Chapter III Katharine, the maid, had the baby with her in her own room. She understood the care of children; in her younger days she had been a nurse on a nobleman's estate. That was a long while ago. Katharine was now old and thin and worn out, but she had not forgotten about nursing. Indeed she handled the blacksmith's son with the same care and tenderness with which, in her youth, she had tended the child of her aristocratic employers. Ever since the evening when he was born she had kept the boy with her; for it was on that very evening that the mother's lingering death began. The doctor came from Waltheim, for the smith himself brought him; but he could do no good. "Your wife is like a bit of porcelain," said he. "Such a woman cannot stand anything." "Yes--yes!" said Stephen, passing his hand through his thick hair. They were standing in the living room, talking together. "Stephen!" came Maria's feeble, anxious voice from the next room. He went into the bedroom with his heavy tread which he did not know how to subdue. "What is it?" he asked. She held out her hand, as if to signify that he should come nearer. Then he came to the bedside, but his bearing was still exactly as it had been ever since the evening when his brother Ludwig left home. "What--what is the baby's name going to be?" she asked tremulously. "Haven't I told you already?" he answered, looking her straight in the face without wincing. "Not--not that name," she begged. "Don't do that to the child." He turned carelessly away, as if to leave the room. The doctor stood on the threshold with his hat and stick in his hand. "Not--not that name, Stephen," begged the sick woman. "You must not excite her," the doctor whispered to the smith. Maria interrupted. "You speak to him, Sir," she gasped out, more and more excited. "He is going to call the boy Cain." The doctor came near laughing. "You'll not think of doing such a foolish thing," said he to Fausch. The smith stood there with his hands in his pockets. He went back into the living room without answering. The doctor followed him. "Give up your folly! Don't make your wife anxious! As to--the name--it would not do at all, such a name," he said persuasively. The smith stood and let the words pass over his head indifferently, just as he might have let the rain drip down his back. Once only he spoke: "What one is, that he must be called," said he. "You're like a bull," said the doctor angrily. "You have a right to send the child out of the house, but you have no right to disgrace it." A sound of sobbing was heard from the bedroom. The doctor called the maid, who hurried in. "You're like a bull," he repeated to the smith. "Your violence will be the death of your wife."