When Uncle Grünebaum arrived at his brother-in-law's house he found so many good women of the neighborhood there, giving advice and expressing their opinions, that, in his lamentable capacity of old bachelor and pronounced woman-hater, he could but appear highly superfluous to himself. And he did see himself in this light and would almost have turned back if the thought of his brother-in-law and fellow-craftsman, left miserably alone in the midst of all this "racket" had not enabled him to master his feelings after all. Growling and grunting he pushed his way through the womenfolk and at last did find his brother-in-law in a not very enviable nor brilliant position and attitude.
The poor man had been pushed completely aside. Mrs. Tiebus had taken measures to exclude him from his wife's room; in the living room among the neighbors he was also entirely superfluous; Master Grünebaum finally discovered him sitting in a miserable heap on a stool in the corner where only the cat that was rubbing against his legs showed any sympathy for him. But his eyes were still shining with that radiance that seemed to come from another world; Master Unwirrsch heard nothing of the women's whispering and chattering, saw nothing of the confusion that reigned among them, nor did he see his brother-in-law till the latter seized him by the shoulder and, not very gently, shook him back to consciousness.
"Give a sign that you're still in the land of the living, Anton!" growled Master Grünebaum. "Be a man, and drive the womenfolk out, all of them except—except Auntie Schlotterbeck there. For although the devil takes them one and all, odd and even, still she is the only one among them that lets a man get in a word at least once an hour. Won't you? Can't you? Don't you dare to? Well, then catch hold of my coat behind till I get you out of this tumult in safety; come upstairs and let things go on as they will down here. So the boy is here? Well, praise be to God, I began to think we'd waited in vain again."
The two fellow-craftsmen pushed their way sideways through the women, got out into the passage with difficulty, and mounted the narrow creaking stairs that led to the upper story of the house. There Auntie Schlotterbeck had rented a small living room, bedroom and kitchen, which left only one room at the disposal of the Unwirrsch family, and that was stuffed so full of all kinds of articles that scarcely enough space remained for the two worthy guild-brothers to squat down and exchange the innermost thoughts of their souls. Boxes and chests, bunches of herbs, ears of corn, bundles of leather, strings of onions, hams, sausages, endless odds and ends had here been hung, or flung, stuffed or stuck below, above, before, beside and among one another with a skill that approached genius, and it was no wonder that Brother-in-law Grünebaum lost his second slipper there.
But through both the low windows the last rays of the sun shone into the room; the comrades were safe from Mrs. Tiebus and the neighbors.... They sat down opposite each other on two boxes and shook hands for five well-counted minutes.
"Congratulations, Anton!" said Nikolaus Grünebaum.
"I thank you, Nikolaus!" said Anton Unwirrsch.
"Hooray, he is here! Hooray, long may he live! And again, hoo—" shouted Master Grünebaum with the full power of his lungs, but broke off when his brother-in-law held his hand over his mouth.
"Not so loud, for mercy's sake, not so loud, Nik'las. The wife is right underneath us here and has trouble enough as it is with all those women."
The new-made uncle let his fist fall on his knee: