The acquittal made no change in the miller's feelings, except, possibly, to intensify them; and perhaps it was so also with Thoma. Still Anton hoped that matters would change for the better; and he was continually studying how he could bring it about. CHAPTER XXXVI. At the capital, the night following the trial was to be spent in revelry and carousal. When Landolin entered the chamber prepared for him at the Ritter inn, he pulled off his coat, and hurling it across the room, exclaimed: "There! I'm rid of it! I've felt the whole time as if I had an iron jacket on." In the great dining-room, where the table was already spread, he walked up and down in his shirt sleeves. The host said smilingly that supper would soon be served. "Are the twelve men all coming?" asked Landolin. "They were all invited, but they seem to have slipped into the ground and vanished." The first to arrive was Landolin's lawyer. He seemed far from being elated with his victory; and in Landolin's manner toward him there was by no means the same dependence and helplessness as before. Then Landolin had treated him as a very sick man does his physician; every word and every glance were welcomed as though fraught with healing. Now Landolin was an ungrateful convalescent, who has come to the conclusion that he has not been sick at all; or, at any rate, that not the physician, but his own good constitution has helped him through. "You are right," said his counsel, "you should have been a lawyer. Your last words turned the scale. It was a master stroke." Landolin accepted this praise as his due, and made no reply. "Call Anton! Where is Anton?" said he, turning to his son. "When I was sending the dispatch I met him at the depot. He went home on the freight train, which usually takes no passengers; but the conductor is an old comrade of his, and smuggled him on board." Landolin whistled, and walked hastily around the table, on which they were just placing the wine-bottles. "Landlord, bring in the supper. Herr Procurator, take this chair beside me. So, this is a different way of sitting down together. I invited all the jurymen,--all. I don't want to know who said guilty, or who said not guilty. I don't want to have an enemy in the world. If they don't come--all right. I've shown how I feel, and that's enough. Landlord, let the witnesses come in, and anybody else that's there. Be sure and call Tobias." Tobias soon appeared. To be sure he had just eaten in the hostler's room; but he wiped his mouth, as though he would say, "If it's necessary I'll do it again." So he sat down next to Peter, and fell bravely to work.