e would like to send Fraeulein
Perini out of the house ten times every day, and ten times every day to
call her back again. There is no person, not even yourself, who is more
needful to her and more useful than Fraeulein Perini." The Professorin
longed to be out of the house, and she could find no adequate reason
for the deep hold which the desire had taken upon her. She had no
desire to be made the depositary of secrets, nor to solve riddles, and
yet she was incessantly occupied with the thought of the daughter of
the house. A child, a grownup girl, whom such a family abandoned,
perhaps this maiden was a charge for her; but how it was to be, she
could not perceive, and yet the thought would not leave her.

She wanted to question the Major, Clodwig, and Bella; and she would
even have liked to have recourse to Pranken, but Pranken had not been
visible for several weeks. She got Joseph to show her Manna's room one
day; and while there, it seemed to her as if the dear child were
calling her, and as if it were her duty to lend her a helping hand.

She wrote a letter to the Superior, informing her that she would pay
her a visit at the first opportunity.

CHAPTER XII.

FRAU PETRA.

When Sonnenkamp was alone in the garden, in the hot-houses, in the
work-room, or his seed-room, he wore perpetually a complacent,
triumphant smile, often congratulating himself upon his success in
making persons and circumstances play into his hands, ruling, bending,
and directing them, just as he did the fruit in the garden.

The refractoriness and the indolence of Frau Ceres were very
serviceable, at first, in lending to the whole establishment an air of
respectability. It gave the appearance of self-containedness, as if
there was no need of other people; as if there was everything in their
own circle, and what should be superadded to this would be received
graciously, but was not an absolute necessity. But this appearance of
seclusion soon became a sort of mysterious riddle, and excited
curiosity and scandal.

Sonnenkamp had foreseen this, but had not anticipated that this state
of feeling would last so long. The shyness and reserve of the dwellers
in the vicinity in forming any intimate relations with him, and their
failure to visit him on familiar terms, gradually disturbed him. This
distance must not be allowed to have too much weight, it had better not
be noticed; an