Fieka paid no heed to the question, she had enough to do with her own thoughts, and they broke out from her lips:--"O, God! and this, too, is my old father's fault. What can be the matter with him?"
"He need not reproach himself about me, Fieka," said Heinrich. "Although at first when I wanted to go away, it was all the same to me where I went to, it is different now. Now, for the first time I know what I have turned soldier for, and for what cause we go to battle. Now, I know what it means when comrade stands by comrade, and a whole regiment enters the field with heart and soul for the Fatherland. You know how I love you; and yet if you would give me your hand to-day, I could not take it. I must go, but I take your heart with me."
"Spoken like a man!" cried Friedrich.
"You are right, Heinrich," said Fieka. "Go. But, when you come hack, you must not expect to find us here any longer. Misfortunes are coming over our heads, and who knows how long the Mill may shelter us."
"Eh, what, Fieka?" said Friedrich, "the Miller has got somewhat into a pickle, he has got up to his neck in water; but, for all that, the waves need not close over his head. He has still got good friends who can stretch out a hand to him."
"Who can help him?" said Fieka, and sat down and let her hands fall in her lap. "Nobody knows what he has got into his head."
"O, Heinrich knows something about it," said Friedrich. "He heard a little bird sing this morning.--Make him tell you what it said, for I must now be off to the Schloss."
CHAPTER XXI.
How the Miller holds to it that 'what is written is written'; why the Amtshauptmann pulls Fritz Sahlmann by the ear, and my uncle Herse loses all command over himself. How too this story comes to a happy end.
He went; and Heinrich and Fieka remained alone.--Up at the Schloss the old Amtshauptmann sat on his chair with the white napkin round his neck. He was peevish.