Roland and Lilian accompanied Frau Weidmann into the house.
CHAPTER IV.
VOCATION AND FATHER-LAND.
While the children had been dreaming and chattering together in the garden, the men had gone into the house. They stepped into the large wainscoted entrance-hall, where a great many withered wreaths were suspended. Weidmann pointed out to Eric that forty-two of these belonged to him, for that was the number of harvests he had worked in here.
The single wreath hanging by itself was the fiftieth one of his father-in-law, which had been placed upon his grave. Weidmann nodded as Eric said:—
"This is a decoration which cannot be purchased, which one can acquire only for himself."
Eric was glad to point this out to Roland.
They entered the sitting-room on the ground-floor. It was spacious and comfortable, with pleasant seats in the window-recesses, and chairs and tables scattered about here and there.
"We live on the ground-floor in the summer," said Weidmann to Eric; "every thing can be overlooked here better: After the leaves have fallen, we remove to the upper story for the winter."
The great sitting-room opened into another apartment, where the heavy damask curtain had just been drawn back. The Banker, whom Eric had become acquainted with at Carlsbad, came out of it, holding in his hand a bundle of papers, and gave him a friendly greeting, expressing his pleasure in meeting again here the man who was as intimate a friend of Clodwig's as he was himself.