Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: June 2, 2025
Fausch knew as well as anybody else that people left Cain no peace. The boy had gone through the secondary school at Waltheim, and was now learning the blacksmith's trade with his father. Thus he was free from the jeers and teasing of his schoolmates, but yet the smith saw that the disgrace clung to him.
Then indeed, he stepped into one of the ale houses, which are numerous in Waltheim, as in every village, took his morning drink, but said nothing here, either, about what had brought him to town, and then took himself off homeward, as surly as he had come. "He's watching his boy," said the Waltheimers, and thought themselves very clever to have found this out.
All the way over the long road from Waltheim the slander had followed them, which they had come so far to avoid. And this gossip and scandal could follow Cain through the whole world just as easily as it had come here. There was no avoiding it! And it is your fault, Stephen Fausch, that the boy must be pursued by scandal his whole life long. But ha ha, it is fair, perfectly fair!
Thus the smith had butted his head through two walls. At home, in Katharine's attic room, lay the child, whose brow had just been branded with a shameful mark, and slept and throve; for the maid understood the care of babies. During the next few days, Maria was carried away from the smithy to the churchyard at Waltheim. This gave the village people plenty to talk about.
Neither did he show any change in his bearing, but remained sullen and reserved as always, and seemed at first to have forgotten that he had half promised the boy his protection against the persecution of the Waltheim lads. Nevertheless, the two powers were still struggling within him, and neither got the upper hand, because both were equally strong.
Hallheimer looked after them and tried to recollect something. Had he not heard rightly, or had not the smith just now called his boy "Franz?" Had the old man been converted? Was he trying to wipe away the mark of shame from the poor fellow? The wagon with its creaking wheels rumbled comfortably along the road, into the strip of woodland and out again, toward Waltheim.
They looked stupidly at one another. But one, an impudent fellow, who had a brandy flask behind him on the ground, even at this early hour, said: "That's a fine name you have!" Then they laughed again still louder. "My name? " stammered Cain. For a moment he did not know what they meant; but suddenly the blood rushed to his face. The story of his shame had made the long journey from Waltheim here!
For this reason many pitied his wife, and this was why she cringed; she had grown used to cringing. In Waltheim, the village to which the smithy belonged, a bit of news had been traveling about for some time: Ludwig Fausch was gone, and had been sent away by his brother, the smith, on account of Maria, his wife. She was going to have a baby! Finally Ludwig More they would not say.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking