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Although the family were entirely obliging, Rudi, odd to say, occupied himself the most about the trip. He seemed wonderfully keyed up and more full of military talk even than usual. He insisted on seeing about time-tables, hotels to be recommended, the favorite dishes and brews to be called for at each stopping place for local tone. Kirtley was pleased over his friendly attentions.
"Maybe you do! But everybody here has had a shot at Barbarossa's ring, although nobody has won it yet!" answered Rudi. "What is that about Barbarossa's ring?" asked a stranger who had never been in Goeschenen. "That's Barbarossa's ring, over there," said Rudi.
Exzellenz will excuse me...." It was a revolting spectacle, but it did not make the least impression on the son, who, putting down his cap and great-coat and unhooking his sword, led me into a kind of study. "These orderlies are such thickheads!" he said. "Rudi! Rudi!" a hoarse, strident voice screamed from the hall. The lieutenant ran out. "You've got to take the fellow to Berlin to-night.
Somehow, through it all, they were to deprive him of his state paper likely when he had become intoxicated, as was evidently planned. But the revelation about the Buchers! That was the finishing blow. "Dastards!" Gard hurled out the word. It was not only Rudi but his parents who had followed his leadership.
"We are coming," several voices answered from some children immediately behind him. It was Max, Hans and Simi, and then Stoffi and Rudi behind them, but they were all. Kurt halted. "Where is the whole troup?" asked Kurt. "Let us wait till they catch up. We must all stay together up there." But none followed. All the answer Kurt got to his question was the screaching of an owl.
"Essen fertig!" was soon vociferated up the stairway by the cook Tekla, whose bulky young form Gard had glimpsed in the kitchen. Not sure of being summoned he did not emerge until Ernst tapped on the door "Meester Kirtley, please come to eating." At table the elder son was introduced Rudolph, called Rudi, a youth of about Gard's age.
The Bucher children, like usual German children, were in effect dedicated to the Government, consecrated to its uses. It could come in and did come in and take this boy or girl for that and that one for this. It had designated Rudi for hydraulic engineering and indicated his university course to that end. Ernst was selected for philosophy. The parents were not only willing but proud of this.
"She has no spoon," said Rudi, who was seated on the other side, and had long been wondering why anybody should sit at table and not eat as long as there was any thing left. "Oh, yes, of course," said his mother. "Who would ever have thought that we should need six spoons? We have always found five enough; and we must have another knife too. Why can't you speak?
He believed he had, on the contrary, grown in their estimation, as had Rudi after his "experience." The poor Herr Kirtley was considered a much abused victim of an unfortunate sickness. Once Frau exclaimed: "Ach Himmel! our sons have such a hard time of it!" When he began to eat ravenously after his enforced abstinence, hearty foods and heavy drinks were supplied.
Pauci, et, ut ita dixerim, non modo aliorum, sed etiam nostri superstites sumus, exemptis e media vita tot annis, quibus juvenes ad senectutem, senes prope ad ipsos exactae aetatis terminos per silentium venimus. Non tamen pigebit vel incondita ac rudi voce memoriam prioris servitutis ac testimonium praesentium bonorum composuisse.
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