This eBook was produced by David Widger <widger@cecomet.net>
[NOTE: There is a short list of bookmarks, or pointers, at the end of thefile for those who may wish to sample the author's ideas before making anentire meal of them. D.W.]
By Georg Ebers
The old captain blew the dust from the wine flagon and carefully removedthe seal. His presence prevented Wolf from renewing the interruptedconversation.
Reflection doubtless warned him that it would be a dangerous venture toenter the same life-boat with this woman, yet how bewitchingly beautifulshe had seemed to him in her proud superiority, in the agitation of soularoused by the yearning for a fairer fate! Have her he must, even thoughhe was permitted to call her his own but for a year, a month, an hour.
Many of her words had been harsh and apparently unfeeling, yet how noblemust be the soul of this young creature who, for the sake of being loyalto truth, the pure source of everything grand and lofty, paid no heed tomuch that is usually sacred to human beings!
But Barbara's conduct during the next hour appeared to belie this opinionof the man who loved her, for scarcely had her father sat down with theknight before the venerable wine flagon than she flung down the smoothingiron, hastily piled the finished articles one above another, and then,without heeding the parchment on which Wolf's verses were written, rolledup the ruby velvet. Directly after, with the package under her arm, shewished the men a merry drinking bout, and added that poor Ursel mightneed her. Besides, she wanted to show her the beautiful material, whichwould please the faithful soul.
Then, without even pausing at the rooms in the second story, she hurriedswiftly down the stairs into the street.
She was carrying Wolf's gift to Frau Lerch, her dressmaker.
The Grieb, where the latter lived as wife of the keeper of the house, wasonly a few steps distant. If the skilful woman, who was indebted to herfor many a customer, began the work of cutting at once, her cousins, theWollers, could help her the next day with the sewing. True, these werethe very girls who would "turn yellow with rage" at the sight of thevelvet, but precisely because these rich girls had so many things ofwhich she was deprived she felt that, in asking their aid, she wascompelling Fate to atone for an injustice.
Haste was necessary for, at the first glance at the velvet, she haddetermined to wear it at the next dance in the New Scales, and she alsosaw distinctly in imagination the person whose attention she desired toattract.
True, the recruiting officer sent to Ratisbon, of whom she was thinking,was by no means a more acceptable suitor, but a handsome fellow, a scionof a noble family, and, above all, an excellent dancer.
She did not love him—nay, she was not even captivated by him like somany others. But, if his heart throbbed faster for any one, it wasBarbara. Yet perhaps his glances strayed almost as frequently to oneother maiden. The velvet gown should now decide whether he gave thepreference to her or to pretty Elspet Zohrer—of course, only in thedance—for she would never have accepted him as a serious suitor.
Besides, the young noble, Pyramus Kogel, himself probably thought of nosuch folly.
It was very different with Wolf Hartschwert. She had been told the smallamount of his inheritance long before, and on that account she would havebeen