United States or Réunion ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Though, of course, Frielinghausen contributed his mite to such conversations, on the whole he felt very much in doubt which he preferred: the narrow interests of the common soldiers in Room IX., or the well-meant rough good nature of the non-commissioned officers. He rather inclined to Room IX.
The peasant felt impelled to get up every now and then. He was restless; he felt that he must keep looking at the fields that lay around them. But the clerk lay quite still in the short grass, and with blinking half-closed eyes gazed up into the summer sky. Baron Walther von Frielinghausen was made bombardier on July 1st.
Room IX. was still to remain "aristocratic" as Weise satirically remarked even after Baron Walther von Frielinghausen had moved over to the non-commissioned officers' quarters. A few days before the regiment left for the manœuvres, Count Egon Plettau arrived and took possession of Frielinghausen's locker. All kinds of wild reports had been circulating in the battery about Plettau.
Frielinghausen had obtained his discharge from the army. Minna Victoria was the only child and heiress of the manager of a large place of entertainment, and Baron Walther von Frielinghausen played the part of manager in place of his father-in-law, the rather impossible Papa Willy Kettke.
Upon such reflections broke the captain's hearty, friendly words, bringing a glimmer of light into the terrible darkness. To merit the goodwill of this man, to show him that his sympathy had not been unworthily bestowed, was at least an object to live for. Frielinghausen set himself to attain it. He paused near the door sunk in thought, he hardly knew for how long.
He had an impression that Wegstetten wished to hear good of the bombardier, and after all, in the fire-workers, it would not be necessary for Frielinghausen to be a proficient at riding. But the less Frielinghausen knew about horses the more he boasted of his acquirements, when once the riding instruction had come to an end.
Wegstetten resolved to take all the nonsense out of him, and to destroy any delusions the youth might have as to his being in any way privileged. But when Frielinghausen stood before him, an overgrown stripling, whose somewhat angular limbs looked still more immature in the coarse, ready-made uniform; and when he met a pair of anxious young eyes fixed on him, his tone softened perceptibly.
When the corporal had gone off to his rendezvous, Frielinghausen was left in supervision of Room IX. The sergeant-major had arranged it thus, in order that from the very beginning the young man might become accustomed to responsibility. And the charge was quite an easy one. By evening none of the recruits had much inclination to make a noise or to get into mischief.
Frielinghausen also had a letter, which he read with streaming eyes and a glowing face. He held his mother's pardon in his hands, and the love which trembled in her words poured balm and healing on his heart, and raised his desponding spirits. He was another man after this Christmas Eve.
Count Plettau was a mere hopeless idler and vagabond. Frielinghausen was at least inspired with a wish to pull himself together and become good for something.
Word Of The Day