The Merchant of Berlin Part 5

Mr. Kretschmer frowned. "_Spener's Journal_ always has some wonderful news, and amuses the Berlin people with all kinds of stupid gossip,"

grumbled he. "The rivalry of such a paper is unbearable."

"Well, how about the miscellaneous intelligence?" asked the printer's boy.

Mr. Kretschmer stamped his foot angrily. "Go to the devil!" said he.

At this moment there was heard a loud crying and shouting; and while the printer's boy pitched out of the door, Mr. Kretschmer hurried to the window to find out the cause of the uproar.

A heaving, noisy crowd filled the street below, and had halted right under the editor's window. In the midst thereof was seen the tall, lank figure of a man, whose extraordinary appearance enchained the attention of the mult.i.tude, and excited afresh their shouts and derisive laughter. And, in fact, nothing could be more striking or fantastic than this man. Notwithstanding the cool October weather, his gigantic figure was clothed from head to foot in gray linen, harmonizing strangely with the gray color of his skin and hair, which latter fell in long locks from his uncovered head down on his shoulders, and gave to the apparition the semblance of a pyramidical ash-heap, out of which his eyes shone like two burning coals. Around his shoulders hung a long cloak of gray linen, which, in addressing the mult.i.tude, he sometimes threw around him in picturesque folds, sometimes spread out wide, enveloping his long arms in it, so that he looked like an expanded bat.

"Ah! it is Pfannenstiel, our prophetic linen-weaver," said Mr.

Kretschmer, smiling, as he opened his window, and exchanged a look of recognition with the man who was gazing up at him.

The linen-weaver and prophet had rapidly acquired some renown in Berlin by his prophecies and predictions. The people believed in his mystic words and soothsayings and mistaken fanaticism. He related to them his visions and apparitions; he told about the angels and the Lord Jesus, who often visited him; about the Virgin Mary, who appeared in his room every night, and inspired him with what he was to say to the people, and gave him pictures whose mystic signification he was to interpret to them. The prophet possessed more than a hundred of these pictures, given him by celestial apparitions. He had them carefully pasted together, and rolled up always with him. These pictorial sheets, roughly painted on coa.r.s.e paper, served the linen-weaver in lieu of cards or coffee-grounds, for the purpose of prophesying to the people and announcing the future to them; and the good folks of Berlin believed in these prophecies with firm faith, and listened with devout confidence to the words of their prophet.

Pfannenstiel was in the act of unrolling his pictures, and the mult.i.tude, which, just before, had been shouting and screaming, became suddenly silent, and gazed up at the weaver with intense expectation.

A breathless silence ensued, and, far down the street, sounded the prophet's loud and sonorous voice. He pointed to the last of his pictures, which, in coa.r.s.e, clumsy drawing, represented a town, from the houses of which flames arose in the most variegated colors.

"Behold! behold!" cried the prophet, "and fall on your knees and pray!

Yes, pray! for I tell you the Holy Ghost appeared to me, His wings dripping with blood, and in His burning and flaming beak He held this picture which I now show you."

"Well, then, how is it that the picture is not burnt too, if the Holy Ghost held it in His burning beak?" asked an impudent shoemaker's boy.

A low laugh ran through the crowd, but this was soon suppressed by angry, threatening voices, commanding silence and quiet.

The prophet turned with an air of majestic composure toward the questioner: "Why was not this picture burnt? Because G.o.d wished to perform a miracle, to manifest Himself to me in His glory, and to prove to me that this vision was from Him, and not from the devil.

Yes, indeed, G.o.d gave me this picture that we might be warned--not to terrify us. Listen, therefore, to my voice, and learn what G.o.d announces to you from my mouth."

"I would like indeed to hear what the stupid rascal is going to announce to these poor foolish devils," muttered Mr. Kretschmer, leaning out of the window and listening attentively.

Pfannenstiel continued: "Behold these columns of fire rising from the houses of this town. This town is Berlin, and the fire will burst out of the roofs of your houses. Woe! woe! will sound in your streets, and weeping and lamentation will fill the air. I say unto you, watch and pray! Strew ashes on your heads, and fall down on your knees and pray to G.o.d for mercy, for the enemy is before your gates, and ere the sun sets the Russians will enter your town! I say unto you, verily I say unto you, G.o.d spoke to me in a voice of thunder, and said, 'The Russians are coming!' Fall down and pray, for the Russians are coming!"

"The Russians are coming!" cried the terrified mult.i.tude and some among them turned pale. The weeping women folded their hands in prayer; the men looked around timidly, and the frightened children clung to their mothers in dread of the Russians, whose name was synonymous with that of savages and cannibals. Even Kretschmer could not help feeling somewhat terrified. He drew back thoughtfully from the window, muttering with a shudder, "The Russians are coming!"

The people crowded around the prophet in still narrower circles, and in more piercing tones wept and cried out: "What shall we do? What shall we do to be saved? Have mercy, O G.o.d! Have mercy on Berlin, for the Russians are coming!"

