Several other farewells were before me--my worthy pastor, old Mother Lieschen, with whom since the Canoness's departure I had chatted a short time on many evenings, and finally my honored patron, Uncle Joachim. I made the leave-taking with the first two as brief as possible. I felt reluctant to use deception toward the good old pastor, and yet I could not tell him the whole truth. But, spite of his eighty years, his eyes were still keen enough to perceive the real state of affairs, so that a shake of the hand was sufficient to make us understand each other.
Mother Lieschen was not in her hut. I could only leave a farewell message, in which I wrapped a small gift of money. Uncle Joachim I found in the fields, where he was overlooking the laborers in place of the steward, who was ill.
I thought it needless to maintain any secrecy toward him. He listened quietly, and his sharp, expressive features showed no signs of surprise.
"I have seen it coming," he said at last, sending forth vehement puffs of smoke from his short pipe. "The farce is excellent, though no longer perfectly new; such things have frequently occurred before, though the exit is usually different. Well, I'm not anxious about you, Sir Tutor, and I shall at least have the advantage of no longer seeing that intriguing woman's face opposite. Believe me, my dear friend, I, too, would gladly take to my heels and try to earn my bit of daily bread elsewhere, even if it should be as head-groom or steward on the estate of one of my former equals and boon companions. But there is my sister-in-law, poor thing. Who knows what her pious husband might do, if the last person in whose presence he is obliged to control himself should go away? You know the proverb about us natives of the Mark--that, though we never burned a heretic, we never produced a saint. Well, if there were a Protestant Pope, he should canonize that poor martyr for me on the spot."
Then, after we had shaken hands, he called me back again.
"You must do me the favor to keep this whole abominable story a secret, Sir Tutor," he said. "I could not blame you if you blazoned it abroad, for, after all, you are the one who is injured, and, if we can get no other satisfaction, to rage and call things by their right names relieves the bile. Still, remember that the honorable man who has thus injured you bears the same name as our Luise, to say nothing of myself. True, the girl has made haste to lay it aside. If you should ever meet her in the outside world, give her a tender greeting from Uncle Joachim, and tell her to bestow a sheet of letter-paper on him. Well, may God be with you, my dear friend! Heads up always, then we see the sun, moon, and stars, and not the wretched worms that crawl on this foul earth."
As he uttered these words, he clasped me affectionately in his arms, and kissed me on both cheeks. Then, turning abruptly away, he went back to his work.
In the afternoon I sat in the self-same butcher's cart in which I had made the journey to the castle. Krischan maintained a diplomatic silence, though I could not doubt that, like the other servants, he was perfectly aware of the nocturnal incident and its unpleasant consequences. Yet I perceived that the popular voice was not against me, for several times on the way I was obliged to refuse a drink from the worthy fellow's bottle. In the village, too, many tokens of a friendly and respectful disposition fell to my lot.
Yet, though this time the bays did not have the heavy box of books to drag through the sand, and my conscience was no weightier burden than it had been six months before, the drive, spite of the bright October weather, was a dismal one, and my heart was far from singing hymns as it had longed to do on the former occasion.
I could not help constantly reflecting that a few weeks before the one woman who attracted all my thoughts had passed over this very road to a future which I could paint only in the blackest hues.