Chapter 4

IN THE HAPPY VALLEY.

About the time that Leonhard Marten was paying for his ticket in the dépôt at A----, how many events were taking place elsewhere! Multitudes, multitudes going up and down the earth perplexed, tempted, discouraged. What were _you_ doing at that hour? I wonder.

Even here, at this Spenersberg, was Frederick Loretz--with reason deemed one of the most fortunate of the men gathered in the happy valley--asking himself, as he walked homeward from the factory, "What is the use?"

When he spied his wife on the piazza he seemed to doubt for a second whether he should go backward or forward. Into that second of vacillation, however, the voice of the woman penetrated: "Husband, so early? Welcome home!"

The voice decided him, and so he opened his gate, passed along the graveled walk to the piazza steps, ascended, wiping the perspiration from his bald head, dropped his handkerchief into his hat and his hat upon the floor, and sat down in one of the great wide-armed wooden chairs which visitors always found awaiting them on the piazza.

His wife, having bestowed upon him one brief glance, quickly arose and went into the house: the next moment she came again, bringing with her a pitcher of iced water and a goblet, which she placed before him on a small rustic table. But a second glance showed her that he was suffering from something besides the heat and fatigue. There was a look on his broad honest face that told as distinctly as color and expression could tell of anguish, consternation, remorse. He drank from the goblet she had filled for him, and said, without looking at his wife, "I have brought you the worst news, Anna, that ever you heard." She must have guessed what it was instantly, but she made neither sign nor gesture. She could have enumerated there and then all the sorrows of her life; but for a moment it was not possible even for her to say that this impending affliction was, in view of all she had endured, a light one, easy to be borne.

"It has gone against us," said Mr. Loretz, picking up his red silk handkerchief and passing it from one hand to another, and finally hiding his face within its ample dimensions for a moment.

"Do you mean the lot?" Her voice wavered a little. Though she asked or refrained from asking, something had taken place which must be made known speedily. Wherefore, then, delay the evil knowledge?

He signified by a nod that it was so.

"And that is in store for our poor child!" said the mother.

Mr. Loretz was now quite broken down. He passed his handkerchief across his face again, and this time made no answer.

Then the mother, with lips firmly compressed, and eyes bent steadily upon the floor, and forehead crumpled somewhat, sat and held her peace.

At last the father said, in a low tone that gave to his strong voice an awful pathos, "How can the child bear it, Anna? for she loves Spener well--and to love _him_ well!"

"Oh, father," said the wife, who had by this time sounded the depth of this tribulation, and was already ascending, "how did we bear it when we had to give up Gabriel, and Jacob, and dear little Carl?"

"For me," said the man, rising and looking over the piazza rail into the gay little flower-garden beneath--"for me all that was nothing to this."

"O my boys!" the mother cried.

"We know that they went home to a heavenly Parent, and to more delight and honor than all the earth could give them," the father said.

"It rent the heart, Frederick, but into the gaping wound the balm of Gilead was poured."

"There is no man alive to be compared with Albert Spener."

"I know of one--but one."

"Not one," he said with an emphasis which sternly rebuked the ill-timed, and, as he deemed, untruthful flattery. "There is not his like, go where you will."

"Ah, how you have exalted him above all that is to be worshiped!" sighed the good woman, putting her hands together, and really as troubled and sympathetic, and cool and calculating, as she seemed to be.

"I tell you I have never seen his equal! Look at this place here--hasn't he called it up out of the dust?"

"Yes, yes, he did. He made it all," she said. "It must be conceded that Albert Spener is a great man--in Spenersberg."

"How, then, can I keep back from him the best I have when he asks for it --asks for it as if I were a king to refuse him what he wanted if I pleased? I would give him my life!"

"Ah, Frederick, you have! It isn't you that denies now--think of that! Remind him of it. _Who_ spoke by the lot? Where are you going, husband?"

