Chapter III: The Count's Visit

SERVICE-TIME found the little church of Nonnenwald filled to its utmost capacity, which was not very great, so that some of the men had to sit on the step of the pulpit or find an uneasy perch on the two or three altar-shaped tomb; which made the small space within the walls still smaller. All the country-people came to church, for the tidings of the wolf-hunt had spread far and wide, and every one wished to hear the news and discuss the capture. There was some staring when Gertrude Reinhart in her deep mourning-veil entered the seat which she had not occupied for four years, and more when the counts Maurice and Victor came in and sat down in the pastor's pew. But the staring was nothing to that which ensued when Brother Gotthold, the Moravian missionary, ascended the pulpit in place of the old Lutheran pastor. Such a thing had never happened before during all the fifty years of Doctor Martin Fisher's pastorate.

In a few words Brother Gotthold explained the matter:

"Your respected pastor, I regret to say, is too ill this morning to leave the house; and as it seemed a pity to dismiss the congregation without a discourse, he has asked me to fill his place, which I shall do as well as I am able."

"He may well say that," whispered the schoolmaster to the shoemaker. "I say it is a scandal for a wandering preacher to be asked into the pulpit when there are those in the parish who could fill it with some credit. I don't know what the consistory will say, for my part. It is just an offshoot of French infidelity—that's what it is."

The shoemaker made a motion with his head which might pass either for a nod or a shake, and turned away. He did not care to engage in a whispering conversation under the bright, earnest eyes which looked down from the pulpit. Herr Franck drew himself up with offended dignity, took a large pinch of snuff, and prepared himself to be critical in respect to style and watchful for unsound doctrine.

Nobody else cared to be critical. Brother Gotthold was well known through all the neighbourhood, and a good many glances of congratulation were exchanged. Even Herr Franck could find no fault with the way he went through the opening services. He took for his text the first verses of the fourteenth chapter of John.

"Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me.

"In my Father's house are many mansions. I go to prepare a place for
you."

The discourse was so simple that little Gustaf could understand every word, but it held the attention of the listeners wonderfully. Fat old Farmer Fuchstein, who had regularly slept through every sermon he had attended for over thirty years, kept wide awake all through, and wiped his eyes more than once. The sermon was upon the consolations of the gospel for the bereaved, for the suffering, for the penitent. Many a head was bowed and many an eye dim with tears as the preacher alluded tenderly to those whose friends were far away across the sea; and when he reminded his hearers that the eternal rest was as near in America as in Germany, and that no man could go beyond the reach of his Father's love and protection, there was a universal burst of sobs. Count Maurice himself listened with evident and deep interest; and as for Count Victor, he never took his eyes from the preacher's face. There was a general sigh when the sermon was concluded and the people gathered in the churchyard.

"Call that a sermon?" said Herr Franck. "Where was the deep divinity, the Greek and Latin, and the fine, long, rolling sentences of our doctor? Why, a child could understand every word. I dare say even silly Hans knows what it was about.—Here, Hans, tell me what the minister talked about."

"About heaven," answered the simpleton readily—"the good place where the angels live and there are no schoolmasters."

"Good boy!" exclaimed Farmer Fuchstein, with a great laugh. "But why dost thou think there are no schoolmasters in heaven, Hans?"

"Because nobody cries there," answered Hans. "The preacher says so."

Another laugh followed, and the schoolmaster stalked away greatly offended.

"Such a sermon as 'I' could have given them!" he said to himself. "And nobody so much as thinks of me—not even the pastor. 'Tis an ungrateful world. Not one of these lads but I have whipped all through the alphabet, and yet they are all ready to grin when I am laughed at. But we shall see what the consistory will say."

Count Maurice and his brother walked away arm in arm as usual, but in silence, which was not usual, since Maurice commonly talked for himself and his brother too.

At last Victor said, with a deep sigh,—

"Maurice, I would give all I have in the world to believe what that man said this morning."

"And I would give it for you if such a belief would be a comfort to you. But, Victor, why not find out the preacher and talk with him?"

"I have talked with so many, and they never did me any good," said Victor.

"I don't remember ever seeing you study the Bible for yourself," said Maurice, simply.

Victor turned an inquiring look on his brother.

"Study the Bible?" he repeated.

"Why, yes. When you wished to learn mathematics, you did not content yourself with talking to professors; you got the books and worked out the problems for yourself. Why don't you do so now? Bibles are not so rare and inaccessible, and you have one."

"I know," said Victor as his brother paused. "I have treasured it, but I never thought of studying it."

They walked on in silence a few minutes, and then Maurice said, in his peculiar matter-of-fact way,—

"After all, Victor, in one way these simple Christian folks have one more chance on their side than we people of advanced ideas."

