"Is Johanna there?" he asked Elly, who was peeping at the congregation through a crack in the door.
She started as if she had been caught committing a theft, for she had just at that moment seen the Herr Kandidat, who was by this time seated in the parsonage pew.
"What's the matter?" asked Leo.
Whereupon Hertha threw her arm round her waist protectingly, and gave him a hostile look.
"Allons," he said, smiling, and then set his face, for he knew that as he came into the church the gaze of all his tenants would be fastened upon him.
The first thing he saw was Johanna's dark eyes with a peculiar light in them. She fixed them on him unflinchingly. He gave her a careless, indifferent nod, but took care that the girls as well as his mother should fill the places in the pew between him and his eldest sister. He had no wish to be disturbed in his worship by the near proximity of the gloomy, inscrutable face.
The pastor had mounted the pulpit and thrown himself on his knees, with his head resting against the edge of the pulpit cushion. His face remained buried in his arms, and only the well-oiled dome of his skull flashed down on the congregation. Leo gave him a scrutinizing upward glance, and murmured to himself, with a sly smile, "He's feeling sick, I'll bet."
Just above the worthy man's crown a wisp of hair stood on end, and, like a reed in the wind, flopped hither and thither. Leo's father used to gauge the sabbatical alcoholic condition of the stout minister by this unmistakable sign. The knowledge had early descended from father to son, and when his old tutor was in a good humour Leo had many a time teased him about it.
"Wonder how he'll come through the ordeal," thought he. For of course the old fellow would have to refer to the home-coming of his high-born patron and send up a prayer of thanksgiving to Heaven. He leaned back comfortably in his seat, twirled his thumbs, and felt prepared to sit through cheerfully the service of praise which seemed especially ordained to glorify himself. The sunbeams danced everywhere, casting little shafts of red, green, and yellow light on the steps of the altar, the desks of the choir, and the tiles of the floor, illuminating the grey faces of the old, and making the bright colouring of the young more radiant. They climbed up the leaden organ-pipes and sat laughing on the brown-paper hymn-books. The branches of the limes swayed gently against the stained-glass windows, as if they too wished to greet the returned squire; and when the leaves swept the window-panes there was a rustling and murmuring, like children whispering to each other before falling asleep. A peaceful dreamy atmosphere of home reigned in the quiet little church.
Pastor Brenckenberg lifted his head. From his bloated countenance his eyes, full of gloom and bull-dog obstinacy, surveyed the congregation. They passed from one to the other as if they would have liked to devour one after the other. When they reached Leo they remained riveted.