It was with this in his hand, he went to his brother that evening as before related, and sought for a reconciliation.
A little girl had seen him groping among the ashes. He had also been observed going towards the farm the foregoing Sunday evening; the people in the house told how strangely he had behaved on Monday; everybody knew that he and his brother were not on good terms, and he was reported and brought up for trial. Nothing could be proved against him, but suspicion rested on him, and now more than ever it seemed impossible to approach his brother.
Though Anders had said nothing, he had thought of Baard when the hay-loft was burnt, and when the evening after, he saw him enter the room looking so pale and strange, he at once concluded that now remorse had struck him, but for such an offence, and against his own brother, there was no pardon. On hearing the circumstantial evidence against him, though nothing had been proved at the trial, he firmly believed that Baard was guilty. They met each other at the trial, Baard in his good clothes, and Anders in threadbare. Baard looked up as he went in, with so imploring a glance that Anders felt it deeply. "He does not want me to say anything," thought Anders, and when he was asked if he believed his brother guilty, he answered clearly and decidedly, "No."
From that day Anders took to drinking, and matters grew worse and worse with him. With Baard it was little better, although he never drank; he was not like himself.
Late one evening a poor woman entered the little room where Baard lived, and begged him to go with her. He knew her: it was his brother's wife. He understood the errand she had come upon, turned deadly pale, and followed without a word. There was a flickering light from the window of Anders' room that served to guide them, for there was no pathway over the snow. They reached the house and went in. On entering, Baard felt at once that here reigned poverty; the room was close; a little child sat on the hearth eating a piece of charcoal: its face was black all over, but it looked up with its white teeth and grinned. There on the bed, with all sorts of clothes to cover him, lay Anders, thin and worn, with his clear high forehead, looking mildly upon him. Baard trembled in all his limbs, he sat down on the bed foot, and burst into tears. The sick man continued silently looking at him. At last he told his wife to withdraw, but Baard signed to her to remain, and the two brothers began to speak together. They related each his history, from the day when they bid on the watch to the time they now met together, and it was clearly shown that during all these years they had never been happy for a single day. Baard finished by taking out the little lump of gold, which he always carried about with him.
Anders was not able to talk much, but as long as he was ill, Baard continued to watch by his bedside. "Now I am perfectly well," said Anders, one morning when he awoke,--"Now, my brother, we will always live together as in the olden time!" But that day he died.
Baard took the wife and the child to live with him, and they were well cared for from that time. That which the brothers had said to each other was soon known through the village, and Baard became the most esteemed man among them. Everybody met him as one who had known great sorrow and again found joy, or as one who had been long absent. Baard felt strengthened by all this friendliness around him, he loved God more, and felt a desire to be useful; so the old corporal became a schoolmaster. That which he impressed first and last upon his pupils, was love, and this precept was so exemplified in himself, that the children were attached to him as to a play-fellow and father at the same time.
This was the story told of the old schoolmaster that had such effect upon Ovind, that it became to him both religion and education.
He looked upon the schoolmaster as a being almost supernatural, although he sat there so familiarly and corrected them. Not to know his lessons was impossible, and if, after saying them well, he got a smile or a stroke of the head, he was glad and happy for the whole day. It always made a strong impression upon the children when, before singing, the schoolmaster would sometimes speak a little to them, and, at least once a week, read aloud a few verses about loving your neighbour. As he read the first of these verses his voice trembled, although he had now continually read it for twenty or thirty years. It ran thus:--
"Be kind to thy neighbour and scorn him not,
Though virtue and beauty be all forgot,