"No matter! You must build after that measure. Buy your needful timber to-morrow, engage carriers here in Rahnstadt, and a good master mason; but before all things, don't breathe a word of it to anybody! If you want money, apply to Moses."
He went off, and old carpenter Schultz stood in the door, looking after him.
"Noblemen, noblemen! Crazy performances! Cap-ribbons! Apron-strings! But Pomuchelskopp out! out! Isn't that good news?"
Franz went to Hogen Selchow; Habermann and Inspector Bremer, who had been engaged for Axel, went with him. Axel departed, with bag and baggage, and the burgomeister from Rahnstadt came in, to superintend the transfer of the property, and with him Bräsig, as assessor. Three weeks were taken up in this business, and in the repairs and refurnishing of Pumpelhagen; then all was arranged to satisfaction. The Frau Pastorin, also, had completed the preparations for the wedding. I shall write about this wedding, exactly as it was; it passed over very quietly, and I shall quietly pass it over.
The day after the wedding, Louise and Franz, and the Frau Pastorin and Habermann, sat in a great coach, and Bräsig was on the box, and they drove to Pumpelhagen. As they passed through Gurlitz, there was a great display of fir boards and beams, and oaken sills, and a notched beam lay all ready, on one side, and the carpenter, Schultz, stood there, in his shirt sleeves, superintending his workmen. Franz stopped the carriage, and called out to the energetic old man, "Is everything ready, Herr Schultz?"
"Everything is ready."
"Then you may speak, Herr Schultz."
"All right!" said Schultz. "But, Mamselle Hab---- I should say, gracious Frau, what trouble you have cost me! When I thought I had it, I hadn't it by a long way. I shall have to put in another notched beam."
"What?" asked Louise, and looked at Franz.
"Only this, dear child," said Franz, putting his arm around her, "that I have bought Gurlitz, and am going to build a pastor's-widow-house here, just like the parsonage."