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Updated: June 9, 2025
They wanted, in his last hour, to be near the old fellow who had led his life as foolishly and light-heartedly as most people, both for his own sake and for Beate's. And so they sat in an adjoining room, while Herr Rauchfuss prepared himself amid great sufferings for his long journey; they sat and drank coffee, which the housekeeper was always making fresh, and ate ham sandwiches.
Frau Rauchfuss knelt by the bed in grief and fear. What was she to do? She simply did not know. To whom could she commend her poor little girl? Now that she had acquired certainty about herself, she felt for the first time her weakness and helplessness. At the physician's words a heavy burden had fallen upon her which she could not shake off.
"Why, Mamsell Rauchfuss," said the little woman with the heart-shaped face, "to what do I owe the pleasure ...?" The strange creature did not answer, but kept on staring. Evidently she was struggling with something that she wanted to say and could not. "Oh, but won't you sit down, Mamsell?" said Herr Leinhose, pulling up a chair to the table.
The eyes of the boarders were no longer directed in anger and injured dignity at the pretty widow, but fell with complacency and sympathy upon the weeping girl, who now found friends at the expense of another, as so often happens if one loses, another must win. "Really, can none of us do anything to help Mamsell Rauchfuss to compose herself?"
But Beate Rauchfuss said, "Oh, let them come it doesn't make any difference." "Of course they all run after you, because they think there's something to get," said Röse. "You'd better tell them you don't mean to have anything to say to them. What do you want of them? You've got us!"
He sat in his armchair, and seemed to be busy with something that was not there. "Go," he said, "or stay, if you like!" And then he began to stroke the cat, which was not there. "Father," said the girl, "what's the matter with you? What kind of a joke is this? The cat isn't there." "You goose," said Herr Rauchfuss, "have you got a hole in your eyes big enough for the cat to get through?"
"You old fool!" said Frau Kummerfelden. "What was it kept your property in such fine condition? Was it your wife's beauty, or her ability?" "Ah, bah! Of course non-essentials have their use too. But the main thing ... Look she might have gone down on her knees to me, and I'd never have married Frau Rauchfuss if she hadn't been such a fetching little thing."
"Don't cry," she said "I shall be all right." Frau Rauchfuss looked down into a pair of earnest and determined eyes. "Put your head down on my shoulder again, and don't worry," said the child. The mother's heart was wonderfully lightened; she felt that she had with her a noble little being who could bring her comfort.
In the last hard moments of the struggle she felt that she had some one noble and strong by her, comforting her with silent power. And now Captain Rauchfuss was all alone with his little "Tubby." His wife had often been an uncomfortable companion to him. He had imagined something quite different under the name of a wife; and now it was not so very different with his little "Tubby."
On a fine summer afternoon Frau Marianne, the young widow, came wandering up to the Ettersberg through the swelling fields, and asked for Mamsell Beate Rauchfuss, whom she found in the garden. The child was lying asleep on the lawn that was used for bleaching, and did not wake when the stranger approached her. "Queer," thought the young widow, "to lie and sleep like that!
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