to year.  As, moreover, they had no prospect of being intrusted with the repairs themselves, they did not give themselves unnecessary trouble to aid in forcing upon Herr Fritz Nettenmair work and profit for which he himself seemed to care nothing at all.  Hence in the course of the discussion they became more and more convinced that, whatever way you looked at the matter, Herr Fritz Nettenmair too was right.  The inspector, a good man, perhaps grasped their motives and those of the prominent men.  For a time he had listened in silence with a dissatisfied face, when he remembered Apollonius.  He saw something in the latter’s expression that seemed to correspond to his own opinion.  “And what do you say?” he asked, turning to him.

Apollonius modestly came a step nearer.

“I wish you would look at the matter as carefully as possible,” said the councilman.

Apollonius replied that he had already done so.

“I need not draw your attention to the fact that the matter is very important,” continued the councilman.

Apollonius bowed.  The councilman repressed what he had been about to say.  With all its softness and mildness, such strict conscientiousness and obstinate honesty was expressed in the young man’s countenance, that the councilman was almost ashamed of the admonition he had been on the point of giving him.

Apollonius began by stating the results of the examination he had made.  He explained the condition of the places he had been able to test and what might be inferred from that as regarded the others.  As the church accounts showed, no extensive repairs had been made to the church roof for eighty years.  Even though the slate itself, if the material was good, might defy the elements for a long time yet, this was not true of the nails with which the slates were fastened to the lathing and planking.  And wherever he had tested them he had found the nails either entirely destroyed or very nearly so.

It was unavoidably necessary to re-lay the entire slate covering and to replace with new material the rotten spots in the lathing and planking.  Another winter would make the condition of the roof so much worse that there was nothing to be gained by postponing the repairs with the object of saving the interest, for, without greater loss, the repairs could at the most be delayed only till the next year.  He led those assembled to places which might serve as samples.  He did not draw the conclusion himself, but knew how to use the cleverness which he had learnt from his cousin to force his opponents to do that for him.

The councilman’s confidence in and respect for our Apollonius grew visibly.  During the rest of the discussion he appealed almost entirely to him and shook his hand cordially when the left the meeting.  If the undertaking should receive the approval of the Council, which he now no longer doubted, he hoped that Apollonius would take an active part in it, and he requested him to write out a report as to the most practical method of beginning it.  Apollonius thanked him modestly for his confidence, of which he would try to show himself worthy.  As to his taking part in the work itself, he replied that his father, as the master, would have to decide.