"One more chance?" answered Victor, rousing himself from abstraction, as usual. "What do you mean?"

"Why, if the French philosophers are right, these people are as well off as we are now, and it will all come to the same thing in the end, since there is no danger that the annihilated philosophers will laugh at them, as somebody says. Nay, in one sense they are better off, since they really do take a good deal of comfort in their belief. But if yonder good missionary and his followers are right, 'we' are making rather an awful mistake. A calculation which has eternity as one of its elements has more need to be correct than a problem in your favourite algebra."

"You are right," said Victor.

"Will you go with me to see the poor woman—Frau Reinhart, I think they call her?" asked Maurice, after another long silence. "This is our last day, you know, and perhaps we may come upon the preacher. I believe he lodges with her."

"Frau Reinhart? Oh yes, the mother of our young friend of the churchyard. Certainly I will go with you. Anywhere rather than to that dinner at the Schloss, with its wine-drinking and stupid jesting, and the two priests watching one's every word and looking like ravens watching over a flock of sheep."

"Oh, come! You are too hard on the good fathers. The elder at least is a kind-hearted man, and very good company. But I am as willing as yourself to escape the dinner. Perhaps the good woman will offer us some refreshment, or we will dine at the little inn. This is the house. Shall we knock?"

"I trust you will do nothing rash, dame," said Count Maurice, somewhat anxiously.

"There is no fear," answered Gertrude; and it was wonderful to see how a bright smile transformed her face. "Have I not these children to think for? But Your Highness' words have given me a new hope; they have revived the life that was well-nigh dead within me. I am strong yet. I and my children can work, and you say no one need want work in America."

"Leisure is much more to seek than work, I do assure you, good dame. Ladies of birth and education in the northern colonies—so I am credibly informed—perform all the menial offices of their households because there are no servants. I have myself dined at the house of a gentleman where the dinner was cooked by the hands of the lady and her daughters, and well cooked too.—And that reminds me to ask for my brother. I dare say he has forgotten that we have had nothing to-day but a crust and a glass of wine."

"If Your Highness would partake of our coarse fare, I should be only too much honoured to prepare refreshments for you," said Gertrude, eagerly. "I have a pie and some sausages which my uncle's wife sent me, and we have cream and fresh butter. If Your Highness could eat black bread—I fear there is none other to be had, but ours is sweet and good."

Count Maurice was a very good-natured man as well as a very fine gentleman in the true sense of those abused words. He loved to give pleasure and he knew how to do it—how to enter into the feelings of those about him. He had no trouble in seeming interested in his fellow-creatures, simply because he really was interested. This was a secret which the landgrave never could understand. He admired his young cousin's easy manners and tried to imitate them, for he really did want his people to like him, but he never succeeded. It was the ox trying to imitate the frolics of the greyhound.

Count Maurice readily and gracefully accepted the hospitality of Gertrude Reinhart, partly because he wished to give her pleasure, and partly because he was hungry and wanted his dinner; consequently, he did so without either awkwardness or condescension.

When the widow called her daughter to help her, Margaret was amazed at the change in her mother's face. It was like the mother she remembered years ago. She wondered what the count could have been telling her.

Meantime, Count Maurice entered into conversation with Philip, looked at and praised his wood-carving, and advised him to study drawing.

"But I have no master," said Philip, doubtfully.

"You have pencil and paper, and you have the things before you. Work at what you have, and the rest will come. The hand which carved this deer's head and this bunch of acorns should soon be able to do better things. But what have we here?"

"It is the design I have been trying to make for a cross to mark my little brother's grave," said Philip; "but it does not satisfy me."

"Philip, you will make an artist," said Count Maurice. "The world will hear of you some day."

"The pastor used to say that of my father," said Philip, flushing high at the unexpected praise. "He said that Providence designed him for an artist, and that he ought to leave his forge and go to the city to study."

"And what said your father?"

"He answered merrily that when Providence had given a man a good trade and a young family, it had given him two things which were meant to be kept together," answered Philip. "My father was the best blacksmith and wheelwright in all the country round. If he had been here, the landgrave's horse would not have spoiled the hunt by falling lame the other day."

Count Maurice smiled. He had a shrewd notion that the landgrave's superstitious dread of the ill omen involved in meeting the funeral had quite as much to do with breaking off the hunt as the lameness of his horse, which nobody perceived but himself.

But he said nothing; and Gertrude having finished her simple preparations, Count Victor was called, and the two brothers satisfied her by making a hearty meal.

"Well, what did your friend the preacher say to you?" asked Maurice of his brother as they were walking homeward. "Something pleasant, to judge by your face."

