“And what think you of doing, my son?”
“I shall endeavour to wait until such time as the much-needed General Council may proclaim the ancient truth, and enable us to avouch it without disunion. Into schism I will not be drawn. I have held truth all my life in the Church, nor will I part from her now. If intrigues again should prevail, then, Heaven help us! Meantime, mother, the best we can, as has ever been your war-cry.”
“And much has been won for us. Here are the little maidens, who, save Vittoria, would never have been scholars, reading the Holy Word daily in their own tongue.”
“Ach, I had not told you, mother! I have the Court Secretary’s answer this day about that command in the Kaisar’s guards that my dear old master had promised to his godson.”
“Another put-off with Flemish courtesy, I see by thy face, Ebbo.”
“Not quite that, mother. The command is ready for the Baron Friedmund Maximilianus von Adlerstein Wildschloss, and all the rest of it, on the understanding that he has been bred up free from all taint of the new doctrine.”
“New? Nay, it is the oldest of all doctrine.”
“Even so. As I ever said, Dr. Luther hath been setting forth in greater clearness and fulness what our blessed Friedel and I learnt at your knee, and my young ones have learnt from babyhood of the true Catholic doctrine. Yet I may not call my son’s faith such as the Kaisar’s Spanish conscience-keepers would have it, and so the boy must e’en tarry at home till there be work for his stout arm to do.”
“He seems little disappointed. His laugh comes ringing the loudest of all.”
“The Junker is more of a boy at two-and-twenty than I ever recollect myself! He lacks not sense nor wit, but a fray or a feast, a chase or a dance, seem to suffice him at an age when I had long been dwelling on matters of moment.”