Edi sat over his history book and Ritz had a book of his own before him, but looked over it at Sally and listened to her explanation. Now Edi lifted his head--he must have come upon something very particular.
"Papa," he said, "now I know for certain what I want to be: a sea-captain. Then I can sail around the world, for _sometime_ I must see all the lands where all these things have happened."
"So, I thought you wanted to be a professor of history," remarked the father, not much disturbed by this piece of news.
"I want to be that, too," said Ritz, "I, too, want to sail in ships."
"No, you see, Ritz, two brothers must not be the same thing, else they get in each other's way," instructed Edi.
"Then I will be a sea-robber, they too sail in ships," Ritz comforted himself.
"We will not hope anything of the kind," said the father behind his church paper.
"And do you remember, Ritz, what I once told you about Julius Caesar?" Edi reminded him. "If I were to catch you like that, then I should be obliged to have you killed."
"No, I do not want that! But what can one be with ships?" Ritz asked plaintively, for if Edi expressed a thought, then it usually remained firmly in Ritz's head.
"One can be also something very good without ships, my dear Ritz," the mother said comfortingly, "and that is much safer; then one stays on firm land, and I should advise you to stay. And what does our Erick want to be? Has he too thought of that?"
"I must become an honorable man," answered Erick at once.
But the father put down his book and said, nodding at the boy: "That is right, Erick, go toward that goal: first, and above all, an honorable man; after that, every calling is all right."
Now the mother rose, for it was time to go to bed. Edi and Ritz took Erick between them and thus marched ahead of the mother to conduct him to his little room which was beside their bedroom, so that the door between could be left open, with the advantage that Erick also could be drawn into the nightly conversation. Both Edi and Ritz were delighted with that.
So the Organ-Sunday, which had begun so hostilely, ended quite peacefully.
When on the next morning the pastor's family was at breakfast, the pastor arranged that Erick should not go with the other three to school, since he belonged to the school in Lower Wood and it was now too far to go there. When the other three had gone, then Erick should come to him in his study. So it was decided, and when Erick came into the study the pastor pointed to a seat and said: "Now sit down in front of me"--for he himself sat on the large sofa--"look into my eyes, and tell me everything from the beginning and exactly what happened yesterday before you came into church, also what you intended to do, for I have heard all kinds of things."