from him, and Ruth also seemed a
very unusual creature, a delicate work of art, with whom he, and he only,
was allowed to play.

It might have happened, that when irritated he would upbraid her with
being a wretched Jewess, but it would scarcely have surprised him, if she
had suddenly stood before his eyes as a princess or a phoenix.

When the Richtberg lay close beneath them, Ruth sat down on a stone,
placing her flowers in her lap. Ulrich threw his in too, and, as the
bouquet grew, she held it towards him, and he thought it very pretty; but
she said, sighing:

"I wish roses grew in the forest; not common hedge-roses, but like those
in Portugal--full, red, and with the real perfume. There is nothing that
smells sweeter."

So it always was with the pair. Ruth far outstripped Ulrich in her
desires and wants, thus luring him to follow her.

"A rose!" repeated Ulrich. "How astonished you look!"

Her wish reminded him of the magic word she had mentioned the day before,
and they talked about it all the way home, Ulrich saying that he had
waked three times in the night on account of it. Ruth eagerly interrupted
him, exclaiming:

"I thought of it again too, and if any one would tell the what it was, I
should know what to wish now. I would not have a single human being in
the world except you and me, and my father and mother."

"And my little mother!" added Ulrich, earnestly.

"And your father, too!