The Legend of the Glorious Adventures of Tyl Ulenspiegel in the land of Flanders Part 25

Soetkin did not like to say anything more, for she was not mistress of the house. So she told her son to go and do as Katheline had bidden him. Ulenspiegel ran to the tavern and brought back with him the four quarts of dobbel kuyt. And soon the kitchen reeked with the good smell of pancakes, and every one felt hungry, even the poor afflicted Katheline.

Ulenspiegel ate heartily, and drank heartily also, for Katheline had given him a full tankard, saying, with a malicious look, that it behoved him to drink more than the others seeing that he was the only male and the head of the house. Afterwards she asked him to give them a song.

But Ulenspiegel did not sing, and Nele was all tearful, seeing Soetkin so pale, and as it were all sunken into herself. Katheline alone of them all appeared to be happy.

When the meal was over Soetkin and Ulenspiegel went up into the loft to bed. Katheline and Nele stayed behind, for they slept together in the kitchen.

All was quiet until the second hour after midnight. Ulenspiegel had already been asleep for a long time because of all the beer he had been drinking. But Soetkin, as her custom was, lay on with eyes wide open, praying Our Lady to send her sleep, but with no avail.

All of a sudden she heard the cry of a sea-eagle, and from the kitchen came a like cry, in answer. Then, from far off in the country somewhere, other cries resounded, always as it seemed in answer to that cry in the kitchen just below.

Soetkin tried to think it was only the night-birds calling to one another, and endeavoured to distract her attention from those sounds. But presently she heard a neighing of horses and a noise as of iron sabots beating along the high road. Then it was that she opened the window of the loft and saw that in very fact there were a couple of horses saddled just outside the cottage, pawing the ground and nibbling the gra.s.s that grew by the side of the road. Thereafter she heard the voice of a woman crying out in fear, and a man's voice threatening, followed by the sound of blows, more cries, a door shutting with a bang, and then steps running up the ladder in mortal fear:

All this time Ulenspiegel was snoring away in his bed, hearing nothing, till the door of the loft opened and Nele came in, out of breath, sobbing, and with scarcely anything on. As hastily as she could the girl dragged against the door a table, some chairs, an old heating stove, any bit of furniture that was to hand. With these she made a rough-and-ready barricade. Meanwhile, outside, the last stars were paling in the heavens and the c.o.c.ks beginning to crow.

Ulenspiegel had turned over in his bed at the noise Nele was making, but now he had gone to sleep again. Nele, meanwhile, had thrown herself on to Soetkin's neck.

"Soetkin," she said, "I am afraid. Light the candle, do!"

Soetkin did so, and all the time Nele never left off moaning. By the light of the candle Soetkin looked the girl up and down. Her shift was torn at the shoulder and in front, and there were traces of blood upon her neck and cheek, such as might be left by the scratch of a finger-nail.

"Whence have you come? And what are these wounds?" Soetkin asked her.

Trembling and groaning all the time, the girl made answer:

"For mercy's sake, Soetkin, do not bring us to the stake!"

Ulenspiegel meanwhile had awakened from his sleep, and was blinking his eyes in the sudden light of the candle. Soetkin said:

"Who is it down there?"

"Not so loud!" Nele whispered. "It is the husband Katheline desired for me."

All at once Soetkin and Nele heard Katheline cry out in a loud voice, and their legs gave way beneath them in their terror.

"He is beating her," said Nele, "he is beating her because of me!"

"Who is it in the house?" cried Ulenspiegel, jumping out of bed. And then, rubbing his eyes, he went stalking up and down the room till at last he found a heavy poker that stood in the corner. He took hold of it, but Nele tried to dissuade him, telling him that there was no one there. But he paid no attention, running to the door and throwing to one side the chairs and tables and the stove that Nele had piled up in front of it. All this time Katheline was crying out from the kitchen, and Nele and Soetkin held Ulenspiegel--the one by the waist, the other by the legs--and tried to prevent him from descending the stairs. "Don't go down," they told him. "Don't go down, Ulenspiegel. There are devils down there."

"Forsooth," says he, "Nele's devil-husband! Him verily will I join in marriage to this long poker of mine! A marriage of iron and flesh! Let me go!"

But they did not loose their hold, hanging on as they were to the landing rail.

And all the time Ulenspiegel was trying to drag them down the staircase, and they the more frightened as they came nearer to the devils below. And they could avail naught against him, so that at last, descending now by leaps and bounds like a s...o...b..ll that falls from the top of a mountain, he came into the kitchen. And there was Katheline, all exhausted and pale in the light of dawn.