"Much that was pleasant," answered Victor, "but chiefly he echoed your advice—that I should study the Bible and let alone the works of men for a while.—Maurice, I wondered this morning what had brought us to this place. I think I know now."

That evening Gertrude called her children about her and explained her plan fully to them. A new prospect had opened before her, a new hope arisen in her mind, which made her feel again some of the spring and energy of youth, before misfortune after misfortune had crushed her to the earth. She had heard that in America there was room for every one who wished to work; that many Germans had gone thither already and were prospering; that there were schools and churches and no one to impose arbitrary taxes or carry men away from their families and sell their blood for money.

"It is a good land, and many of our countrymen are there already. We will save what money we can for a year or two, sell what we have here, and go thither."

Margaret's face brightened for a moment, and then fell again.

"But if my father should come back and find us gone?" said she.

"We cannot make any move for two or three years yet," answered her mother. "By that time, we shall have certain news one way or other. The count says every one believes that the war will come to an end before long, and that the Americans are sure to win. We shall need to work hard and save money. We will buy back our cows and—But this is not the time to speak of business," she added, checking herself. "We will talk it all over to-morrow."

"Are you not pleased with the thought of going to America?" said Margaret to Philip as they went to take a last look at the hens and to see that all was secure.

"I am pleased with whatever pleases my mother," answered Philip. "It is good to see her smile once more as she used to do."

"And shall you not like to go to America?"

"I cannot tell that till I know a little more what America is like. His Highness says many fine things about it, and some that are not so fine—about the agues and the wild beasts and the savages."

"Oh, you always look on the dark side."

"And then it is a great undertaking, Greta. We think it a great thing to visit Fulda or Eisenach; and when Uncle Hans went to Frankfort last year, the whole village turned out to see him go. But America is a long way beyond Frankfort."

"And, in short, you mean to spoil and hinder all you can," said Margaret, angrily. "You care for nothing but carving and flowers and making pretty things like a girl. You ought to be the woman and I the man to go out into life."

"And get your head broken the first day with your tongue," said Philip. "'Men' don't talk to each other as you talk to me, Greta. If they did, there would be more quarrels than there are now. There is not a boy in the whole village who would dare to tell me I ought to be a girl."

"I will take that back," said Margaret, rather ashamed. "I know I hurt people's feelings ever so many times; but oh, Philip, if you knew how I mourn for father and for the change in my mother! It makes me desperate. But you don't make any allowance for my troubles. Nobody does!"

"They are not 'my' troubles, I suppose?" said Philip, in the tone which always seemed to become more measured and gentle the more deeply he was moved. "It is nothing to me to go to bed without poor little Fritz, whom I have nursed ever since he was born, who knew and loved me when he knew no one else. Oh, my baby, my innocent darling!" And Philip leaned his head against the door of the henhouse and wept bitterly with those deep, in-drawn sobs which are so dreadful to hear.

Never had Margaret seen him give way so entirely. She had always given herself credit for having far deeper feeling than her brother. She had a kind of violent impatience of grief which made her rebel against it angrily, while Philip never complained and seldom gave way. She said to herself, and found some comfort in saying, that none of them, not even her mother, felt the family calamities as she did; but now she began to have an inkling that she was not, after all, so very superior to her quiet and cheerful brother. She stood silent and awkward, provoked at the pain in her conscience and at Philip for causing it, wishing to comfort him, but not knowing how.

At last, she put her arm round his neck:

"Don't cry so, Philip—don't! You will make yourself sick. Don't you know what Brother Gotthold said this morning? Think how happy the dear little fellow is now, and how you will see him again some day. Yes, I am sure you will."

"I know," answered Philip, checking his sobs and pressing the hand which Margaret put into his; "but oh, Greta, you don't know how I miss him."

There was a little silence, and then Margaret said, anxiously,—

"But, Philip, you won't oppose this plan, will you? Think what it is to see mother smile again!"

"Not only will I not oppose it, but I will do all I can to help it on," answered Philip. "I have already thought of a plan whereby I can earn something in the long evenings that are coming, and to-morrow we will talk it over. It is time to go to bed now."

"And you are not angry with me?" asked Margaret, penitently.

"Oh no," said Philip, cheerfully. "Good-night!"

Margaret crept away to her own little room with an uncomfortable feeling of humiliation and something like self-contempt at her heart. She had always been used to look down on Philip and think that she should have been the eldest son. Philip was always so quiet and cheerful.

"He took things so easily," Margaret said; "nothing seemed to touch him."

In the worst of their dark days, when he had been obliged to come home from Fulda where he had been studying with his uncle, and to give up the idea of going to college—when they had to sell their cows to meet the expenses of the mother's long illness, and when it became known that Fritz would always be an innocent—even then Philip could smile and play with the children, and when he had a little spare time could find pleasure in carving plants and leaves, in gathering crystals and flowers and watching the colours of the sunset.

