"You DARE not!" he cried aloud, "you dare not sell it, I say! It
is not yours alone; it is ours--"
Strehla flung the emptied jug on the bricks with a force that
shivered it to atoms, and, rising to his feet, struck his son a
blow that felled him to the floor. It was the first time in all
his life that he had ever raised his hand against any one of his
children.
Then he took the oil lamp that stood at his elbow and stumbled off
to his own chamber with a cloud before his eyes.
"What has happened?" said August a little while later, as he
opened his eyes and saw Dorothea weeping above him on the wolfskin
before the stove. He had been struck backward, and his head had
fallen on the hard bricks where the wolfskin did not reach. He sat
up a moment, with his face bent upon his hands.
"I remember now," he said, very low, under his breath.
Dorothea showered kisses on him, while her tears fell like rain.
"But, oh, dear, how could you speak so to father?" she murmured.
"It was very wrong."
"No, I was right," said August; and his little mouth, that
hitherto had only curled in laughter, curved downward with a fixed
and bitter seriousness. "How dare he? How dare he?" he muttered,
with his head sunk in his hands. "It is not his alone. It belongs
to us all. It is as much yours and mine as it is his."
Dorothea could only sob in answer.
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