To this delicate question the minister was unable to give a satisfactory reply.
"But is it not the case that I shall there still be the wife of Herr Levetinczy?" asked Timéa, with lively curiosity. To this the Herr Pastor was glad to reply, with gracious readiness, that that would certainly be the case.
"Well, then, I shall ask Herr Levetinczy, when we both go to heaven, to keep a little place for my father, that he may be with us; and surely he will not refuse me?"
The reverend gentleman scratched his ear violently, and thought he had better lay this difficult point before the church synod.
The third day he said to Timar that it would be best to baptize and marry the young lady at once: then her husband could give her instruction in the other dogmas.
The next Sunday the sacred rite was celebrated. Timéa then for the first time entered a Protestant church. The simple building, with its whitewashed walls and unornamented chancel, made a very different impression on her mind from that other church, out of which the naughty boys had chased her when she peeped in. There were golden altars, great wax tapers burning in silver candelabra, pictures, incense filling the air, mysterious chants, and people sinking on their knees at the sound of a bell. Here sat long rows of men and women apart, each with their book before them, and after the precentor had set the tune, all the congregation joined in unison. Then silence, and the minister mounted the high pulpit and began to preach without any ceremony. He did not sing, nor drink from the chalice, nor show any holy relics—only talk, talk on.
Timéa sat in the first row with her sponsors, who led her to the font, where another long sermon was preached. At last it was over; the neophyte bowed her head over the basin, and the minister baptized her, in the name of the Trinity, "Susanna." She wondered why she should be called Susanna, as she was quite satisfied with her own name.
Then they all sat down again and sung the eighty-third psalm, "Oh, God of Israel," which awoke in Timéa a slight doubt as to whether she had not been turned into a Jewess.
All her doubts vanished, however, when another minister arose, and read from the chancel a document which set forth that the noble Herr Michael Timar von Levetinczy, of the Swiss Protestant Church, had betrothed himself to Fraülein Timéa Susanna von Tschorbadschi, also of the Swiss Protestant religion.
Two more weeks must pass before the marriage. Michael spent every day with Timéa. The girl always received him with frank cordiality, and he was happy in his anticipations of the future. He generally found Athalie with his bride, but she made some pretext for leaving the room, and her mother look her place.