All these things Greta had set down in her own mind as marks of a frivolous, light-minded disposition. It was she who had to bear the burden of everything, as she said, and she shut her eyes to the fact that Philip quietly and silently took on himself all the more disagreeable parts of the work, both in the house and in the field; that it was Philip who amused Fritz by day and slept with him or oftener watched with him at night, who kept him out of mischief and taught him the few things he was capable of learning.

She had shut her eyes to all these things, as I said, but now they seemed to be suddenly opened. She remembered with a pang of remorse the hundreds of times she had spoken sharply to the poor innocent, how many times she had thrown his stores of pebbles and acorns out of the window and knocked down his block houses, and then she remembered, that last day, how Fritz had begged to go and see the new calf and she had refused to take him because she was engaged in putting the last stitches to a new hood.

"Philip would have laid down his best piece of carving to please the child," she thought.

And then a cold, sick shudder came over her. If she had gone with Fritz in the daytime, perhaps he would not have stolen out at night, and he might have been here now. Philip had known of her refusal, and yet he had never spoken one word of reproach.

Greta had been much in the habit of spending an hour or so before going to bed in dwelling on her grievances and picturing to herself a state of life in which all should be made easy and pleasant—when she should be surrounded by luxuries and splendour, dress in velvet and jewels, and associate with nobles and princes. To-night, however, the hour was spent very differently—in honest repentance, confession, and humiliation of herself before her heavenly Father, in self-examination and comparison of herself with the standard of God's word. This was not one of those gusty paroxysms of exaggerated self-reproach and violent weeping in which she had not seldom indulged when she could not help seeing that she had been in the wrong, and which left her more self-satisfied than before. Now she felt a genuine conviction of her own unworthiness and helplessness, and cried earnestly for help to the Strong. That hour had its influence over Greta's whole life.

Philip, too, had his exercises in his own little room, which he had so long shared with Fritz. This scheme of going to America would, if carried out, be a deathblow to his dearest hope—a hope long cherished in secret, and which had to-day received new life from the words of, Count Maurice: "You should be an artist."

Philip loved everything that was beautiful. That which had been talent and knack in his father, in him rose to something like genius. There lived in the neighbourhood of Fulda a nobleman who had a fine gallery of pictures and statues. He was a good-natured man and not averse to a little gossip now and then with the schoolmaster, Philip's uncle, on his favourite subjects of the odes of Horace and the Greek metres; and finding Philip had a fancy for drawing, he invited the boy to come and see his pictures whenever he liked.

Philip went, and found a new world opened to him. Was it possible that he could ever make anything like that gladiator sinking and dying there in the marble—like that wonderful Venus with her broken arms upraised and her foot on the tortoise? From that hour, Philip's darling dream was that he might some day go to Rome and study under some of those great masters of whom he had heard. He had now been at home for two years, where he had no chance to see a picture or statue, and no one with whom he could talk over his plans, but none the less had he cherished them in secret. But now, if this new plan were carried out, all must be given up. A new country would be no place for an artist; there would be nothing but rough work to do.

Philip did not fear work or hardship. He knew, before he heard it from Count Maurice, that a great many Germans had emigrated to America and done well there. He had heard a letter read which such an emigrant had written to his brother in Fulda, telling of the large farm, of the cows and sheep and horses, and the money that was to be made. It would be a grand opening for Gustaf—better than working day and night for a mere subsistence, and perhaps, after all, to be carried off as his father had been the next time the landgrave wanted to sell some of his people for money. Then, as Greta said, it was a great thing to see his mother smile again.

Philip had been sitting on the foot of his bed in the dark. He got up; and striking a light, he went to the cupboard in the wall where he kept his choicest working materials and tools. In a far corner was something carefully covered up with a cloth. Philip drew it forward reverently and unrolled it. It was a block of alabaster, of the clear, fine grain found in the Thuringerwald, partly carved into the semblance of a child's head. The carving was unfinished and faulty in many respects, yet an artist would have seen in it marks of true genius. The eyes were a little out of proportion, but they saw. The mouth smiled and the whole thing was full of expression. It was, in fact, a fair portrait of the little child that was gone. Philip looked at it and kissed it. Then he covered it again and put it back in its place.

Then he closed the door, put out his lamp, and threw himself on his knees by the bedside. How long he remained there he knew not, and only one Eye saw what passed in his mind. To that One with strong crying and tears he appealed, and he was heard.

"Herein we perceive the love of God, because he laid down his life for us; and we ought also to lay down our lives for the brethren."

Philip Reinhart laid down his life at his Saviour's feet that night, and the sacrifice was accepted.