Even had I known how, surely I had no part nor lot in such a form of worship.
“Sir,” I said, not heeding the outstretched book, but feeling about in my breast-pocket, “permit me to present you with my card. You will then see——”
He, however, in his turn refused to heed the outstretched card. He did not so much as look at it.
“I cannot oblige you to,” he whispered, as though our conversation were unfit for the eagle’s ears; and leaving the open book on the little shelf in the front of the pew he strode back again to his place and resumed his reading, doing what he called my part as well as his own with a severity of voice and manner ill-suited to one presumably addressing the liebe Gott.
Well, being there and very comfortable I did not see why I should go. I was behaving quite inoffensively, sitting still and holding my tongue, and the comfort of being in a building with no fresh air in it was greater than you, my friends, who only know fresh air at intervals and in properly limited quantities, will be able to understand. So I stayed till the end, till he, after a profusion of prayers, got up from his knees and walked away into some obscure portion of the church where I could no longer observe his movements, and then, not desiring to meet him, I sought the path that had led me thither and hurriedly descended the hill to our melancholy camp. Once I thought I heard footsteps behind me and I hastened mine, getting as quickly round a bend that would conceal me from any one following me as a tired man could manage, and it was not till I had reached and climbed into the Elsa that I felt really safe.
The three caravans were as usual drawn up in a parallel line with mine in the middle, and their door ends facing the farm. To be in the middle is a most awkward situation, for you cannot speak the least word of caution (or forgiveness, as the case may be) to your wife without running grave risk of being overheard. Often I used carefully to shut all the windows and draw the door curtain, hoping thus to obtain a greater freedom of speech, though this was of little use with the Ilsa and the Ailsa on either side, their windows open, and perhaps a group of caravaners sitting on the ground immediately beneath.
My wife was mending, and did not look up when I came in. How differently she behaved at home. She not only used to look up when I came in, she got up, and got up quickly too, hastening at the first sound of my return to meet me in the passage, and greeting me with the smiles of a dutiful and accordingly contented wife.
Shutting the Elsa’s windows I drew her attention to this.
“But there isn’t a passage,” said she, still with her head bent over a sock.
Really Edelgard should take care to be specially feminine, for she certainly will never shine on the strength of her brains.