Eyes Like the Sea Part 51

"That I did _not_ know."

"With us the laudable custom prevails of going to church every Sunday for the purpose of devotion."

"And to show off your new bonnets."

"Don't make fun of me, please. Esaias is not only the schoolmaster, but the cantor and the organist as well. He has a splendid ba.s.s voice. When he intones the verse--

'How blest the man whose walk in life ...'

the whole podium trembles. It was that wondrously beautiful voice which first enthralled me."

"But I should have thought that the organ would have drowned the sound of the hymn?"

"But not only in church have I had the opportunity of hearing him, but at funerals also."

"Then you condescend to go to funerals too?"

"Not as a habit. But you must know that most of the people there beg me to act as sponsor to their new-born children. Now, two-thirds of our children seem only born to die, and I am obliged to always go to the funerals of my little _proteges_."

"Then Esaias is in the habit of speaking and singing over them?"

"Yes, and what beautiful speeches they are too, all in verse."

"So Esaias is a poet into the bargain?"

"Yes, he really makes most beautiful verses."

"And I've no doubt he wrote a nice onomasticon on St. Elizabeth's Day?"

"He did nothing of the kind. He's not that sort of man. It is not his habit to flatter anybody; on the contrary, he always tells them the truth to their faces."

"That is generally the distinguishing characteristic of all Calvinist schoolmasters."

"Well, but let us keep to the point. I left off at the funerals, I think. I was struck by the frequent mortality among our little ones, and set in movement a project among the ladies of the town for starting a _creche_. The idea found zealous partisans. We soon found a large meeting-room; the ladies supplied linen in large quant.i.ties; milk and other necessary aliments were provided by public subscription; money we resolved to collect in the usual way."

"By a charitable concert?"

"I see that you are a practical man. A charitable concert was indeed arranged, and a committee of seven appointed to manage it. The sessions of this committee were held in my house; mine was the most convenient locality, and I had a piano besides. Each member of the committee had her part a.s.signed to her: one was to recite, another to sing a solo, a third to give a comic reading, a fourth to play a piece on the piano, a fifth to dance a Hungarian dance; I was to fiddle, Esaias was to sing the high priest's aria from the opera of _Nabucco_: 'He who trusts in the Lord!'--You know the rest."

"Of course I do. At the first meeting of the committee one of the members had a slight misunderstanding with another member, at the second meeting a second member had a second misunderstanding, and by the time the fifth meeting was held Esaias and yourself were left to practise alone."

"That is, word for word, what did happen, with this little difference, that we never had any practice at all. On the fifth occasion, four of the six members of the committee sent letters of excuse. Every one of them was ill. It was a veritable epidemic. Only the dancing master found no excuse for himself. As he was the only dancing-master in the town he could not go and lie that he had sprained his foot.

"Esaias walked three times up and down in front of my house, puffing away at his big pipe. Every time he pa.s.sed he looked up at the window, and, seeing n.o.body there, went on farther.

"At last the dancing-master came _cha.s.se_-ing up; I could see from his grinning face that he had some ill-tidings to tell me. Only people who have found some excuse for covering their retreat come smiling like that.

"'My lady! I am inconsolable'--('I know all about _that_!' thought I)--'but I can't come to the concert. Our gipsy musicians have gone to Pest.' ('What do they want there?' I asked.) 'All the gipsy bands in the kingdom have a.s.sembled together for a grand compet.i.tion.... Now, without gipsy music I can't dance. Who can play me the "_Bihari Kesergo_," I should like to know?' ('I will!' I said.) 'Ha! ha! ha! that wouldn't do at all! What? _one_ dancer and _one_ violin-player!--it would be a mere farce.'

"Hereupon Esaias popped in. Seeing through the window that I was no longer alone, he took heart and came in. He had not dared to do so before."

Here I intervened: "If I am not very much mistaken, I know this dear Esaias of yours. It once happened to him, while still a student, that he sat beside the priest's daughter at supper. He did not dare to say a word to her; but in the afternoon he went up the church tower and courted the young lady from one of the windows."

