"Fader dead!" said the child, as she sat on Wilhelm's knee and heard the sad story. "Dead! Shall Frida never see him again, nor walk with him, nor talk with him? Oh! dear, dear fader, why did you die and leave Frida all alone? I want you, I want you!" and the child burst into a flood of tears.
They let her cry on, those kind-hearted people—nay, they wept with her; but after some minutes had passed, Wilhelm raised her head, and asked her if she would not like to see her father once more, though he could not speak to her now.
"Yes, oh yes! take me to see him!" she exclaimed. "Oh, take me!" Then looking eagerly up she said, "Perhaps Jesus can make him live again, like he did Lazarus, you know. Can't he?" But alas! of the story of Lazarus being raised from the dead these two people knew nothing; and when they asked her what she meant, and she said her father had read to her about it out of her little brown book, they only shook their heads, and Wilhelm said, "I feared there was something wrong about that little book. How could any one be raised from the dead?"
Frida's passionate exclamations of love and grief when she saw the dead body of the man who lay in Johann Schmidt's hut removed all doubt from the minds of those who heard her as to the relationship between them; and the manner in which the child turned from a crucifix which Gretchen brought forward to her, thinking it would comfort her, convinced them more firmly that the poor man had indeed been a heretic.
No! father never prayed to that, nor would he let her do so, she said—just to Jesus, dear Jesus in heaven; and though several of those who heard her words crossed themselves as she spoke, and prayed the Virgin to forgive, all were much taken with and deeply sorry for the orphan child; and when Wilhelm raised her in his arms to take her back to his hut and to the care of Elsie, more than one of the inhabitants of the Dorf brought some little gift from their small store to be taken with him to help in the maintenance of the little one so strangely brought among them. Ere they left the Dorf, Johann Schmidt had returned from executing his message to Dringenstadt. He had seen the Pfarrer, and he had promised to come along presently and arrange about the funeral.
CHAPTER IV.
THE PARSONAGE.
"The Lord thy Shepherd is—
Dread not nor be dismayed—
To lead thee on through stormy paths,
By ways His hand hath made."
ON the morning of the day that we have written of, the young Protestant pastor of Dringenstadt was seated in a room of the small house which went by the name of "Das Pfarrhaus."
He was meditating more than studying just then. He felt his work there an uphill one. Almost all the people in that little town were Roman Catholics. His own flock was a little one indeed, and only that morning he had received a letter telling him that it had been settled that no regular ministry would be continued there, as funds were not forthcoming, and the need in one sense seemed small. He had come there only a few months before, knowing well that he might only be allowed to remain a short time; but now that the order for his removal elsewhere had come, he felt discouraged and sad. Was it right, he was asking himself, to withdraw the true gospel light from the people, and to leave the few, no doubt very few, who loved it to themselves? Karl Langen was a true Christian, longing to lead souls to Jesus, and was much perplexed by the order he had received. Suddenly a knock at the door roused him, and the woman who took charge of his house on entering told him that a man from the Forest wished to speak to him. Telling her to send him in at once, he awaited his entry.