Mr. Loretz had turned away from the piazza rail and picked up his hat. His wife's question arrested him. "I--I thought I would speak with Brother Wenck," said he, somewhat confused by the question, and looking almost as if his sole purpose had been to go beyond the sound of his wife's remonstrating voice.

"Husband, about this?"

"Yes, Anna."

"Don't go. What will he think?"

"Nobody knows about it yet, except Wenck, unless he spoke to Brother Thorn."

"Oh, Frederick, what are you thinking?"

"I am thinking"--he paused and looked fixedly at his wife--"I am thinking that I have been beside myself, Anna--crazy, out and out, and this thing can't stand."

"Husband, it was our wish to learn the will of God concerning this marriage, and we have learned it. The Lord----"

"I will go back to the factory," said Mr. Loretz, turning quickly away from his wife. "I must see if everything is right there before it gets darker." He had caught sight of the tall figure of a woman at the gate when he snatched up his hat so suddenly and interrupted his wife. Then he turned to her again: "Is Elise within?"

"No, husband: she went to the garden for twigs this afternoon."

"She had not heard?"

"No. It is Sister Benigna that is coming. Must you go back?" She poured another glass of water for her husband, and walked down the steps with him; and coming so, out from the shade into the sunlight, Sister Benigna was startled by their faces as though she had seen two ghosts.

Two hours later, Mr. Loretz again turned his steps homeward, and Mr. Wenck, the minister, walked with him as far as the gate. They had met accidentally upon the sidewalk, and Mr. Loretz must of necessity make some allusion to the letter he had received from the minister that day acquainting him with the allotment which had made of him so hopeless a mourner. The good man hesitated a moment before making response: then he took both the hands of Loretz in his, and said in a deep, tender voice, "Brother, the wound smarts."

"I cannot bear it!" cried Loretz. "It is all my doing, and I must have been crazy."

"When in devout faith you sought to know God's will concerning your dear child?"

"I cannot talk about it," was the impatient response. "And you cannot understand it," he continued, turning quickly upon his companion. "You have never had a daughter, and you don't understand Albert Spener."

"I think," said the minister patiently--"I think I know him well enough to see what the consequence will be if he should suspect that Brother Loretz is like 'a wave of the sea, driven with the wind and tossed.'"

Yet as the minister said this his head drooped, his voice softened, and he laid his hand on the shoulder of Mr. Loretz, as if he would fain speak on and in a different strain. It was evident that the distressed man did not understand him, and reproof or counsel was more than he could now bear. He walked on a little faster, and as he approached his gate voices from within were heard. They were singing a duet from _The Messiah_.

"Come in," said Loretz, his face suddenly lighting up with almost hope.

Mr. Wenck seemed disposed to accept the invitation: then, as he was about to pass through the gate, he was stayed by a recollection apparently, for he turned back, saying, "Not to-night, Brother Loretz. They will need all the time for practice. Let me tell you, I admire your daughter Elise beyond expression. I wish that Mr. Spener could hear that voice now: it is perfectly triumphant. You are happy, sir, in having such a daughter."

As Mr. Wenck turned from the gate, Leonhard--our Leonhard Marten--approached swiftly from the opposite side of the street. He had been sitting under the trees half an hour listening to the singing, and, full of enthusiasm, now presented himself before Mr. Loretz, exclaiming, "Do tell me, sir, what singers are these?"

Mr. Loretz knew every man in Spenersberg. He looked at the stranger, and answered dryly, "Very tolerable singers."

"I should think so! I never heard anything so glorious. I am a stranger here, sir. Can you direct me to a public-house?"

To answer was easy. There was but the one inn, called the Brethren's House, the sixth below the one before which they were standing. It was a long house, painted white, with a deep wide porch, where half a dozen young men probably sat smoking at this moment. Instead of giving this direction, however, Loretz said, after a brief consultation with himself, "I don't know as there's another house in Spenersberg that ought to be as open as mine. I live here, sir. How long have you been listening?"

"Not long enough," said Leonhard; and he passed through the gate, which had been opened for the minister, and now was opened as widely for him.

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