Tales of the Wonder Club Volume II Part 10

"Humph!" replied the host, little pleased at this personal allusion; but he drew a chair to the table and made an effort at being sociable.

My ancestor until now had hardly had time to give more than a cursory glance at the features of his host, but finding himself now at table opposite him, he took a minute survey of his countenance in all its details.

The exterior of our host was striking, to say the least. He was a man of about five-and-forty, of middle height, broad rather than tall. His neck and chest might have served as a model for the Farnese Hercules. His hair and beard, which were matted and unkempt, were of a flaming red, and he was just beginning to turn bald. His brow was low, knotted, and streaked with red. His eyebrows, which were of the same tint as his hair, were enormous, and overhung a pair of small, deep-set brown eyes that moved furtively from right to left with the rapidity of lightning, giving to his countenance a remarkably sinister expression.

His complexion was florid, and the nose, which was large and bottle-shaped, was of so bright a red that it made the eyes water to look upon it, and spoke little for its owner's temperance. His ears, large and red, stood out at the sides of his head like those of an animal, and their orifices were carefully protected by fierce tufts of red hair. The back part of his head was excessively developed, and the jaw was large and ma.s.sive. His arms were very muscular, and hairy as an ape's, with strongly-defined purple veins, and his hands, the fingers of which were short and stunted, were the colour of raw meat. The legs were somewhat short for the body, and slightly bowed.

My ancestor, as he scanned the grim features of his host, could not help imagining himself a prince in a fairy-tale who had been lured by the evil genius of the storm into the castle of some ogre, who would sooner or later devour him unless rescued by the good fairies. The ogre was not a communicative person. He had not opened his mouth once since he had taken his seat at the table, save to toss down a gla.s.s of schnaps.

At length the Englishman, curious to know something of the life and habits of this mysterious individual, was the first to break silence.

"You live in a very isolated spot, mine host," said he.

"Ja," was the laconic reply.

"Have you no nearer neighbours than those of the township?" demanded his guest.

"Nein," grunted the ogre.

"And do you enjoy this solitary existence?" pursued the traveller.

"Ja!" was the inevitable monosyllabic response.

"I shall not get much out of him," said my ancestor to himself, and again there was silence for the s.p.a.ce of five minutes.

As if searching for some topic wherewith to renew the conversation, the student cast his eyes round the apartment, taking in at a glance the minutest article of furniture or other commodity that the room contained.

It was a homely, undecorated apartment, built after the fashion of the period, and differed little from most other apartments of the sort. If it was remarkable for anything, it was for its extreme simplicity, not to say nakedness, but there was one object hanging on the wall that at once attracted the traveller's eye. It was a two-handed sword of peculiar shape, and appeared bright and sharp as if ready for use.

"Aha!" exclaimed the Englishman, fixing his eye on the object, "you have been a soldier, I see."

"Not I," said the host.

"No? Ah! I see that your sword is not of the same form as those used in battle. It is probably antique--an heirloom, perhaps."

The man answered with a nod of the head.

"I thought so," said the stranger; "and yet it seems bright and well cared for. It has evidently been sharpened lately. Do you always keep it well sharpened?"

"On great occasions, yes," was the reply, and our host gave a peculiar wink, accompanying it with a significant gesture with both hands, in imitation of wielding the two-handed instrument over his head, then slapping his own neck he uttered a low whistle and a sort of chuckle thus: "Wh--ew!--click!" being his mode of expressing the action of cutting off a head.

"Ho! ho!" exclaimed the Englishman, "is that in your line?"

The ogre answered by a savage laugh.

At this moment the crying of a child was heard overhead, together with the harsher tones of its mother scolding it.

"Then you do not live perfectly solitary, as I thought," said the student; "you have also wife and children?"

"One boy only," replied the man.

"Ah! An only son--a great pet, I'll warrant," said his guest, finishing his last morsel of supper. "What age may he be?"

"Ten years old--fine boy--just like me--bringing him up like his father," said the strange individual.

"If he turns out like his father, he'll be a beauty," thought my ancestor. Then he asked aloud of his host:

"And what profession may that be that you wish to apprentice him to?"

"Like his father," was the curt reply; but it was followed by the same sort of expressive gesture that I have just described.

"What!" exclaimed the student, "to cut off people's heads?"

"Yes," replied the ruffian; "I am a Scharfrichter."

"A what?" inquired my ancestor, who though he could make himself generally understood in German, had never yet come across the word "Scharfrichter" in his vocabulary.

"A Scharfrichter," repeated the man, raising his voice. "Don't you know what that means? Why, one who cuts off heads."

"An executioner!" muttered the foreigner, half-aloud. "Have I been constrained to crave the hospitality of an executioner?"

These words were inaudible to his host, but the ruffian evidently observed a change in his guest's countenance when he informed him of the nature of his profession, for he hastened to reply.

"One sees at once that you are a foreigner, and unused to the customs of this country. You shudder at meeting an executioner, and sicken at the thought of cutting off a head. No matter, it is always so at first. In fact, the pleasure derived from seeing executions is an acquired taste; but I'll show you some sport to-morrow. There is to be some rare fun down at the township at daybreak," and the wretch gave another wink and a chuckle. "I'll show you how to cut off a head. One blow--click!--cuts like cheese."

"Horrible being!" muttered my ancestor to himself in his native tongue.

"Is it possible that anything human can actually revel in such brutality?" and he shuddered in spite of himself. Then he said aloud to his host--

"What was it that first gave you a taste for so horrible a profession?"

"Hm! I hardly know. I had a natural genius for it, I suppose. My father was a butcher, and I was brought up from infancy to see cattle slaughtered. At a very early age I took to slaughtering the animals myself. I seemed to take a liking to it from the very beginning. I happened to have an uncle at that time who was a Scharfrichter, and my greatest delight was to see him cut off the heads of the criminals. I began to long to do the same.

"I was a very young man when this uncle died, and as he had no male issue to take his place, and no one else seemed to come forward, I thought I would offer my services, and they were accepted. I have been headsman of the town these thirty years, and when I die my son will step into my shoes."

"But if he doesn't take to it?"

"He _must_ take to it--he'll _have_ to take to it."

"Why, are there not many other n.o.ble professions just as inviting as that of chopping off the heads of one's fellow-mortals?"

"Not for the son of a headsman. I see you are ignorant of the laws of this country. Here in Germany the son of a headsman is bound by law to adopt the profession of his father, and should the executioner have a daughter instead of a son, in that case, the man who marries his daughter is bound to be headsman. Then the Scharfrichter is obliged to build his house a mile away from other men, for he is a being hated and shunned by everyone."

"This then is the reason of your solitude?"

"It is; and so far is this superst.i.tious fear of contamination carried in this country, that your citizen considers himself defiled if by chance he has eaten out of the same plate that a headsman has once used.

Accordingly all vendors of crockery have orders to knock a chip out of every earthen vessel that they sell to the headsman."

"Dear me!" exclaimed my ancestor, "what a peculiar custom! I never heard that before. I certainly did remark that your crockery was in a most dilapidated state, but I didn't consider the remark worth making, although more than once in the course of the evening I felt inclined to ask you how on earth you contrived to knock out chips of such a peculiar shape by mere accident."