"I see, by this remark, gracious Frau, that you know human nature very poorly. Man has two consciences, the one inside of him, and that no devil can take from him, but the other is outside of him, and that is his good name, and that any scamp may take from him, if he has the power, and is clever enough, and can kill him before the world, for man lives not for himself alone, he lives also for the world. And these wicked rumors are like the thistles, that the devil and his servants sow in our fields, they stand there, and the better the soil is the bigger they grow, and they blossom and go to seed, and when the top is ripe, then comes the wind,--no man knows whence it cometh or whither it goeth, and it carries the down from the thistle-top all over the field, and next year the whole field is full of them, and men stand there and scold, but no one will take hold and pull up the weeds, for fear of getting his fingers pricked. And you, gracious Frau, have also been afraid of pricking your fingers, when you let my old friend be driven out of your house, as a traitor and a thief, and I wanted to tell you that, and to tell you that that hurt my Karl Habermann the worst of all. And now farewell! I have nothing more to say." With that, he left the room, and Fritz followed him.
And Frida? Where was the bright young wife with her clear eyes and sound understanding, who looked at everything so sensibly and quietly? This was not the same woman, the cool, intelligent composure had changed to restless agitation, and before the clear eyes lay a shadow, which hindered her from looking about her. "Ah," she exclaimed, "untrue again! All these suspicions are merely the progeny of lies, of self-deception and the most unmanly weakness! And my distress for him, my love for him, must make me a sharer in his wrong, I must give a deadly wound to this honest heart that loved me so truly! But I will tell him!"--she sprang up,--"I will tear away this web of lies!" but she sank down again, in weakness; "no, not yet; I cannot; he is too ill." Ah, she was right; insincerity and falsehood surround in a wide circle even the most upright heart, and come nearer and nearer, and draw it into the whirlpool, till it no longer knows whether it is out or in, when cool composure is lost, and considerate thought is absorbed in fear or hope.
When Bräsig came to his wagon, Ruhrdanz, with the help of Krischan Däsel and others, had packed nearly all the goods, and what was left soon found a place. Bräsig was getting into the wagon by Ruhrdanz, when Fritz Triddelsitz held him fast: "Herr Inspector, I beg of you, tell Herr Habermann that I am innocent, that I couldn't help it."
Bräsig would have made no answer, but when he saw Fritz's sorrowful face, he pitied him, and said, "Yes, I will tell him; but you must reform." Then he drove off.
"Herr Inspector," said Ruhrdanz, after a little while, "it is none of my business, and perhaps I should not speak of it; but who would have thought it--I mean about Herr Habermann."
"What do you mean?"
"Oh, nothing,--I only mean that he should go off so suddenly, and then this shooting."
"Eh, that is all stuff and nonsense," said Bräsig, in vexation.
"So I said, Herr Inspector; but the groom Krischan, he stood there, as we were packing, and he said that the whole disturbance came from the confounded papers, because Herr Habermann had no regular papers to show. Yes, so I say, the confounded papers!"
"Habermann's papers are all right."