Jan had a long blonde moustache and a pair of shrewd eyes, and his manner of speech was coarse—terribly so. Marjon slept in the little kitchen, and, as Jan's eldest girl was not yet sixteen, Marjon could be of great service in the family.
"Did you get him out?" asked Jan, who had come in his working-blouse to meet them. And when they shook their heads, he began cursing, tremendously.
"Well-! Did ye ever see such scoundrels? I'd like to pitch into the loons! Can't that perfesser see that Markus knows more in his little finger than the whole scurvy lot of them—patients, doctors, perfessers, and all? And because he's given the priest a dressing-down, and broken an image worth a nickel, must he be shut up in a mad-house? Well-!!!"
Jan was furious, and proposed, with the aid of a sledge-hammer, to convince the learned gentlemen that they had made a blunder.
"He is to be examined to-morrow," said Johannes, thinking to calm him.
But Jan retorted scornfully, "Examined! Examined! I'll examine their own cocoanuts with a three-inch gimlet! If anything comes out but sawdust I hope to drop dead."
He said much more that I will not repeat.
Johannes stayed away from the Villa Dolores the entire day, for it was too dreary for him there. He would now far rather be in this poor household with its many children. He noticed how the young mother managed her uproarious little troop, how constantly and cheerfully busy she was the whole day long—bearing, and getting the better of, difficulties which would have dismayed and discouraged many another.
Johannes ate with them, and although not very hungry, because of his anxiety, he enjoyed his food. And after they had had their late afternoon coffee, and the younger children had gone to bed—when Van Tijn had returned from his work, and with a certain solemn thoughtfulness had filled his pipe and was silently smoking it—then Johannes felt wonderfully at peace. He had not known such peace in a long time. Very little was said. Outside, the twilight was falling; indoors, the only light was from the little flame under the coffee-pot. The women, too, were tired, and sat listening to the sounds in the street. And Johannes knew that they were all thinking of the friend in the asylum.