"Ach!" he snapped with a sudden change of countenance. "I shall be von more name and date to make harter t'e student's lessons and longer t'e tables--t'at is gratitude! Vit' t'e vorld we haf at present no concern. For t'is, indeed, you bless me--t'at I am not a quack to make public an incomplete discofery, for ot'er quacks to do mischief. You are glad t'at it is vit' you alone I concern myself. But you are not grateful; you are happy because I say t'at you shall be yet more beautiful; t'at is not gratitude. You might--"
At the eager shrillness of his voice I drew a step away.
"Indeed I'm grateful, whether you believe it or not!" I cried. "You think all women so selfish! Of course I'm glad that I alone am in the secret, but you proposed it yourself, and I rejoice as much as you do that some day--by and by--other women will be happy as I am happy--"
"Yes--by and by! You emphasize t'at," he snapped mockingly, but then he recovered himself and his queer new deference. "And you haf t'e right; I vish you to rechoice in your own lofeliness. Ve haf engaged toget'er in t'is great vork, and it is vell t'at we bot' haf our revards--I t'at I aggomblish somet'ing for t'e benefit of my kind, and you--since vomen cannot lofe t'eir kind, but only intifiduals--you haf t'e happy lofe t'at is necessary to a voman."
His eyes rested on my ring.
I couldn't tell him--proud as I am of it--that John had loved me before I ever heard of the Bacillus. But I could punish his gibes.
"Oh, by the way--I'm not coming to-morrow," I said. "My Aunt is to give a tea."
Strange to see him struggle with his disappointment like a grieving child! But he bravely rallied.
"T'at is goot," he said, "you shall tell me v'at people t'ink of you. You vish to go about--to be admired; you vish to gif up science; not so?"
"Oh, no! I couldn't be a doll, for men to look at and then tire of me. I must study the harder--to be worthy--"
The look of his face, of the thin, straight-lipped mouth, the keen old eyes, stopped me.
"You vill not gif up study now, at least," he sneered; "not until you haf t'e perfect beauty. You haf need of me."
Prof. Darmstetter is so irritating! Why, he has just as much need of me! He himself said I was the best subject he could find for the experiment. But even if he had finished his work with the Bacillus, he'd rather teach me, a despised woman, all the science I could master than develop the budding talent of the brightest Columbia boy. The sight of my beauty is a joy to him. Really, I pity the poor man. He makes the great discovery when he's himself too old to profit by it; the Bacillus will not work against Nature. It has brought him only a hopeless longing-But I shall study. He shall see! Not in the laboratory, of course; that is hardly fitting now. I wouldn't go there again except for the lure of promised beauty--can more loveliness be possible? But I do feel the responsibility of beauty. The wisest and best will crowd about me, and they must find my words worthy the lips that shape them and the voice that utters. And I shall learn from their wisdom.