"It is possible that it was he. I, however, made both the gentlemen stay, that at least the coffee and 'cowl-skippers'[113] might not be wasted. They did not wait to be asked twice, but ate with right good will. During the meal we fully discussed the best means of helping forward the stranded concert. Suddenly the dancing-master looked at his watch: 'Gracious me, if it isn't six o'clock! I must be off to give the children of the chief magistrate a dancing-lesson'--and with that he jumped up, kissed my hand, and pirouetted off.

[Footnote 113: A sort of dumpling.]

"Then Esaias also rose from the table, brushed the crumbs of the cowl-skippers from his coat, and said: 'Blessing and peace be with you!'--This was always his parting formula. Such a salutation as 'Your humble servant!' or 'I commend myself to your protection!' n.o.body has ever heard from his lips--no, not even his superintendent; for Esaias is not _humble_ and not _your servant_, and does not commend himself to anybody, nor will he tell a lie even as a matter of form.

"'What! must you go too?' I replied to his 'blessing and peace.' 'You have no six-o'clock school this evening.'

"'No; but why should I stay here if there's to be no practice?'

"'Must I, then, begin singing in my own house before a man?'

"'It depends upon the man,' replied Esaias.

"'What am I to understand by that?' I inquired, much astonished.

"'What are you to understand by that?' said he, striking the leg of his boot repeatedly with his pipe stem--'what are you to understand by that?

It is not very hard to understand, I should think. If a lawyer, a doctor, or a squire were to come to see you and amuse himself here with or without music, not a dog in the village would have anything to bark at; but if they saw the schoolmaster come here at six o'clock in the afternoon--if they saw him, I say, remain here last of all when the other guests were gone, then there would be such a stir in Israel that men would be ready to stone me.'

"'Do I stand, then, in such evil odour as all that?'

"'I did not say that you were in any evil odour at all.'

"'It is true,' he continued, 'that there are as many names written in your alb.u.m as in Charles Trattner's almanack. That, however, does a pretty woman no harm. But me the Church would not forgive. If I get into evil odour, if I overstep the line, I shall be sent packing.'

"'Then celibacy obtains among the Calvinists also?'

"'Not celibacy, but we have the canonical prescriptions. A canonical offence is a very serious business for a Calvinist priest or schoolmaster. Let a man be a veritable John Chrysostom, and it will avail him nothing if he commit a canonical offence.'

"'And _you_ have _never_ committed a canonical offence?' I said to him.

"'Never!' he replied resolutely. And he grew quite red in the face. He was so proud of his virtue."

"Why surely this is quite a new thing?" I interrupted--"a thing never known in the world before: a man who is virtuous, and not ashamed to confess it?"

"Quite unique, isn't it? When I heard this I seized his hand and would not let him leave me. I could read from his eyes that it was the first time he had ever felt the pressure of a lady's hand. 'You have been candid,' I said to him, 'I will be candid also. You would never approach a woman whom you had not led to the altar. I know it. Then you shall lead _me_ to the altar!'

"Even this did not seem to surprise him. His face remained as motionless as a statue.

"'That is soon done,' said he; 'but _respice finem_! Man proposes, but 'tis an old dog that holds on. I am not like other men. I am a very difficult man to get on with. You can't deal with me as with those who look through their fingers at the goings-on of their spouses. If I take you to wife, there must be an end to all this dancing and prancing and gadding about, and flirting and ogling. My wife will not have to go fasting, but she won't be allowed any junketing. I don't understand a joke. Do you see this cherry-wood pipe-stem? If I catch my wife at any piece of trickery, I'll break this cherry-stem across her back--take my word for it.'"

I couldn't help smiling at this. "And you, my dear, pretty ward, have actually taken the schoolmaster to husband, cherry-stem and all?"

"I should like to have taken him, but he didn't surrender himself so easily. I a.s.sured him that I would submit myself to the most stringent discipline of virtue, and if I transgressed against him, I should not mind his beating me. But even that did not vanquish him. By no means whatever could he be brought to sit down beside me on the sofa. He even pushed back the chair on which he was sitting, when he saw that I was besieging him. At last he brought his big guns to bear upon me.