"Hm!" said the old Herr, and he paced up and down the room with long strides, "this is a very strange thing!" At last he stood still in front of Friedrich, and looked at him with a peculiar look in his eyes: "Money is very scarce just now, and I know where there is a father of a family wringing the very skin off his fingers, and his wife and child sit in tears."
Friedrich looked up. He looked into the Amtshauptmann's face, and it seemed to him as if a beam of light came from it and fell warmly upon his heart.
"Dumouriez!" he cried and he snatched up the valise and put it under his arm.--"I know what to do with it," he said, "Good-day, Herr."
He was going. The old Herr followed him to the door--"My son," and he took his hand, "when you come back again from the war let me see you, and hear how things have gone with you."
The Justice-room was empty. The Herr Amtshauptmann was sitting with his wife in her room.
"Neiting, when this Friedrich, this Miller's man, comes back again I think I shall be better pleased than if a Princess were to come and see us."
As the Miller and my uncle Herse went down the Schloss Hill, they did not speak a word; but for opposite reasons: the Miller was silent because he was wrapped up in himself, my uncle because he was quite out of himself. At last my uncle broke out:--
"And so that's what they call a court of justice! That's what they call a verdict? The rude old fellow won't let a man bring in a single word. We'll go further, Miller Voss; we'll go to a higher court."
"I'll go no further, Herr Rathsherr,"' said the old Miller, feebly, "I have gone far enough already!"
"Neighbour," said old Baker Witte, who had followed them and had heard what the Miller said, "don't let that worry you too much, things may get better. And now come home with me; your Fieka is there."