Vinzenz Lesa blew such thick clouds of smoke from his pipe that his wife found it advisable to let them disperse a little. Then she said cautiously, “I think we had better hear first what Mr. Delrick has to say. It will be a blessing to be able to talk to him. What do you say about going to Freiburg?”
“I wouldn’t think of going,” said her husband curtly. “You don’t suppose I’ll go as far as that for no reason whatever. Why should I go to Freiburg, as if I had nothing else to do?”
“Nobody who knows you could possibly think that,” said his wife. “Besides, Mr. Thornau hasn’t fixed it on a Sunday for nothing. He knows well enough you wouldn’t come during the week. He asks us most politely, and it would have been easy for him to tell any other person to fetch the children home. Apparently, he would value it very much if we took the children to him. I must admit, Vinzenz, that I have grown extremely fond of them. They have both clearly shown me how they hate to leave. I’d love to go and put them into his hands myself.”
“Why don’t you go with them, then?” he retorted, still showing an obstinate disinclination in his voice. “You had better go to Freiburg. You are sufficient escort for them.”
“No, Vinzenz, I won’t do it,” answered his wife with firm decision. “You can see from the letter that Mr. Thornau wants you, too. You also know that I couldn’t settle with Mr. Delrick what is further to be done about the boy. We’ll either go together, or we won’t go at all. It is for you to decide.”
The silence which followed proved too long for Mrs. Lesa and she began again. “I don’t really see why we shouldn’t go to Freiburg as long as they ask us to. Don’t you remember how delighted we used to be as children when father and mother would take us there on a Sunday? We were the happiest creatures on earth sitting in the high carriage between them with such exciting adventures before us. We really should do it for memory’s sake. We always went to church first and heard the beautiful organ. Do you remember how your mother insisted on doing this first of all? Wouldn’t it give you pleasure to go back? It also would give you a splendid chance to run over to your farm. You ought to have looked it over long ago, and you are sure to find lots of things to attend to. Now that Jos is with us, you can leave much more easily than afterward. You’ll have a lot of important things to do there, and if nothing special takes you there, you’ll never make up your mind to go. You had better take the journey before something actually goes wrong and you might have reason to blame yourself for not having gone before.”
The thought that the trip might have a good side had begun to take hold of Vinzenz Lesa. Very deliberately, but still unwillingly, he replied, “How did you think of all these things? I don’t see how we could be away so long. It would take at least three days.”
“Not for everybody,” replied Mrs. Lesa promptly, for she had thought out everything minutely. “We can easily attend to things here on Sunday morning before leaving. We’ll be in Freiburg early in the afternoon and that same evening I’ll travel home as far as I can with the children, in order to get here as soon as possible on Monday morning.”
“How many children do you expect to bring home? The two strangers will have gone and you yourself have only one.”