“Yes, and you’ll run back no doubt when we are in the cars,” said her master contemptuously. “Well, then, I shall take my death of cold on the journey—at any rate I shall be spared the trouble of telling Lebermann just how my funeral came off!”
“Well, well, Karl,” said Helen, soothing his dismal forebodings; “seems to me there might be some other way out of your difficulty. Pauline can fetch the great-coat to the station and hand it to you there. Do you understand, Pauline?”
Pauline nodded humbly and departed, while the judge arose and took up the leather bag containing the money and tickets, and enjoined his ladies to make haste. “Put on your things, children—I think the carriage is coming!”
As the party reached the station their happy mood was somewhat dampened, for Pauline and the great-coat were not in sight. All in vain did eager eyes pierce the darkness of night, and all were about to succumb to fate and take their seats in the car, when the long-expected one, like Schiller’s diver, appeared breathless upon the scene, holding the coat on high, and swinging it like a triumphal banner. The judge without delay slipped into the warmer garment, and indeed it was high time, for already the conductor was slamming to the doors of the other compartments,—a sharp whistle, and the train started.
Our three travellers were in the rosiest mood imaginable. Helen, who had not set foot outside of the provincial town, which was now her home, since her marriage, pictured to herself the glories of Berlin in the brightest of hues, and Annchen dreamed vague, golden dreams, and indulged in exquisite air-castles, in which at the decisive moment her unknown hero was always seen leaning out of some window.
The judge was gleefully rubbing his hands.
“Now then—at last we are free of that miserable place,” he said, making himself comfortable in his corner of the compartment. “Now let us all go to sleep and open our eyes to-morrow morning in Berlin!”
The train sped through the night air; and it was not until it had reached Berlin that the Schwarzes awoke with the proud consciousness of being in the Imperial Capital.
The judge put his somewhat dishevelled head out of the window.
“See the hurry and bustle of the crowd,” he said cheerfully. “This is rather different from the streets of Solau! Here the individual disappears like a drop in the ocean, and no one knows or cares what his neighbour is about. Come, children, we must get out!”