"Bräsig, Bräsig, I beseech you," cried the little Frau Pastorin, "stop this unchristian behavior!"
"Do you call that unchristian behavior? It seems to me like a song of the holy angels in Paradise, if I compare it with the scurvy tricks of this pack of Jesuits."
"Bräsig, we are not the judges of these people."
"I know very well, Frau Pastorin, I am not the magistrate, and you are not in the judge's chair, but when a toad hops across my path, you cannot expect me to look upon it as a beautiful canary bird. No, Frau Pastorin, toads are toads, and Zamel Pomuchelskopp is the chief toad, who has spit his venom upon us all. What do you say to his chicanery that he has contrived against me? You see, in the one foot-path, which has led to the pastor's acre, for this thousand years, so far as I know, he has had a stake put up, so that we cannot go there, and he sent word to me that if I went there, he would have my boots pulled off, and let me go hopping about in the snow, like a crow. Do you call that a Christian disposition? But I will complain of him. Shall such a fellow as that liken me to a crow? And Pastor Gottlieb must complain of him. How can he forbid him the foot-path? And young Jochen must complain of him, for he has said openly, young Jochen was an old blockhead, and young Jochen is not obliged to put up with that. And you must complain of him, because he would not build a widow-house, since all the people have told me there must be Acts about it. And Karl Habermann must complain of the young Herr. We must organize revolution against the Jesuits, and if I can have my way, we will all drive to-morrow, in a carryall, to Gustrow, to the court of justice, and complain of the whole company, and we will take along five advocates, so that each may have one, and then, hurrah for a lawsuit!"
If he had known that Louise had suffered most from the Jesuits, he might have proposed taking another advocate for her; but as yet, he had no suspicion of her troubles. Frau Pastorin tried to pacify him, but it was not an easy task, he wanted to turn everything topsy-turvy, and the misfortunes of his old friend had so agitated his heart, that the troubles which usually lay in its depths, the farm-boy angers, and the card-playing vexations, all came to the surface. "I came over here," said he, "to amuse myself, since it was club-day, and to win back my three thalers from that old toad of an evil-doer, that Kurz, which he got out of me with his infamous cheating, and now the devil must hold his confounded spy-glass before my eyes, and bring all the wickedness of the world right into the neighborhood. Well, I call that amusing! And Frau Pastorin, if you don't think ill of it, I might spend the night here with you, for this stupid game of Boston will come to nothing, and it would be a good thing for me to sleep with Karl, because he needs somebody to cheer him up."
Frau Pastorin said she should be glad to have him stay, and the evening was spent in maledictions on his side, and efforts at pacification upon hers. Habermann and Louise did not appear, and when Bräsig went up to his old friend, Louise was no longer there.
The next morning Bräsig took leave of his old friend, with these words:
"Rely upon it, Karl, I will drive to Pumpelhagen, myself, and look after your affairs. You shall get everything, though it makes me creep all over, to cross a threshold where you have been thrust out so infamously."
The same morning, Habermann sat down and wrote to Franz; he told him truly and circumstantially what had happened lately in Pumpelhagen, he wrote of the dreadful conclusion the matter had arrived at, and informed him of the shameful suspicions which had fallen upon him, and finished with the statement that he and his child were of one mind, they must refuse his offer. He wanted to write warmly and heartily of the friendship which he felt for the young man, but he could not speak freely, as before, he seemed constrained. At last he begged him earnestly, to leave him and his child to themselves; they two must bear their fate, alone.
Louise wrote also, and when, towards evening, the Frau Pastorin's maid took the letter to the post, she stood at the window, and looked after her, as if she had taken leave of her dearest friend in the world forever. She looked at the sun, which was going down in the west, and murmured, "My dying eyes shall look to thee, thou goal of my desires." But she did not turn red as yesterday, she stood there pale, and, as the last rays of the sun disappeared behind the houses, a deep sigh rose from her oppressed heart, and as she turned away bitter tears flowed down her pale cheeks. The tears flowed not for her lost happiness, no, for his.