Pastor.
Pardon the interruption; but I have heard your daughter, Miss Marie,
called "the calamity child" by some of the villagers. Has that any
connection with this year of distress?
Mrs. Brauer.
And you didn't know that, Pastor--how she came into our house? Well,
during that same terrible winter, we were returning one night, my
husband and myself, from the town, where we had at our own expense
erected a soup-kitchen--when suddenly, at the corner of the woods
yonder, where the road makes a sharp turn, our horses shied--and there,
in the middle of the road, we saw lying, a woman, with a child pressed
closely to her bosom. She refused to stir and begged us to put her out
of her misery. Of course, we took her into the sleigh at once--ah, she
was in an awful condition----
Brauer.
I tell you, Pastor, it was months before we could rid the blankets of
vermin.
Mrs. Brauer.
And the child, the poor little thing----! But after being bathed and
fed, and lying there, between the clean white covers, we both stood
over its bed--the little thing, with its pinched face, laughed at us
and stretched out its tiny hands--my husband said to me: "Wife, I
believe this is our share of all this sorrow and misery that heaven has
sent us."
Brauer.
For you must know. Pastor, that our own daughter, Gertrude was then
not yet born.
Mrs. Brauer.
No, not until three years later. Well, we bought the child from that
miserable, drunken woman, in proper, legal form--determined and glad to
get rid of her, for she did smell so of gin, I could not endure it any
longer.
Brauer.
That is what the worst drunkards in these parts prefer to brandy.
Pastor.
Unfortunately!!!
Brauer.