"Ha! our ex-court-organist. The same ill-boding frown between the brows as in 1737! You are little changed in thirteen years. And I, at fifty-three, am grown to be a first lieutenant."
"You proved a friend to my son in his danger," said Sebastian, "and are therefore welcome to me and mine. To what lucky chance am I indebted for this visit to my quiet home?"
"To the most unlucky, my dear sir! I was so careless, at the prime minister's last court, as to tread on the left fore paw of his lady consort's lapdog. The beast cried out; the countess demanded satisfaction; and in punishment for my misdeed I am marched as first lieutenant to Poland in the body-guard of his excellency."
Sebastian felt a horror creep over him at the sarcastic, misanthropic wit of his visitor, and sought to change the conversation. But Scherbitz went on jesting in his bitter way about his tragical destiny, concluding with the information that he had come over to Leipzig simply to see Papa Bach once more in his life; for, on the word of a first lieutenant, he had loved and honored him since the first time he had seen him thirteen years ago.
The next morning Scherbitz walked in the little garden behind Thomas's school, bounded by its high wall. He saw Caroline fastening a vine to an espalier, and came to assist her. In a conversation with her, he learned that none of the daughters of Bach had any talent for music. The charming singing he had heard early in the morning was by Madam Bach. But Caroline had a poetic taste, and was Friedemann's favorite sister.
In talking with Friedemann, his friend could not fail to discover the morbid state of his mind. Scherbitz thought it came from thinking too deeply.
"Not the will," he said, "but action removes mountains. We are but philosophers, and the slaves of circumstances. Had not the minister played the spy on you and his pretty niece, had not I stepped on the lapdog's foot, we might both have been at this moment sitting quietly in Dresden; you beside Natalie, witching the world with music; I as a merry page of fifty-three, jesting and enduring."
"Do you know," said Friedemann, and as he spoke his countenance altered strangely, "I have often prayed that I might be mad, for a time—not for ever!" In a quick, vehement tone, "Oh! no—no—not for ever; but mad enough to forget. And yet, the memory of what I have suffered would even then cling to me!"
He pressed his hands with a wild gesture over his eyes.
"You must not talk so wildly," said the lieutenant soothingly. "You are yet young, and can accomplish much."