Again he gave that short rather scoffing laugh.
"I am calculating how many parsons get their living in a hole like that," he said, "and what a comfortable thing it is to go in for theology."
"Why don't you go in for it?" she asked. "All sources of knowledge have a common fountain."
"You don't understand anything about it, my dear Fräulein," he rebuked her gently. "What matters is not knowledge, but conviction. A man must suffer everything for his convictions; he must drudge and starve for his convictions. The town has in its gift six livings for theological students. But I would rather cut off my right hand than accept one. For your convictions' sake you must go out into the world and fight your way. That is what I am going to do. I begin the day after to-morrow."
His small, short-sighted eyes flashed. He pushed back the lock of genius from his forehead with a trembling hand.
Now he was talking according to her expectations. She wondered if this would be the right moment to present him with the revolver. But she deferred the presentation out of respect for the grandeur and significance of his new mood.
Taking up the bag with the weapon in it, she clasped it tightly, and then aired her sentiments with the same enthusiasm as she had done that night on the terrace.
"Oh, Herr Redlich," she cried, "can there be anything more splendid than to fight like that--to plunge into the ocean of life, to wrest happiness from the grim powers of fate, to become ever stronger and more iron in purpose, no matter how things go against us? Oh, it must be sublime!"
But, as before, her appeal failed to wake any response in him.
"Good heavens, Fräulein, when you come to consider it, of what does the much-vaunted battle of life consist?" he said. "Letting yourself be trampled on, sleeping in a cold bed in the winter, and getting nothing for dinner all the year round, I am going to try it, of course, but it's hard all the same. If I had an income I shouldn't feel so bad."