“God be praised, I am with you again!” he said, drawing a deep breath; “it seems to me as if all danger were past when I am again in our quiet house with you and the children.”
“No, my beloved husband, it is just here that dangers are threatening you,” said the young wife, sinking into the open arms of her husband, and reposing her head on his breast. “My God, why did you return?”
“Because I was afraid when I was far from you, while I feel here with you courageous enough to brave the whole world,” said her husband, almost cheerfully, imprinting a glowing kiss on the forehead of his young wife. “Believe me, Anna, a husband always lacks the right kind of courage when he believes his wife and children to be in danger. For six days I have been separated from you; well, in these six days, which I have spent in perfect security at Erlangen, I have not passed a minute without feeling the painful palpitation of my heart, nor have I slept a minute. I always thought of and trembled for you.”
“But we are in no danger, while YOU are, my beloved,” said the young wife, sighing. “Our house is closely watched, you may depend upon it. I have seen French gens-d’armes hidden behind the pillars of the church, and staring for hours at our street-door. Oh, if they knew that you were here, they would arrest you this very night!”
“They would not dare to arrest me!” exclaimed Palm, loudly. “We do not yet belong to France, although the Emperor of France has assumed the right of giving the ancient free city of Nuremberg to Bavaria, as though she were nothing but a toy got up in our factories. We are still Germans, and no French gens-d’armes have any right to penetrate into our German houses. But look, the children are moving; little Sophy is opening her eyes. What a barbarian I am to speak so loudly, and not even to respect the slumber of our little ones!”
He hastened to the small bed, and bending over it, nodded smilingly a greeting to the little girl, who was staring at him, still half asleep. The child whispered, in a low voice: “Dear, dear father!” and fell quietly asleep again.
“Come, Anna,” whispered Palm, “let us go to your room, in order not to disturb the children.”
“But the spying eyes of our enemies might see you there,” said his wife, anxiously. “No, let us stay here, even though we should awaken the little girls. They will not cry, but be happy to see their beloved father, and what we are speaking to each other they cannot understand. Come, let us sit down here on the small sofa, and permit me to place the screen before it; then I am sure nobody will be able to see you.”
She conducted Palm to the small sofa in the corner of the room, and placed the screen as noiselessly as possible before it.
“So,” she said, nestling in his arms, “now we are here as if in a little cell, where only God’s eye can find us. So long as we are in this cell I shall not be afraid.”