"Yes, they are coming!" cried Pfannenstiel. "G.o.d told me so in the roll of His thunder and the lightning of His eyes; and he said to me: 'Go and say to the people of Berlin, "The Russians are coming!" and thou shalt see in the same hour how their hearts will shrink, and how cast down they will be; how their eyes will run tears, and their lips utter prayers, for the Russian is the sworn enemy of the Berlin people; and as often as the cry, "The Russians are coming," sounds through the streets of Berlin, there will be wailing and lamentation in every house and every heart; and they will bow down in timid contrition and abject obedience. Speak, therefore, to them, and say, "The Russians are coming!" that they may become humble and quiet; that the proud word may be silenced on their lips, and that they may submit in peace.'"

"What shall we do?" asked the people. "Help us, advise us, for thou art our prophet."

Pfannenstiel drew himself up to his utmost height, and an expression of triumphant cunning sparkled in his eyes. "Do you not understand the voice of G.o.d? G.o.d commands you to withdraw in silence and peace to your own dwellings, to weep and pray. Go, then! Let the word of your mouth and the rebelliousness of your hearts be silent. Go home to your huts, shut the doors and windows, and do not venture out, for without, death and the Russians await you!"

Obedient to the voice of their prophet, the crowd separated in different directions, and dispersed quietly.

Pfannenstiel looked after them with a smile of scorn; then silently rolled up his pictures, threw his gray cloak over his shoulders, and, casting a serious and significant look up at Mr. Kretschmer's window, strode down the street slowly and with an air of majestic dignity.

CHAPTER VI.

THE COWARDS' RACE.

The warning sounded loud and threatening in Mr. Kretschmer's ears--"The Russians are coming!" A cold chill ran through him, and he could not prevent an involuntary shudder. But he tried to rouse himself from this despondency, and laughed at himself for this credulous fear.

"This Pfannenstiel is a fool, and I would he a greater one if I believed his nonsense," said he. "No, no, my information is warranted and authentic. The king has had a sharp skirmish with the Russians near Reitwan, and driven them back, and then proceeded quietly to Meissen. Thus there is no ground for anxiety, and I can safely let off my bomb-sh.e.l.ls against the Russians."

Mr. Kretschmer felt his courage return and his heart grow warm.

"Now I see the whole game," cried he, laughing. "Pfannenstiel wishes the _Vossian Gazette_ to take notice of him. He wants to be talked about, and wishes the newspapers to spread his reputation. For that reason he stationed himself right under my window, for that reason he cast such significant looks at me, for that reason he addressed the crowd and poured forth his nonsense right here. Yes, that's it! He wishes to prove to me how great his power is over this people which believes in him, even when he utters the most incredible and unheard-of things. Well, we can help the man," continued he, laughing, as he stepped to his desk. "The desired article for the 'Miscellaneous' is found, and I think that the prophetic linen-weaver, Pfannenstiel, is well worth more than the four children at a birth and the miserable stork's nest of yesterday's _Spener's Journal_. Let's write it off quickly."

Kretschmer began to write most industriously, when he was suddenly interrupted by a violent knocking at the door. It opened, and a stately old gentleman entered, with well-powdered wig and long queue.

"Mr. Krause, my worthy colleague!" exclaimed Kretschmer, jumping up and hastening toward the old man. But Mr. Krause had no word of greeting. He sank sighing into a chair.

"Do you know the news?" asked he, in a whining tone, folding his trembling hands, and looking at Kretschmer timidly, as he stood before him.

"Know what?" demanded the latter in reply, feeling his heart sink.

"The Russians are coming!" sighed Mr. Krause.

"That is a silly tale," cried Kretschmer peevishly, with an impatient gesture.

"Would to G.o.d it were!" groaned Krause; "but the news is, alas, but too true, and it can no longer be doubted!"

"Man of misfortune," cried Mr. Kretschmer, "who told you so?"

"Pfannenstiel."

"Pfannenstiel?" repeated Kretschmer, laughing heartily; "oh, yes!

Pfannenstiel prophesied it just now in the streets, under my window.

Now don't distress yourself, dearest friend and colleague. That was only a clumsy trick of the scoundrel to get me to write an article about him in the _Vossian Gazette_. I have already gratified his wish."

"You are mistaken," said Krause, mournfully. "I sent Pfannenstiel into the streets, to quiet the people, and to admonish them to behave peaceably and soberly, even if the Russians should come."

"Oh! you believe in all these dreams of Pfannenstiel?"

"I believe in the truth, and in what I know!" exclaimed Krause emphatically. "Pfannenstiel has for a long time been my agent, and for a considerable stipend, paid every month, informs me of all that happens, is talked and thought of in the town. He is a very useful man, peculiarly suited to this service."

"The approach of the Russians is then town-talk, and nothing more?"

asked Kretschmer, who was still anxious to throw doubt on the bad news.

"No, it is a fact," said Krause seriously. "Pfannenstiel is, as you know, not only a prophet, but also a quack doctor, and his herbs and decoctions are certainly often of astonishing efficacy. He always gathers the plants for his mixtures himself, and roams about in search of them in the neighborhood of Berlin for days together. Last evening he was outside the town, on one of these tramps, intending to pa.s.s the night sleeping under a tree. He was awoke by the sound of troops marching, and as he looked carefully around, he could plainly distinguish in the bright moonlight the uniforms of the Russian army.

It was a long column of many thousand men. They halted not far from the place where Pfannenstiel lay, and he crept carefully nearer. He then ascertained from their conversation that this was only a small division of the army, which had advanced by forced marches from Frankfort, and was commanded by General Tottleben."