What the Swallow Sang Part 22

The man had realized the promise of the boy; intoxication had torn away the mask of hypocrisy, and there was the stupid, dissolute face of the Halle student, whom Gotthold so well remembered. It could not be otherwise. But that this pitiful creature should be his father's successor, this blinking owl sit in the eyrie of the eagle, whose fiery eyes had always sought the sun; this coa.r.s.e buffoon be permitted to tinkle his bells in the very place where the preacher, with glowing eloquence, had summoned his hearers to repentance and atonement, seemed to him a personal insult. And yet this man was in his proper place; the flock was worthy of the shepherd; everything here was of a piece--like a picture drawn by some master hand, in the boldest outlines and most glaring colors: the drunken Pastor nodding in the sofa corner, the excited, wine-flushed faces of the gamblers, the voluptuous figure of the maid-servant pa.s.sing to and fro and handing the fiery beverage to the revellers, exchanging a sly smile or hasty word with one, coquettishly pushing away the hand of another, who tried to pa.s.s his arm around her waist--the true G.o.ddess of this temple of sin!--and the whole enveloped in the circling wreaths of gray smoke which ascended from the constantly burning pipes, and floated in dusky red rings around the dim wicks of the candles; only that it was no picture, but the coa.r.s.est, rudest, most commonplace reality. And alas, the outrage that she should be compelled to live under this roof, that the wild riot should re-echo even in her quiet room--not for the first or last time!-that these were the men who frequented the house--these empty-headed, silly young n.o.blemen, this rough upstart, with his coa.r.s.e hands and coa.r.s.er jests. And when this company of fauns and satyrs departed, to have for her only consoler solitude--solitude which stared at her with cold, hard, piercing serpent eyes. There they were, those very eyes; they had just glanced over the cards with a quick stealthy look! Those eyes, and hers--soft, gentle, tender!

Gotthold no longer saw the gamblers. He beheld her sitting in the lonely nursery beside her child's playthings; a touching figure, still so girlish in its soft, delicate outlines. He saw the sad face suffused with a roseate flush of joy, saw it disfigured with pain and terror-he lived over in imagination the whole scene, which already seemed like a dream; and dreamed on of a future which must surely come, a future full of sunlight, love, and poetry.

He could not have told how long he had been sitting absorbed in thought, when a loud noise at the gaming-table suddenly startled him.

Something unusual seemed to have happened; Hans Redebas and Brandow alone retained their seats, the others were bending over the table with eager faces; even Rieke was gazing so intently that she forgot to push away the a.s.sessor's arm, which had been thrown around her waist.

"Do you take it again?" cried Redebas.

"Yes."

"Another thousand? That will make it five!"

"Devil take it, yes!"

A breathless silence followed, in which Gotthold heard nothing but the noise of the cards Redebas dealt, and then another outcry and tumult, such as had previously roused him from his revery, only this time it was so loud that even the drunken Pastor staggered out of his corner.

Gotthold approached the table. His first glance rested upon Brandow's face, which was deadly pale; but his thin lips were firmly compressed, and a disagreeable smile even sparkled in his stern, cold eyes, as he now cried, turning to the new-comer:

"They have plucked me finely, Gotthold; but night never lasts forever."

"But this," cried Redebas throwing the cards on the table, and making a memorandum in his pocket-book, "I decline!"

"What does that mean?" asked Brandow.

"That I will play no more," answered Redebas with a loud laugh, closing his pocket-book and rising heavily.

"I always thought the loser could break up the game, not the winner."

"If the winner is not sure of his point--oh! yes."

"I demand an explanation!" cried Brandow, pushing the table aside.

"Why, Brandow, do be reasonable!" exclaimed Otto and Gustav von Pluggen, in the same breath.

"Are you in partnership again?" answered Brandow with a sneering laugh, and then stepped before Redebas: "I demand an explanation at once!"

The giant had drawn back a step: "Oho," he cried; "if that's what you want, come on!"

"My dear Brandow," said the a.s.sessor soothingly, putting himself between them.

"I know what I am doing, Herr a.s.sessor," answered Brandow, pushing him aside.

"And I know too," cried Redebas, throwing up the window, and shouting across the quiet court-yard in a voice like the roar of a lion.

"Harness the horses, August! harness the horses!"

A scene of wild confusion followed, in which all shouted together, so that Gotthold could only distinguish a word here and there. Hans Redebas raved loudest of all, but apparently quite as much from fear as anger, while Brandow remained comparatively calm, and was evidently intent upon separating the a.s.sessor, who was constantly intermeddling, from the three others whom the Pastor now joined, and by all possible signs announced his intention of making a speech, in which he actually several times got as far as the beginning: "My beloved friends!"

The three carriages, to which the impatient coachmen had harnessed the horses long before, drove up. The quarrel had been continued from the room to the hall, from the hall to the door, and even to the carriage steps.

"We shall see, we shall see," cried Hans Redebas; "are you in, Pastor?

Then, in the devil's name, drive on--we shall see," he shouted again from the carriage window, as the powerful Danish horses trotted away at a rapid pace towards the northern gate, from whence the shorter road, which, however, was scarcely visible in the darkness, led through the forest to Dahlitz.

Meantime Otto and Gustav von Pluggen had finally become involved in a quarrel with each other. Gustav, who had no lamps on his carriage, declared that he must go across the moor, while Otto wanted to follow Redebas. Gustav had already borne so much from his older brother that day, that he considered himself obliged to take this refusal as a personal insult. He had no bundle of hay in front of his head, and wouldn't run the risk of breaking his skull against the trees in the forest. "Then he could light the straw in it, and find his way home by that," Otto replied.

So they drove away in opposite directions.

"That is very foolish," said Brandow, looking after Gustav's carriage.

"One will get across and the other won't," replied Hinrich Scheel.

"We know that you are the best driver."

"An accident is liable to happen to any one."

"That is, you want it to be so."

"It seems you don't."

Brandow did not answer immediately. He had thought the matter less difficult; but he need not break his neck, only an arm or leg.

He cast a timid glance through the window; the light fell directly upon Gotthold's grave, handsome face. Brandow ground his teeth. No, it was not enough. He must have his life; the d.a.m.ned hypocrite deserved nothing better, and where was the crime? An accident might happen to the best driver.

Suddenly he started. He had not thought of that before. By his quarrel with his a.s.sociates at the gaming-table he had fortunately prevented the whole party from remaining all night until broad daylight, as they had often done before, and thus robbed Gotthold of a suitable excuse for staying also, if such was his intention--and of that Brandow, after what he had heard, was firmly convinced. He had also, by intentionally keeping the a.s.sessor out of the quarrel, made it impossible for the latter to go away at once with the others, though he had not lacked invitations, as thus his prey would have escaped him, for Gotthold probably would not have remained without the a.s.sessor. But now--how could he separate the two? If the a.s.sessor stayed--and he did not seem to think of leaving--Gotthold would stay also, or at least have a most plausible excuse for doing so; and if he forced the a.s.sessor to go--

Again his sullen glance wandered towards the two men in the room--the a.s.sessor talking to Gotthold with the most animated gestures; the latter, to judge from his expression and movements, listening reluctantly.

"I drove them both here, so I can drive them both back again," said Hinrich Scheel, pressing down the ashes in his pipe.

Both! One! yes; but what had the other done to him? Nothing! Nothing at all! And he had received ten thousand thalers from him to-day.

"It's a pity about the beautiful money, if any accident should happen to us on the moor," said Hinrich, knocking the tobacco out of his pipe; "I'll get the carriage ready, and take those jades of Jochen Kluts; it would be a pity to hurt our grays."

He walked slowly away. Brandow's eyes followed the short dark figure; he wanted to call him back, to tell him he need not harness the horses, but only a strange, hoa.r.s.e, choking sound came from his throat; his tongue clung to his palate, and as he raised his foot he staggered like a drunken man, and was obliged to hold fast to the trunk of one of the old linden-trees, through whose thick branches a violent gust of wind was just roaring. The rain, which again began to fall, beat into his face, now burning with a strange flush, although he was shivering from head to foot.

There! What was that? The noise of the carriage which Hinrich was pushing out of the barn. There was still time! But, after all, he had said nothing, nothing at all; how could he help it if an accident happened to Hinrich on the moor at night?

Gotthold and the a.s.sessor had remained in the room; the latter was trying to explain to Gotthold that Brandow had certainly been quite right when he asked that the game should be continued, but had done wrong to express his wish in so peremptory a manner; and finally he ought not to have forgotten that he was the host, and as such must overlook any little impropriety on the part of his guests.

During the latter part of his long speech, the a.s.sessor had addressed himself in an admonitory tone, partly to Brandow, who had just entered the room, and going up to the side-board swallowed several gla.s.ses of wine. "I have in fact been compelled to overlook many such things to-day, and am obliged to you, Herr a.s.sessor, for keeping me in practice up to the last minute."

The tone in which Brandow said this, and the gesture with which he approached the a.s.sessor, were so peculiar that the latter was partly sobered, and stared in astonishment at his host, who now came a step nearer and said in a low voice:

"Or what do you call it, when the guests, in presence of the servants, subject the conduct of the master of the house to such an unsparing criticism?" and he pointed to Rieke, under whose direction another maid servant and the groom Fritz were beginning to remove the gla.s.ses standing about on the tables, and sweep up the fragments scattered over the floor.

The a.s.sessor drew himself up to his full height.

"I beg your pardon," said he, "and will request you to be kind enough to place your carriage at my disposal for my return. I regret that I did not accept from your other guests the favor I must now solicit of you. I can still depend upon your company, Gotthold?"

"I think Brandow will make no objections."