The man next to him urged him on. “You can speak out, we are among ourselves.”
The man with a bony face showed a manuscript. “I have searched in vain since this morning. People are afraid for their skins. There is not a printer in Pest who dares set up this proclamation.”
Ulrich Jörg leaned over the paper. His bald head reflected the light and the wreath of yellowish white hair round his ear moved in a funny way.
“This is not a proclamation,” somebody whispered. “This means revolution!”
Ulrich Jörg stretched out his hand.
“My printing works will see this through.” He said this so quietly and simply, that Anne could not understand why all these gentlemen should throng suddenly round him. But when she cast her eyes on him, he no longer looked funny. His small eyes glittered under the white eyelashes and his face resembled that of St. Peter in her little Bible.
Two boys rushed past the door. With shrill voices they shouted: “Freedom!”
Anne recognised the word she had heard from behind the bookcase. Mere boys clamoured for it too. How simple! Everybody wanted the same thing. Freedom! Somehow it seemed to her that there was some connection between that word and another. Youth! And yet another. Whatever was it? She thought of the awkward youth’s feverish eye.
From the direction of the Town Hall people came running down the street; artisans, women, students, servants. The actors of the German theatre were among them too. Anne recognised the robber-knight and the queen. The queen’s petticoat was torn.
“Hurray for the freedom of the press. Down with the censor!”