Yes, somebody did, after all. As he was sitting by himself on the steamer, a setter, who had lost his master, came to him and put its head on his knee. The schoolmaster was not particularly fond of dogs, but he allowed it to stay; he felt it pressing its soft warm body against his leg, he saw the eyes of the forsaken brute looking at him in dumb appeal, as if it were asking him to find its master.
But as soon as they landed, the setter ran away. “It needed me no longer,” thought the schoolmaster, and he walked home and went to bed.
These trifling incidents of Midsummer day had robbed the schoolmaster of his assurance. They taught him that all foresight, all precautions, all the clever calculations in the world availed nothing. He felt a certain instability in his surroundings. Even the public house, his home, was not to be counted on. It might be closed any day. Moreover, a certain reserve on the part of Gustav troubled him. The waiter was as civil as before, more attentive even, but his friendship was gone; he had lost confidence. It afforded the schoolmaster food for thought, and whenever a tough piece of meat, or too small a dish of potatoes was set before him he thought:
“Haha! He’s paying me out!”
It was a bad summer for the schoolmaster: the second violin was out of town and the book-seller frequented “Mosesheight,” a garden restaurant in his own district, situated on a hill.
On an evening in autumn the bookseller and the second violin were sitting at their favourite table, drinking a glass of punch, when the schoolmaster entered, carrying under his arm a parcel which he carefully hid in an empty hamper in a cupboard used for all sorts of lumber. He was ill-tempered and unusually irritable.
“Well, old boy,” the bookseller began for the hundredth time, “and when are you going to be married?”
“Confound your ‘when are you going to be married!’ As if a man hadn’t enough trouble without it! Why don’t you get married yourself?” growled the schoolmaster.
“Oh! because I have my old Stafva,” answered the bookseller, who always had a number of stereotyped answers in readiness.
“I was married very happily,” said the Pole, “but my wife is dead, now, ugh!”