Chapter III

The two boys had come to a turn in the road, and stood looking back over the way they had come. The younger of the two looked up wistfully to the cherry-blossomed trees overhead. "It is hot, Sebastian!--Let us rest."

With a smile the other boy threw himself on the grass. The large, flat book that he carried under his arm fell to the ground beside him, and his hand stole out and touched it. He had a wide, quiet face, with blue eyes and a short nose, and lips that smiled dreamily to themselves. As he lay looking up into the white blossoms that swayed and waited against the clear blue of the sky, the lips curved in gentle content.

His companion, who had thrown himself on the cool grass beside him, watched him admiringly. His glance shifted and rested on the book that lay on the grass. "What is it?--What is it, Sebastian?" he asked timidly. He put out an inquisitive finger toward the book.

Sebastian turned it quietly aside. "Let be," he said.

The boy flushed. "I was not going to touch it."

The other smiled, with his slow, generous eyes fixed on the boy's face. "Thou art a good boy, Erdman!" ... "It is only thy fingers that itch to know things." He patted them gently, where they lay on the grass beside him.

Erdman was still looking at the book. "Was it your brother's?" he asked in a half whisper.

"Christoph's?" Sebastian shook his head. "No, it is mine--my own."

The soft wind was among the blossoms overhead--they fell in petals, one by one, upon the quiet figures.

"Want to know 'bout it?" asked Sebastian, half turning to meet his companion's eye.

The boy nodded.

"It's mine. I copied it, every note--six months it took me--from Christoph's book."

"Did he let you?"

Sebastian shook his head, a grim, sweet smile curving the big mouth. "Let me?--Christoph!"

The boy crept nearer to him. "How did you do it?"

"I stole it--carried it up to my room while the others were asleep--and did it by the moon."

"The moon?"

The boy nodded, laughing. "Didst never hear of the moon, brave boy!"

Erdman smiled pettishly. "There isn't a moon--always," he said, after a moment.

"And that also is true," quoth the boy gravely. "But some time, late or early, one gets a glimpse of her--if one lies awake to see," he added softly.

The other glanced again at the book. "Let me look at it," he pleaded.

Sebastian smiled and reached over a hand to the book. "Don't touch. I'll show it thee." He untied the strings and spread it on the ground, throwing himself in front of it and resting his chin in his hands. "Come," he said, "I'll show it thee."

Erdman threw off his heavy cap and bent toward the book, with a little gesture of wonder. "I heard about Christoph's book--a good many times," he said softly.... "I didn't ever think I'd see it." He reached out his hand and touched the open page.

"Nobody ever saw it," said Sebastian absently. He was humming to himself. "Listen to this!" he said eagerly. He hummed a few bars. "That's Buxtehude's--isn't it great!" His face went tumpty-tumpty with the notes, and the blue eyes shone. "But this is the one I like best--listen!" He turned over the pages rapidly. "Here it is. This is Reinken's. 'By the waters of Babylon, by the waters, by the waters of Babylon.'" He hummed the tune below his breath--and then louder and fuller.... The clear, sweet soprano of the notes died away softly. "Some day I shall play it," said Sebastian lingeringly. "Some day. See--here is the place for the harps! And here are the great horns. Listen!" His voice droned away at the bass and ran into the swift high notes of the treble. "Some day I shall play it," he repeated wistfully.

Erdman's slow gaze was following the page. "I can't read so fast," he said enviously.

Sebastian smiled back. "I know it by heart--almost. When the moon was behind the clouds I waited. I sang them over and over."

"Very softly," said Erdman, as if seeing the picture of the boy and the darkened room.

"Very softly," assented Sebastian, "so that no one should hear. And now I have them all!" He spoke exultingly. "And next month I shall see Reinken.... I shall hear him play!"

The other stared at him. "But Reinken is at Hamburg," he said at last.

"And that, too, is so," said Sebastian smiling.

"And we go to Lueneburg----"

"And we go to Lueneburg!" repeated the boy, with a mocking lilt in his voice. "And Lueneburg is twenty miles from Hamburg. Hadst thought of that!" He laughed exultingly.

The other shook his head. "I don't know what you mean," he said.

Sebastian was fastening the big violin in place on his back. He looked up under smiling brows, as he bent to draw the last strap. Then he touched his sturdy legs with his hand and laughed. "I mean that these are the horses to carry me to Hamburg and back many times. I shall hear the great Reinken play!--And I, too, shall play!" he added proudly.

"Do you never doubt, Sebastian?" asked the other thoughtfully, as they moved on.

"Doubt?"

"Whether you will be a great musician?... Sometimes I see myself going back--" He paused as if ashamed to have said so much.

Sebastian shook his head. His blue eyes were following the clouds in the spring day. "Sometimes I doubt whether I am among the elect," he said slowly. "But never that I am to be a musician." His full lips puckered dreamily, and his golden head nodded, keeping slow time. "By the waters--" he broke out into singing. "Is it not wunderschoen!" The blue eyes turned with a smile. "It is wunderschoen! Ach--wunderschoen! Is it not, Erdman?" He seemed to awake and laid his hand affectionately on the boy's shoulder.

The other nodded. "Yes, it is schoen," he said wistfully.

"Come, I will teach it to thee!"

And the notes of Reinken's choral, "An den Wasserfluessen Babylon," floated with a clear, fresh sound on the spring morning air, two hundred years ago, and more, as two charity pupils walked along the road to Lueneburg.