The second day there was certainly more jesting and satire than I liked. Christopher said it reminded him of "Reinecke Fuchs."
In the middle of the second day we missed Eva, and when in a few hours I came back to the house to seek her, I found her kneeling by our bed-side, sobbing as if her heart would break. I drew her towards me, but I could not discover that anything at all was the matter, except that the young knight who had stopped us in the forest had bowed very respectfully to her, and had shown her a few dried violets, which he said he should always keep in remembrance of her and her words.
It did not seem to me so unpardonable an offence, and I said so.
"He had no right to keep anything for my sake!" she sobbed. "No one will ever have any right to keep anything for my sake; and if Fritz had been here, he would never have allowed it."
"Little Eva," I said, "what has become of your 'Theologia Teutsch?' Your book says you are to take all things meekly, and be indifferent, I suppose, alike to admiration and reproach."
"Cousin Elsè," said Eva very gravely, rising and standing erect before me with clasped hands, "I have not learned the 'Theologia' through well yet, but I mean to try. The world seems to me very evil, and very sad. And there seems no place in it for an orphan girl like me. There is no rest except in being a wife or a nun. A wife I shall never be, and therefore, dear, dear Elsè," she continued, kneeling down again, and throwing her arms around me, "I have just decided—I will go to the convent where Aunt Agnes is, and be a nun."
I did not attempt to remonstrate; but the next day I told the mother, who said gravely, "She will be happier there, poor child! We must let her go."
But she became pale as death, her lip quivered, and she added,—"Yes, God must have the choicest of all. It is in vain indeed to fight against Him!" Then, fearing she might have wounded me, she kissed me and said,—"Since Fritz left, she has grown so very dear! But how can I murmur when my loving Elsè is spared to us?"
"Mother," I said, "do you think Aunt Agnes has been praying again for this?"
"Probably!" she replied, with a startled look. "She did look very earnestly at Eva."