ofessor said nothing more. As though Othomar were a child, he went
on helping him, washed his ear, his neck, his hands, with a mother's
gentleness. Then he made him lie down in bed, covered him over, tidying
the room like a servant. Then he went and sat by the bed, where Othomar
lay staring with strange, wide-open eyes: he took the prince's hand and
sat thus for a long time, looking softly down upon him. The light
behind, turned down low, threw Barzia's large head into the shadow and
just glanced upon his bald cranium, from which a few grey locks hung
down his neck. At last he said, gently:

"Your highness wishes to get well, do you not?"

"Yes," said Othomar, in spite of himself.

"How does your highness propose to do so?" asked the professor.

The prince did not answer.

"Doesn't your highness know? Then you must think it over. But you must
keep very calm, will you not, very calm...."

And he stroked Othomar's hand with a gentle, regular motion, as though
anointing it with balsam.

"For your highness must never again give way to nervous attacks. Your
highness must study how to prevent them. I am giving your highness much
to think about," continued Barzia, with a smile. "I am doing this
because I want to let your highness think of other things than of what
you are thinking. I want to clear your brain for you. Are you tired and
do you want to go to sleep, or shall I go on talking?"

"Yes, go on," whispered the prince.

"There are days of great grief in store for the Imperial," the doctor
resumed, gently. "Your highness must think of those days without
permitting yourself to be overcome by the grief of them.... The little
prince will probably not recover, highness. Will you think of that ...
and think of your parents, their poor majesties? There are days like
these for a nation, or for a single family, in which grief seems to pile
itself up. For does not this day, this night seem to mark the end of
your race, my prince?... Lie still, lie still, don't move: let me talk
on, like a garrulous old man.... Does your highness know that the
emperor to-day, for the first time in his whole life, cried, sobbed? His
younger son is dying. Between this boy and the father is a first-born
son, who is very, very ill.... Is not all this the end?"

"Yet, if God wills it so," whispered Othomar.

"It is our duty to be resigned," said Barzia. "But does God will it so?"

"Who can tell?..."

"Ask yourself, but not now, highness: