“Because Mother Jacob made kougelhofs and cheese-tarts three days ago. It’s the only thing she thinks of; it’s what one might call her philosophical idea when the fair-time approaches. Daddy Jacob thinks only of bottling his wine and smoking his pipe behind the store; and when his wife calls he lets her call, knowing that nothing will stop her; for she is like a hen that’s going to lay—the more she is driven about the more noise she makes. But here we are. What a lot of people!—Come, Dame Thérèse, you may alight.—Maître Hans Aden, come and hold Schimel’s bridle, while I go and beg Daddy Jacob to take us in.”
They were in front of the public-house, the crowd whirling around them. They saw the drinkers go up and down the steps unsteadily; glasses jingled, cans clashed; voices called for beer, sourcrout, sausages; the servant-girls, whom the guests chucked under the chin as they passed, uttered laughing little cries; Mother Jacob clattered the plates and dishes, and Daddy Jacob turned the tap in the cellar.
Coucou Peter entered the public-house, promising soon to return. Indeed, at the end of a few seconds, he came back with Maître Jacob himself, a hale man with jovial face and shirt-sleeves turned up to his elbows.
“My poor fellow,” he said, “nothing would please me better than to be of service to you. But every room is taken; I’ve nothing left but the barn and the shed; see if either of those will suit you.”
Coucou Peter looked at little Thérèse with an air of distress, and then at the crowded street.
“If it were only for myself, Maître Jacob, I’d accept it at once; a poor devil of a fiddler is used to sleeping on straw. But just look at this good little mother, at this poor child, and at this good Doctor Mathéus, the cream of philosophers!” cried he, in a heartrending tone of voice. “Come, Daddy Jacob—put yourself in the place of these people!”
“What can I do, Coucou Peter?” replied the publican. “With all the goodwill in the world, I can’t empty my rooms; I can’t offer you——”
“Ah, Monsieur Coucou Peter, don’t give yourself so much trouble on our account,” then said Dame Thérèse; “we are not so hard to please as you think.”
“You accept the shed, Dame Thérèse?”