Lilly, completely dazed, stared at the doorway, which a moment before had framed his figure.
She wanted to cry out and plead, "Stay here! Come back!" But she heard the door on the other side of the hall fall shut, and everything was over.
She crouched at the window-sill indulging in speculations of what _might_ have taken place if he had happened to remain.
About quarter of an hour later the bell rang again.
He begged pardon; he had forgotten his umbrella.
"This time you don't slip away!" something within her cried.
He caught up his soaking umbrella, which she had failed to notice despite the shining puddle which was crawling along the crack between two floor boards, and was about to escape again, when Lilly essayed:
"Life is made so hard for us, you have no idea how hard."
He went on to tell about the speeches they had to deliver offhand on a subject sprung on them without warning, regardless of whether or not the students had prepared the theme. But this time they had gotten wind of the surprise in store--the next day in literature class they would be required to give a comprehensive view of Rückert. That was why he would have to glance over the poems once again to find out exactly who had been buried in the three graves at Ottensen.
_She_ could help him--she, the low-flying sparrow, could help _him_, the soaring heaven-dweller.
She timorously related the story of the poor, defeated count of Brunswick and Klopstock, the pious bard of "The Messiah." The only thing she had forgotten was who the twelve hundred exiles were who lay in the first of the graves.
He seemed unwilling to believe in this unexpected good fortune. Was she sure of what she said? That about Klopstock was correct; he knew it from the tables of his history of literature. But the rest of it? Oppressed by grave doubts he shook his triumphant mane.
Lilly eagerly allayed his fears. To be sure, it was more than a year since she had heard of those lovely things, but she had a good memory, and would certainly not misinform him lightly.
At last he seemed relieved. He drew a deep breath, and observed, with his mind bent more upon general matters:
Once embarked on the current of open talk, he went on to offer his views concerning the other difficulties of human life. Mathematics was all right; in fact, he had done very well in analytic geometry. But history and the languages, and above all, German composition! A fellow was sometimes driven to despair by the wretched state of things in this world.