e Sergeant Schumann, only separated from the Heppners by a
partition wall, sat at the round table by the sofa with his wife.

Their room, with its antimacassars, its upholstered furniture, its
flower-pots and canary-bird, its sewing-machine in the window, was more
like an old maid's best parlour than a soldier's sitting-room. The
small, neat-featured mistress herself, who was not very strong, and
always, even in summer, wore a little shawl round her shoulders, suited
her surroundings admirably.

She had a thousand small cares, and one great grief: that they were
childless. But she never troubled her husband with her sorrow, taking
care to bear it alone. He had bothers enough in the service; how often
did she not hear his voice storming outside! He should have peace at
home. One thing only she could not bear without complaining to him: the
terrible quarrellings of their neighbours. She shuddered whenever she
heard the strife begin afresh; and gradually out of this had grown an
aversion from all this noisy life. She became a most zealous advocate
of her husband's plans for retiring; and could scarcely find patience
to await the moment when he would put off the richly-laced coat beside
which she had formerly been so proud to walk. In her heart she had
always been rather against the martial calling, and would take
Schumann's sword from him as though it dripped blood.

All this would cease when he changed his military coat or the handsome
dark uniform of a railway-official; all this discomfort would come to
an end; above all, this noise: the shouts and curses with which
recalcitrant recruits had to be knocked into shape, the trampling of
nailed boots on the stone stairs, the bellowing of commands on the
parade-ground, and--last, but not least--the hideous racket next door.

The sergeant-major had almost finished his time of service. A post
awaited him as assistant at a small railway-station in the
neighbourhood; and once when Schumann was away at the practice-camp,
she had not been able to resist the temptation to see the place for
herself. It was on a branch-line, which wound up among the hills. The
station was a little distance from the village in a green plantation.
She yearned after the peaceful spot.

And now Schumann had again begun to speak of remaining on in the army!

His wife let him talk, listening patiently. She sat quietly opposite to
him, giving him his supper as usual, as busy and attentive as though he