Wilhelm Kellar stirred in his bed; Walda was at his side in a moment. Everett followed her. Wilhelm Kellar would have spoken, but his tongue still refused to do his bidding. While he was looking up at his daughter and the physician, Mother Kaufmann bustled in.
“How comes it that thou art here alone with the stranger?” she asked, casting an ugly look upon Walda.
“I am here to serve my father,” said the girl, with a sweet dignity. “Dost thou not know that the Herr Doktor hath assigned me here?”
“He is foolish,” snapped Mother Kaufmann.
“What art thou saying, woman?” asked the school-master, who had just passed through the doorway. “Walda is in her father’s care and in my care. It is not thy concern to ask questions.”
The woman scowled and drew her thin lips tightly over her hideous teeth.
“And thou art a second father to Walda, I suppose?” she sneered.
“Gerson Brandt hath spoken the truth. He is more than father to me in that he is my teacher and my safe counsellor,” said Walda, stepping back towards him.
“Thou art always my sacred charge for whom I pray,” said Gerson Brandt, in a soft voice. “For thee and for thy happiness I would do all things in my power.” There was that in his face which told the man of the world all emotion had not died in the heart beating beneath the queer coat of the school-master.
“Ah, and I pray for thee every night when I ask a blessing for my father,” spoke Walda. “I entreat wisdom and strength for thee.”
Gerson Brandt looked into her eyes and a sudden light illumined his face.
“Thou needest much of divine aid for thy work with little children,” the girl added.
“Yea, yea,” the school-master said, as he turned away.
“Yea, yea, didst thou say?” repeated the shrill voice of Mother Kaufmann. “Just remember that thy conversation should be yea, yea and nay, nay.”
Ignoring the elder woman, Everett gave a few directions to Walda. Then he passed out into the darkening evening.
There was labor for all in Zanah. Early in the morning the villagers took their hasty breakfasts in the kitchens and then went out to work in the mills and fields. The children over six years of age were gathered into the school-houses, the boys being accorded more privileges in the way of learning than the girls, who were not permitted to enjoy the instructions of Gerson Brandt. The future “mothers” of the colony were kept many hours in a rambling building, where they were taught all the domestic arts, with but now and then a lesson from the books borrowed from the school-master. In the very centre of the village stood the _kinderhaus_, where the babes of the colony were tended during the working-hours of their mothers. A wide porch surrounded the _kinderhaus_ on four sides, and a tangled garden of bloom divided it from the street. In a vine-covered arbor, set among the flowers, Walda Kellar was accustomed to spend her hours of meditation during her last month before the _Untersuchung_. It was not long before Everett discovered this fact; and when Mother Kaufmann relieved the girl in the sick-room he often made excuse to speak to her as she went through the little wicket gate. Outside the sick-room, however, she was always the prophetess of Zanah, aloof in manner and difficult to reach by word.