The military looking old gentleman soon knew everything that might be of interest in such a hungry-looking, black-gowned, young theological student. He knew his name, he knew that he came from the famous town of Neustadt, he had heard that a certain Uncle Grünebaum was still in good health and that a no less certain Auntie Schlotterbeck still saw the dead wandering about in the streets. That the theologian had an old mother in Neustadt and that this mother was ill with a serious, painful disease and would perhaps have to die—all this the old gentleman with the gray moustache heard, and the young girl heard it too, moreover with sympathy, as it seemed, for she had raised her head and turned it towards where the young man was sitting. Her face was kind, but not beautiful; it was her eyes that were beautiful, with which, however, she could not see the theologian but only the broad back of the landlord of the Post-horn Inn. The landlord blocked her view as well as that of the young man whom he was questioning so eagerly.
How angry the wind was outside, and how unmistakably it showed its fury! It blustered round the house as if mad and shook every window at which its ally, the night, the dreary autumn night, the enemy of man, the enemy of light, looked in. Oh, how angry the wind and the night were with the travelers who were now so safe from them; how angry with the fat landlord of the Post-horn Inn and with the landlady and the landlady's rosy daughter! No pursuer whose victims had escaped into some inviolable sanctuary could be more angry.
But who was it who at this moment emphatically snapped out the words: "That impudent Jew!"....
Was it the wind or was it the night?
No, it was the elderly military gentleman with the moustache and if there had been any doubt that by this kindly designation he meant our friend Moses Freudenstein, whose name Hans Unwirrsch had just mentioned, he dissipated such doubt immediately by adding:
"A conceited, impudent Jewish brat, if it's the rogue to whom, lately, in Paris, I had to give a piece of my mind! Wasn't it so, Fränzchen? Moses Freudenstein, yes, that was the name. Won't you move nearer, sir; come over here to this table; it's an evening for people to gather close together and I shall be glad to make your nearer acquaintance and to hear something further about this Moses."
The landlord and his family, wondering much at this sudden interruption, had turned to the speaker, and Hans, much excited by this unsuspected attack on his friend, had risen.
With no trace of timidity he began Moses Freudenstein's defense from where he sat; but the old gentleman waved his hand soothingly.
"Come, come; always keep step! Right, left! Right—now the wind has the floor again. Just listen to its blustering outside! This is the sort of weather that takes away even a pastor's appetite for a dispute. Come over here, candidate, and have a glass of punch; and don't take it amiss if I've done it again and said something unsuitable;—I suppose I have, for here's my niece pulling my coat-tail."
Perhaps at that moment it would have been quite agreeable to the young lady if the landlord had still stood between her and the theological student; but the view was now perfectly open and nothing prevented our Hans from thanking with a glance the blushing child who had pulled the coat of the owner of the gray military moustache.