The week was drawing to a close, and the burgomaster was now obliged to consider the question of the distribution of parts. He found the patient out of bed and wearing a very cheerful, hopeful expression.
"I don't know, Herr Freyer, whether I can venture to discuss my important business with you," he began timidly.
"Oh--I understand--you wish to know when I can play again? Next Sunday."
"You are not in earnest?" said the burgomaster, almost startled.
"Not in earnest? Herr Burgomaster, what would be the value of all my oaths, if I should now retreat like a coward? Do you think I would break my word to you a second time, so long as I had breath in my body?"
"Certainly not, so long as it is in your power to hold out. But this time you cannot! Ask the doctor--he will not allow it so soon."
"Am I to ask him, when the question concerns the most sacred duty? I will consult him about my life--but my duties are more than my life. Only thus can I atone for the old sin which ten years ago made me a renegade."
"And you say this now--when you are so happy?"
"Herr Burgomaster," replied Freyer with lofty serenity: "A man who has once been so happy and so miserable as I, learns to view life from a different standpoint! No joy enraptures, no misfortune terrifies him. Everything to which we give these names is fluctuating, and only one happiness is certain: to do one's duty--until death!"
"Herr Freyer! That is a noble thought, but if your wife should hear it--would she agree?"