Page:Edward Prime-Stevenson - The Intersexes.djvu/330

 humour. The susceptible Professor falls in love at sight with the boy! The lad's sister vanishes from his heart, a dream in which he no longer has any interest. The boy-loving moiety of his nature reacts. Little by little, he succeeds in explaining to young Ferdinand the outward tangle of coincidences that has so excited and angered the lad. The Professor's charm of manner, his evident sincerity, captivate Ferdinand, as they have done so many other youth. From suspicion and wrath Ferdinand's frank, impressionable heart is caught; a fervent peace is sworn. The story ends with their expecting to settle down together as tutor and pupil, for the fair Ottilie marries Leopold. Professor Fridolin is more than consoled for his superficial "loss";—with his Ferdinand in his arms. The story is extremely amusing, farcically droll in places, but subtly philosophic—a small chef d'œuvre in its kind. Here is the conclusion of the meeting between Fridolin and Ferdinand, with Fridolin's running fire of soliloquy, comment and tactful open-heartedness with the lad who stands before him in subsiding wrath:

"… (Ottilie as a boy!—the most interesting boy that I ever saw in my life!) … Have a little patience, for once, please … (how becoming his bad temper is to him!) … and be so kind as to tell me in a couple of words just what has really happened … (Yes, he has just exactly the same nose as hers!—how captivating such a male Ottilie is—that saucy way of speaking to me! When he looks in that way at me, he has just such eyes as his sister's—such brown eyes!) … Where I have been to blame, my dear young man, why. of all that later; the business now is to discover this lost sister of yours … (He smiles a little—he smiles like her, too! Oh, what a smile he has! Yes, he smiles more charmingly than his sister.) … You really won't have anything to eat? Well then, we must at least drink together, and out of this green glass here, Mr. Ferdinand. You allow me, an old professor [Fridolin was in his thirties!] to call you by your first name? (He nods, he smiles again! That fine-bred expression of his face!) … There—the sound of the wine in this glass in my notion belongs to the most charming sounds in all Nature—just like the lingering, caressing sigh of a first kiss—"