At the same moment a merry song was heard at a little distance:
"One bright afternoon I stood to look Into the depths of a silver brook, And there I saw little fishes swim, One of them was grey, I look'd at him. He was swimming, swimming and swimming And with delight seemed overbrimming; I never saw such a thing in my life As the little grey fish seeking a wife."
Lina struggled hard to regain her composure, and then, in spite of the Bible and the Christian requirements demanded of her, she started up and rushed out of the arbour. On her way to the house she passed Mina who was coming out to join her with her sewing. Godfrey followed Lina with long slow steps, and looked as much put out as the clergyman who was interrupted in a very long sermon by the beadle placing the church key on the reading desk and saying that he might lock up the church himself when he had done, for he, the beadle, must go home to dinner. Indeed he was in much the same position as that clergyman. Like him he had wished to preach a very fine sermon, and now he was left alone in his empty church.
Mina was an inexperienced little thing, for she was the youngest of the family, but still she was quick-witted enough to guess something of what had taken place. She asked herself whether she would cry if the same thing were to happen to her, and what it would be advisable for her to do under the circumstances. She seated herself quietly in the arbour, and began to unroll her work, sighing a little as she did so at the thought of the uncertainty of her own fate, and the impossibility of doing anything but wait patiently.--"Bless me!" said Bräsig to himself as he lay hidden in the tree. "This little round-head has come now, and I've lost all feeling in my body. It's a horribly slow affair!"--But the situation was soon to become more interesting, for shortly after Mina had taken her seat a handsome young man came round the corner of the arbour with an fishing rod over his shoulder and a fish basket on his back.--"I'm so glad to find you here, Mina," he exclaimed, "of course you've all finished dinner."--"You need hardly ask, Rudolph. It has just struck two."--"Ah well," he said, "I suppose that my aunt is very angry with me again."--"You may be certain of that, and she was displeased with you already, you know, even without your being late for dinner. I'm afraid, however, that your own stomach will punish you more severely than my mother's anger could do, you've neglected it so much to-day."--"All the better for you to-night. I really couldn't come sooner, the fish were biting so splendidly. I went to the black pool to-day, though Bräsig always advised me not to go there, and now I know why. It's his larder. When he can't catch anything elsewhere he's sure of a bite in the black pool. It's cram full of tench. Just look, did you ever see such beauties?" and he opened the lid of his basket as he spoke, and showed his spoil, adding: "I've done old Bräsig this time at any rate!"--"The young rascal!" groaned Bräsig as he poked his nose through the cherry-leaves, making it appear like a huge pickled capsicum such as Mrs. Nüssler was in the habit of preserving in cherry-leaves for winter use. "The young rascal to go and catch my tench! Bless me! what monsters the rogue has caught!"--"Give them to me, Rudolph," said Mina. "I will take them into the house, and will bring you something to eat out here."--"Oh no, never mind."--"But you mustn't starve," she said.--"Very well then--anything will do. A bit of bread and butter will be quite enough, Mina."--The girl went away, and Rudolph seated himself in the arbour.--"The devil take it!" muttered Bräsig, stretching his legs softly, and twisting and turning, in the vain endeavour to find a part of his body which was not aching from his cramped position. "The wretch is sitting there now! I never saw such goings on!"