Eric sat down quietly behind a pillar.
As he looked up, he saw Manna kneeling not far from the altar.
So will she soon kneel when she is married to Pranken.
Terrified, as if some one had seized him from behind, Eric looked round; there was no one there. He would have left the church, but the quiet hour and the quiet service did him good. What further he thought of, he knew not. The organ sounded, Manna passed him by, he heard the rustle of her dress, he did not stir. The lights on the altar were extinguished, he left the church.
"Ah, you too were in the church?" was the question put to him in a woman's voice.
He looked up astonished; Fräulein Milch stood before him. He greeted her pleasantly, and said he was not aware that she also was a Catholic.
"I am not one, but there are times when I cannot pray alone, I must go into another house, into one that has been erected to the Most High; then must I be with my fellow-creatures, who, like me, seek consolation and peace in the Eternal, even if they do call upon him in another way than mine. I do not pray as the others do, but I pray with them."
She looked confidingly into his countenance, as if she meant to say, "Thou canst not be alone either." As Eric did not make any answer, she asked after his mother, and begged him to say to her, that she had not been to visit her because she was afraid of disturbing her; but that she herself would always be found at home.
"And you, Captain, must come and see us whenever you feel like it. We have not a great deal to offer, but there is one thing that can always be had at our house, and that is quiet. And you need not even bid good-day when you come, but you can make yourself at home with us, whenever you happen to feel the need."
She now asked how Eric felt since Roland had left him, and she was the first to whom Eric expressed his great longing for the youth.