"My Joseph! where is my Joseph?"
"In the warm stable below, sound asleep," said Tony; "let him sleep on quietly, your father is with him; we laid him in warm, dry hay; and I'll tell you what we will do—we will carry him upstairs immediately, and lay him in my bed, in the next room. You can go down to fetch him: Adam, you need not be afraid about your Martina; go at once, and I will stay with her."
"And I!" said Speidel-Röttmann. Adam went down to the stable, and carried the child upstairs to bed, but Schilder-David was sleeping so soundly that he did not choose to wake him. The child, too, continued fast asleep, even when he took him in his arms. The father stroked the child's head fondly, and then his hand once more hung down by his side. Martina was now brought gently into the room; she bent over Joseph quietly, and listened to his breathing.
"Lie down beside the child, on my bed," said the Forest Miller's Tony to Martina, who looked at the girl in surprise, while Tony added, "You may be very glad that matters have taken this turn. Your Adam and I were forced into a betrothal; he disliked it quite as much as I did, and your Adam is good and true; he never spoke one word to me except about you; and though we were bride and bridegroom, yet we never kissed each other once."
"Then I will give you a kiss," said Martina, starting up and embracing Tony.
"I wish I had my cheeks between the two," said Häspele to Adam; and then addressing the two women, "You are both very nice girls, I must say! Come, Tony, your best plan is to take me: will you have me? I see you won't, but I'll give you a wedding present whoever you marry, all the same."
"Where is my father?" interrupted Martina.
"Still sleeping in the hay."
"Good Heavens! when he awakes, and no longer finds the child by his side, he will go out of his senses."
"Don't be uneasy, I will go to the stable and stay there with him till he awakes," answered Tony; but Häspele detained her by asking for something to drink, before he set out as quick as he could for the Reitersberg, where the men were still keeping watch. Tony quickly poured him out a glass of hot wine. The betrothal wine had been tasted by strange guests to-day.