"Oh, you have grown grey, perhaps for me--!" he said, deeply moved.
"Yes, maternal cares age one early."
He flung himself in the grass before her, unable to speak. She passed her hand gently over his bowed head: "Ah, if my poor son had only returned a happy man--how my heart would have rejoiced. If you had brought back a dear wife from the city, I would have helped her, done the rough work to which she was not accustomed--and if you had had a child, how I would have watched and tended it! If it had been a boy, we would have trained him to be the Christus--would we not? Then for twenty years he could have played it--your image."
Freyer started as though the words had pierced his inmost soul. She did not suspect it, and went on: "Then perhaps the Christus might have descended from child to grandchild in your family--that would have been beautiful."
He made no reply; a low sob escaped his breast.
"I have often imagined such things during the long years when I sat alone through the winter evenings! But unfortunately it has not resulted so! You return a poor lonely man--and silver threads are shining in your hair too. When I look at them, I long to weep. What did those wicked strangers in the outside world do to you, my poor Joseph, that you are so pale and ill? It seems as if they had crucified you and taken you down from the cross ere life had wholly departed; and now you could neither live nor die, but moved about like one half dead. I fancy I can see your secret wounds, your poor heart pierced by the spear! Oh, my suffering child, rest your head once more on the knee of her who would give her heart's blood for you!" She gently drew his head down and placing one hand under it, like a soft cushion, lovingly stroked his forehead as if to wipe away the blood-stains of the crown of thorns, while tear after tear fell from her long lashes on her son--the son of a virgin mother.
Silence reigned around them--there was a rustling sound above their heads as if the wind was blowing through palms and cedars--a weeping willow spread its boughs above them, and from the churchyard wall the milkwort nodded a mute greeting from Golgotha.
[CHAPTER XXXV.]
THE WATCHWORD
While the lost son of Ammergau was quietly and sadly permitting the miracle of his home to produce its effect upon him, and rising from one revelation to another along the steep path which again led him to the cross, the countess was languishing in the oppressive atmosphere of the capital and its relations.