"Hanske," she was saying, "O Hanske, why must you leave me? Is it my fault if Nele is naughty?"

Ulenspiegel did not take any notice of her, but straightway opened the door of the shed, and finding no one there, rushed out into the yard, and thence into the high road. Far away he descried two horses galloping off and disappearing in the mist. He ran after them hoping to overtake them, but he could not, for they went like a south wind that scours the dry autumn leaves.

Ulenspiegel was angry with disappointment, and he came back into the cottage grieving sore in his heart and muttering between his teeth:

"They have done their worst on her! They have done their worst!..."

And he looked on Nele with eyes that burned with an evil flame. But Nele, all trembling, stood up before Katheline and the widow.

"No!" she cried. "No, Tyl, my lover! No!"

And as she spoke she looked him straight in the face, so sadly and so frankly that Ulenspiegel saw clearly that what she said was true. Then he spake again, and questioned her:

"But whence came those cries, and whither went those men? Why is your shift all torn on the shoulder and the back? And why do you bear on forehead and cheek these marks of a man's nails?"

"I will tell you," she said, "but be careful that you do not have us burned at the stake for what I shall tell you. You must know that Katheline--whom G.o.d save from h.e.l.l--hath had these three-and-twenty days a devil for her lover. He is dressed all in black, he is booted and spurred. His face gleams with a flame of fire like what one sees in summer-time when it is hot, on the waves of the sea."

And Katheline whimpered: "Why, oh why, have you left me, Hanske, my pet? Nele is naughty!"

But Nele went on with her story:

"The devil announces his approach in a voice that is like the crying of a sea-eagle. Every Sat.u.r.day my mother receives him in the kitchen. And she says that his kisses are cold and that his body is like snow. One time he brought her some florins, but he took from her all the other money that she had."

All this time Soetkin kept on praying for Katheline, with clasped hands. But Katheline spake joyfully:

"My body is mine no more. My mind is mine no more. O Hanske, my pet, take me with you yet once again, I beg you, to the Witches'

Sabbath. Only Nele will never come. Nele is naughty, I tell you."

But Nele went on with her story:

"At dawn," she said, "the devil would go away, and the next day my mother would relate to me a hundred strange things. But, Tyl dear, you must not look at me with those cruel eyes.... Yesterday, for instance, she told me that a splendid prince, clad in grey, Hilbert by name, was anxious to take me in marriage, and that he was coming here himself that I might see him. I told her that I wanted no husband, handsome or plain. Nevertheless, by weight of her maternal authority she persuaded me to stay up for him, for she certainly keeps all her wits about her in whatever pertains to her amours. Well, we were half undressed, ready to go to bed; and I had gone off to sleep sitting on that chair. It seems that I did not wake up when they came in, and the first thing I knew was that some one was embracing me and kissing me on the neck. And then, by the bright light of the moon, I beheld a face that shone like the crests of the waves of a July sea when there is thunder in the air, and I heard a low voice speaking to me and saying: 'I am your husband, Hilbert. Be mine! I will make thee rich.' And from the face of him that spake these words there came an odour like the odour of fish. Quickly I pushed that face away from me, but the man tried to take me by force, and although I had the strength of ten against him, he managed to tear my shift and scratch my face, crying out the while that if only I would give myself to him he would make me rich. 'Yes,' I answered, 'as rich as my mother, whom you have deprived of her last liard!' At that he redoubled his violence, but he could not do anything against me. And at last, since he was more disgusting than a corpse, I scratched him in the eye with my nails so sharply that he cried out with pain, and I was able to make my escape and run up here to Soetkin."

And all this while Katheline kept on with her "Nele is naughty. And why did you go away so soon, O Hanske, my pet?"

But Soetkin asked her where she had been while wicked men were attempting the honour of her child.

"It is Nele that is naughty," Katheline replied. "As for me, I was in company of my black master, when the devil in grey comes to us, with his face all b.l.o.o.d.y. 'Come away,' he cries, 'come away, my boy, this is an evil house; for the men, it seems, are of a mind to fight with one to the death, and the women carry knives at the tips of their fingers.' And there and then they ran off to their horses, and disappeared in the mist. Ah, Nele, Nele! She is a naughty la.s.s, I tell you!"

XLVI

On the following day, while they were making a meal of hot milk, Soetkin said to Katheline:

"You see how misfortune is already driving me from this world; and yet you, it seems, would like to drive me away all the faster by your accursed sorceries!"

But Katheline only went on repeating: