Читать книгу Hammer and Anvil - Spielhagen Friedrich - Страница 33

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He was, as well as I could distinguish by the faint light of the moon that was now partly obscured by clouds, a man of tall stature and slender frame; so alert in his movements that I took him to be young, or at least comparatively young, until, at a sudden turn he made, the flickering glare of the fire through the open door fell upon his face, and I saw that his features were deeply furrowed, apparently with age. And as now, holding my hand, he led me into the forge, which glowed with a strong light, he seemed to me to be neither young nor old, or rather both at once.

It is true, the moment was not precisely favorable to physiognomical investigations. The stranger surveyed me with large eyes that flashed uncannily out of the crumpled folds and wrinkles that surrounded them from head to foot, and felt my shoulders and arms, as a jockey might examine a horse that has got over a distance in three minutes that it takes other horses five to accomplish. Then, turning on his heel, he burst into a peal of laughter, as the smith turned upon the deaf and dumb apprentice, Jacob, who all this time had been blowing the bellows, quite indifferent to what was going forward, and gave him a push which spun him around like a top.

"Bravo! bravo!" cried the stranger, "that was well done! Easier handling him than the other--eh, Pinnow?"

"The other may thank his stars that he gets off so easily," growled the smith, as he drew a red-hot bar from the coals.

"I am ready to try it again at any time, Pinnow," I cried, and was delighted that the stranger, with an amused look, nodded his approbation, while with affected solemnity he cried: "For shame young man, for shame! a poor old man! Do you consider that a thing to boast of?"

The smith had seized his heavy forge-hammer, and was plying the glowing bar with furious strokes until the sparks flew in showers, and the windows rattled in the frames.

The stranger stopped his ears. "For heaven's sake, man," he cried, "stop that infamous noise! Who in the devil's name can stand it, do you think? Do you suppose that I have your plebeian ears? Stop, I say, or----"

He gave the smith a push, as the latter had just before done to his apprentice, but the old man stood more firmly than the young one. With a furious look he raised his hammer--it seemed as if the next moment he would bring it down on the stranger's head.

"Have you gone mad?" said the stranger, casting a stern look at the enraged smith. Then, as the latter slowly lowered the hammer, he began speaking to him in an undertone, to which the old man answered in a muttering voice, in which I thought I could at intervals distinguish my own name.

"It may be," said the stranger; "but here he is now, and here he shall stay."

"Excuse me," I said, "I have not the least idea of thrusting my company upon you: I would not have set my foot in the house, had not----"

"Now he's beginning again," exclaimed the stranger, with a laugh of half vexation; "will you ever come to your senses, you two? What I want is peace and quiet, and above all, some supper; and you shall keep me company. Hallo! Christel! Where is the girl? You, Pinnow, take off your leather apron and come in too."

With these words he opened the low door on the right of the forge-fire, which led from the forge into the living-room. I had often enough been in the latter, and indeed I knew the whole place well: the living-room was a moderately large apartment, but only half as high from floor to ceiling as the forge; the sleeping-rooms lying above it, which were reached by a steep stair, or sort of ladder, in a corner of the room, passing through a hole in the ceiling. There was also a door, reached by two steps, which led into a small side-room, where the smith's mother slept. This old woman, a prodigy of age, was now crouching in her easy-chair in her usual corner, close to the stove, which was heated from without. In the middle of the room stood a heavy oaken table, and on the table the great basket which Christel had brought from the town. Christel herself was apparently searching for something in a closet at the further end of the room.

"Now, Christel," said the stranger, taking a light to look into the basket, "what have you brought? That looks inviting. But bestir yourself, for I am hungry as a wolf--and you too," turning to me--"are you not? One is always hungry at your age. Come this way to the window. Sit down."

He made me sit on one of the two benches that stood in the recess of the window, seated himself on the other, and continued in a somewhat lower tone, with a glance at Christel, who was now, with a noiseless despatch, beginning to set the table:----

"A pretty girl: rather too much of a blonde, perhaps; she is a Hollander; but that is in keeping here: is not the old woman nodding there in her easy chair just like a picture by Terburg? Then old Pinnow, with the face of a bull-dog and the figure of a seal, and Jacob with his carp's eyes! But I like it; I seldom fail, when I have been in the town without my carriage, as happens to-day, to look in here, and let old Pinnow set me over; especially as with a good wind I can get across in half an hour, while by the town-ferry it takes me a full hour, and then afterwards as much more before I reach my estate."

The stranger spoke in a courteous, engaging manner, which pleased me exceedingly; and while speaking, repeatedly stroked with his left hand his thick beard, which fell half-way down his breast, and from time to time glanced at a diamond ring on his finger. I began to feel a great respect for the strange gentleman, and was extremely curious to know who he was, but could not venture to ask him.

"What an abominable atmosphere in this room!" he suddenly exclaimed; "enough to make one faint;" and he was about opening the window at which we were sitting, but checking himself, he turned and said: "To be sure! the old woman might take cold. Christel, can't you get the old lady to bed?"

"Yes, sir; directly," said Christel, who had just finished setting the table, and going up to the old woman, screamed in her ear, "Grandmother, you must go to bed!"

The old woman received this intimation with evident disfavor, for she shook her head energetically, but at last allowed herself to be raised from her crouching position, and tottered from the room, leaning on Christel's arm. When Christel reached the steps that led to the side room she looked round. I sprang to her assistance, and carried the old lady up the steps, while Christel opened the door, through which she then disappeared with her charge.

"Well done, young man," said my new acquaintance, as I came back to him; "we must always be polite to ladies. And now we will open the window."

He did so, and the night air rushed in. It had grown darker; the moon was hidden behind a heavy mass of cloud that was rolling up from the west; from the sea, which was but a few paces distant, came a hollow roaring and plashing of the waves breaking on the beach; a few drops of rain drove into my face.

The stranger looked out intently at the weather. "We must be off presently," I heard him say to himself. Then turning to me: "But now we will have some supper; I am almost dying of hunger. If Pinnow prefers grumbling to eating, let him consult his taste. Come."

He took his seat at the table, inviting me by a gesture to place myself beside him. I had, during the day, eaten far less than I had drunk, and my robust frame, which had long since overcome the effects of my intoxication, now imperatively demanded sustenance. So I very willingly complied with the invitation of my entertainer; and indeed the contents of the basket which Christel had now unpacked were of a nature to tempt a far more fastidious palate than mine. There were caviare, smoked salmon, ham, fresh sausage, pickles; nor was a supply of wine wanting. Two bottles of Bordeaux, with the label of a choice vintage, stood upon the table, and out of the basket peeped the silvery neck of a bottle of Champagne.

"Quite a neat display," said the stranger, filling both our glasses, helping himself first from one dish and then from another, and inviting me to follow his example, while chatting at intervals in his pleasant fashion. Without his questioning me directly, we had somehow come to speak of my affairs; and, unsuspicious and communicative as I was, before the first bottle was emptied I had given him a pretty fair account of my neither long nor eventful life. The occurrences of the past day, so momentous for me, occupied rather more time in the recital. In the ardor of my narration, I had, without observing it, filled and drunk several glasses of wine; the weight that had laid upon my spirits had disappeared; my old cheerful humor had returned, all the more as this meeting with the mysterious stranger under such singular circumstances, gave my imagination room for the wildest conjectures. I described our flight from the school, I mimicked Professor Lederer's voice and manner, I threw all my powers of satire into my sketch of the commerzienrath, and I fear that I smote the table with my fist when I came to speak of Arthur's shameful ingratitude, and the outrageous partiality of the steuerrath. But here my talkative tongue was checked; the melancholy dimness of my father's study spread a gloom over my spirits; I fell into a tragic tone, as I swore that though I should have to go on a pilgrimage to the North Cape, barefoot, as I was already bareheaded, and beg my bread from door to door--or, as begging was not my forte, should I have to take to the road--I would never more set foot in my father's house again, after he had once driven me from it. That what I was in duty bound to bear from a parent had here reached its limits; that nature's bond was cancelled, and that my resolution was as firmly fixed as the stars in the sky, and if any one chose to ridicule it, he did it at his peril.

With these words I sprang from the table, and set down the glass from which I had been drinking, so violently, that it shivered to pieces. For the stranger, whose evident enjoyment of my story had at times encouraged me, and at others embarrassed, when I came to my peroration, which was delivered with extreme pathos, burst into a paroxysm of laughter which seemed as if it would never end.

"You have been kind to me," I exclaimed; "true, I think I could have held my own without your assistance; but no matter for that--you came to my help at the right moment, and now you have entertained me with food and drink. You are welcome to laugh as much as you please, but I, for my part, will not stay to listen to it. Farewell!"

I looked round for my cap; then, remembering that I had none, strode to the door, when the stranger, who in the meantime had also risen from his seat, hastened after me, caught me by the arm, and in the grave but kindly tone that had previously so charmed me, said:

"Young man, I entreat your pardon. And now come back and take your seat again. I offer you the word of a nobleman that I will respect your feelings, even if your expression of them takes a somewhat singular form."

His dark eyes gleamed, and there were twitchings in the maze of wrinkles that surrounded them.

"You are jesting with me," I said.

"I am not," he replied, "upon the word of a nobleman. On the contrary, you please me extremely, and I was several times on the point of interrupting your story to ask a favor of you. Come and stay awhile with me. Whether you are reconciled with your father, as I hope, or if the breach be past closing, as you believe, at all events you must first have a roof over your head; and you cannot possibly stay here, where you are evidently not wanted. As I said, I will feel it a favor if you will accept my invitation. I cannot offer you much, but--there is my hand! Good! now we will pledge good fellowship in champagne."

I had already forgiven my mysterious but amiable acquaintance, and pledged him in the sparkling wine with all my heart. With merriment and laughter we had soon emptied the flask, when the smith entered. He had thrown off his leather apron, donned a sailor's jacket, and wrapped a thick muffler round his muscular neck. It now struck me for the first time that he had not on the great blue spectacles which for several years I had never seen him without, and which he wore on account of his alleged near-sightedness: and it now occurred to me that he was not wearing them at the time of our quarrel. Still, I might be mistaken on that point; but I had no time to reflect upon so unimportant a matter, for my attention was at once fixed by some words exchanged in a low tone between the smith and the stranger.

"Is it time?" asked the latter.

"It is," replied the smith.

"The wind is favorable?"

"Yes."

"Everything in order?"

"Except the anchor, which you would not let me finish."

"We can do without it."

"Not well."

The stranger stood for a few moments in thought; his handsome face seemed suddenly to have grown twenty years older; he stroked his beard, and I noticed that he was observing me from the corner of his eye. He then caught the smith by the arm and led him out of the door, which he closed behind him. Outside the door I heard them talking, but could make out nothing, for the stranger spoke in a subdued voice, and the smith's growling speech was at all times difficult to understand; presently, however, the dialogue grew louder, and, as it seemed, more and more vehement, especially on the part of the smith.

"I will have it so!" cried the stranger.

"And I say no!" maintained the smith.

"It is my affair."

"And my affair as well."

The voices sank again, and presently I heard the outer door creak. They had left the forge; I stepped to the open window and saw them go to the little shed close to the beach, by which Pinnow's boat was usually drawn up on the sand. They disappeared in the shadow of the shed; then I heard a chain rattle, and a grating on the sand; they were launching the boat. All was then still: the only sounds audible were the stronger roaring of the sea, mingled with the rush of the wind in the leaves of the old oak, which threw its half-decayed boughs over the forge.

I heard a rustling in the room, and turned quickly round. It was Christel; she stood behind me, looking with an intense gaze, as I had just done, through the window into the darkness.

"Well, Christel!" I said.

She placed her finger on her lips, and whispered, "Hush!" then beckoned me from the window. Surprised rather than alarmed, I followed her.

"What is the matter, Christel?"

"Don't go with them, whatever you do. And go away from here at once. You cannot stay here."

"But, Christel, why not? And who is the gentleman?"

"I must not tell you; I must not speak his name. If you go with them, you will learn it soon enough; but do not go!"

"Why? What will they do to me, Christel?"

"Do? They will do nothing to you. But do not go with them."

A noise was heard outside; Christel turned away and began clearing the table, while the voices of the two who were returning from the beach came nearer and nearer.

I do not know what another would have done in my place; I can only say that the girl's warning produced upon me an effect precisely opposite to that intended. True, I well remember that my heart beat quicker, and that I cast a hurried glance at the four double-barrels and the long fowling-piece that hung in the old places on the wall; but the desire to go through with the adventure was now fully awaked in me. I felt equal to any danger that might beset me; and, for the matter of that, Christel had just said that no harm was intended to me.

Besides--and this circumstance is, perhaps, the real key to my conduct that evening--the stranger, whoever he might be, with his partly serious and partly jocose, half-sympathetic and half-mocking language, had somehow established a mysterious influence over me. In later years, when I heard the legend of the Piper of Hameln, whom the children were irresistibly compelled to follow, I at once recalled this night and the stranger.

He now appeared at the door, dressed in a coarse, wide sailor's jacket, and wearing a low-crowned tarpaulin hat in place of his cloth cap. Pinnow opened a press in the wall, and produced a similar outfit for me, which the stranger made me put on.

"It is turning cold," he remarked, "and your present dress will be but little protection to you, though I trust our passage will be a short one. So: now you are equipped capitally: now let us be off."

The smith had stepped to Christel and whispered her a few words, to which she made no reply. She had turned her back upon me since the men had entered, and did not once turn her head as I bade her good-night.

"Come on," said the stranger.

We went through the forge, where the fire had now burnt down, and stepped out into the windy night. After proceeding a few steps, I turned my head: the light in the living-room was extinguished; the house lay dark in the darkness, and the wind roared and moaned in the dry branches of the old oak.

The noise of the sea had increased; the wind had freshened to a stiff breeze; the moon had set; no star shone through the scudding clouds which from time to time were lighted with a lurid gleam, followed by a mutter of distant thunder.

We reached the boat which was already half in the water, and they made me get on board, while the stranger, Pinnow, and the deaf and dumb Jacob, who had suddenly made his appearance out of the darkness, and was, as well as I could make out, also in sailor's dress and fisherman's boots--pushed off. In a few minutes we were flying through the water; the stranger stood at the helm, but presently yielded it to Pinnow, when the latter with Jacob's assistance had finished setting the sails, and took his seat beside me.

"Now, how do you like this?" he asked me.

"Glorious!" I exclaimed. "But I think, Pinnow, that you had better take in another reef; we are carrying too much sail, and over yonder"--I pointed to the west--"it has an ugly look."

"You seem to be no greenhorn," said the stranger.

Pinnow made no reply but gave the hasty order: "Take in the foresail," at the same time putting up the helm and letting the boat fall off the wind. It was not a moment too soon, for a squall striking us an instant after made her careen so violently that I thought she would founder, though luckily she righted again. The jib was taken in altogether, and the foresail now hoisted only half-mast high, and under this canvas we flew through the waves, upon whose whitening crests played the pale glare of the lightning at ever shorter intervals, and still louder and louder followed the roll of the thunder.

After a while the squall abated as rapidly as it had come up, and the stars began to shine here and there through the clouds. I came aft--I had been helping Jacob to handle the sails--and took my seat again by the stranger. He passed his hand over my jacket:

"You are wet to the skin," he said.

"So are we all," I answered.

"But you are not used to it."

"But I am nineteen."

"No older?"

"Not two months."

"You are a man."

I felt more pride from this short speech than I had ever felt shame during the longest diatribe of Professor Lederer, or any of my other teachers. There were few things which I would not have been willing at that moment to attempt had the stranger required it; but he offered no compact with the powers of darkness, nor anything of the sort, but only advised me to lie down in the boat and be covered with a piece of canvas, as the trip was likely to last longer than had been expected, the wind having hauled round another quarter; I could be of no more service now, and "Sleep is a warm cloak, as Sancho Panza says," he added.

I protested, affirming that I could keep awake for three days and three nights together; but I yielded to his insistence, and had hardly stretched myself on the bottom of the boat, when sleep, which I had thought so far, fell upon me heavy as lead.

How long I slept I do not exactly know; but I was awakened by the grating of the keel upon the sand of the shore. The stranger helped me up, but I was still so heavy with sleep that I cannot remember how I got ashore. The night was still dark; I could distinguish nothing but the gleaming crests of the waves breaking on a long level beach, from which the land rose higher as it ran inward. When I had recovered my full consciousness the boat had already pushed off; my unknown friend and I were following a path that ascended among trees. He held me by the hand, and in a friendly, pleasant manner pointed out the various irregularities of the path, in which he seemed to know every stone and every projecting root. At last we reached the top of the cliff; before us lay the open country, and in the distance a dark pile, which I gradually made out, in the dawning light, to be a mass of buildings, with a park or wood of immense trees.

"Here we are," said the stranger at last, as, after passing through a silent court-yard, we stood before a great dark building.

"Where?" I asked.

"At my house," he responded, laughing. We were now standing in the hall, and he was trying to light a match.

"And where is that?" I asked again. I could not myself have told how I found the boldness to put this question.

The match kindled; he lighted a lamp which was in readiness, and the light fell upon his long dishevelled beard and haggard face, in which the rain and surf seemed to have deepened every wrinkle to a fold and every fold to a furrow. He looked at me fixedly with his large deep-set eyes.

"At Zehrendorf," he replied, "the house of Malte von Zehren, whom they call 'The Wild.' You don't regret having come with me?"

"That I do not," I answered him with energy.