A Word Only A Word, Volume 1.
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Georg Ebers >> A Word Only A Word, Volume 1.
An important matter was being discussed between the two strangely
dissimilar companions.
After it grew dark, Ulrich was to come to the charcoal-burner again.
Marx knew where a fine buck couched, and was to drive it towards the boy,
that he might shoot it. The host of the Lamb down in the town needed
game, for his Gretel was to be married on Tuesday. True, Marx could kill
the animal himself, but Ulrich had learned to shoot too, and if the place
whence the game came should be noised abroad, the charcoal-burner,
without any scruples of conscience, could swear that he did not shoot
the buck, but found it with the arrow in its heart.
People called the charcoal-burner a poacher, and he owed his ill-name of
"Hangemarx" to the circumstance that once, though long ago, he had
adorned a gallows. Yet he was not a dishonest man, only he remembered
too faithfully the bold motto, which, when a boy, one peasant wood-cutter
or charcoal-burner whispered to another:
"Forest, stream and meadow are free."
His dead father had joined the Bundschuh,--[A peasants' league which
derived its name from the shoe, of peculiar shape, worn by its members.]
--adopted this motto, and clung fast to it and with it, to the belief
that every living thing in the forest belonged to him, as much as to the
city, the nobles, or the monastery. For this faith he had undergone much
suffering, and owed to it his crooked mouth and ill name, for just as his
beard was beginning to grow, the father of the reigning count came upon
him, just after he had killed a fawn in the "free" forest. The legs of
the heavy animal were tied together with ropes, and Marx was obliged to
take the ends of the knot between his teeth like a bridle, and drag the
carcass to the castle. While so doing his cheeks were torn open, and the
evil deed neither pleased him nor specially strengthened his love for the
count. When, a short time after, the rebellion broke out in Stuhlingen,
and he heard that everywhere the peasants were rising against the monks
and nobles, he, too, followed the black, red and yellow banner, first
serving with Hans Muller of Bulgenbach, then with Jacklein Rohrbach of
Bockingen, and participating with the multitude in the overthrow of the
city and castle of Neuenstein. At Weinsberg he saw Count Helfenstein
rush upon the spears, and when the noble countess was driven past him to
Heilbronn in the dung-cart, he tossed his cap in the air with the rest.
The peasant was to be lord now; the yoke of centuries was to be broken;
unjust imposts, taxes, tithes and villenage would be forever abolished,
while the fourth of the twelve articles he had heard read aloud more than
once, remained firmly fixed in his memory "Game, birds and fish every one
is free to catch." Moreover, many a verse from the Gospel, unfavorable
to the rich, but promising the kingdom of heaven to the poor, and that
the last shall be first, had reached his ears. Doubtless many of the
leaders glowed with lofty enthusiasm for the liberation of the poor
people from unendurable serfdom and oppression; but when Marx, and men
like him, left wife and children and risked their lives, they remembered
only the past, and the injustice they had suffered, and were full of a
fierce yearning to trample the dainty, torturing demons under their
heavy peasant feet.
The charcoal-burner had never lighted such bright fires, never tasted
such delicious meat and spicy wine, as during that period of his life,
while vengeance had a still sweeter savor than all the rest. When the
castle fell, and its noble mistress begged for mercy, he enjoyed a
foretaste of the promised paradise. Satan has also his Eden of fiery
roses, but they do not last long, and when they wither, put forth sharp
thorns. The peasants felt them soon enough, for at Sindelfingen they
found their master in Captain Georg Truchsess of Waldberg.
Marx fell into his troopers' hands and was hung on the gallows, but only
in mockery and as a warning to others; for before he and his companions
perished, the men took them down, cut their oath-fingers from their
hands, and drove them back into their old servitude. When he at last
returned home, his house had been taken from his family, whom he found in
extreme poverty. The father of Adam, the smith, to whom he had formerly
sold charcoal, redeemed the house, gave him work, and once, when a band
of horsemen came to the city searching for rebellious peasants, the old
man did not forbid him to hide three whole days in his barn.
Since that time everything had been quiet in Swabia, and neither in
forest, stream nor meadow had any freedom existed.
Marx had only himself to provide for; his wife was dead, and his sons
were raftsmen, who took pine logs to Mayence and Cologne, sometimes even
as far as Holland. He owed gratitude to no one but Adam, and showed in
his way that he was conscious of it, for he taught Ulrich all sorts of
things which were of no advantage to a boy, except to give him pleasure,
though even in so doing he did not forget his own profit. Ulrich was now
fifteen, and could manage a cross-bow and hit the mark like a skilful
hunter, and as the lad did not lack a love for the chase, Marx afforded
him the pleasure. All he had heard about the equal rights of men he
engrafted into the boy's soul, and when to-day, for the hundredth time,
Ulrich expressed a doubt whether it was not stealing to kill game that
belonged to the count, the charcoal-burner straightened his mouth, and
said:
"Forest, stream and meadow are free. Surely you know that."
The boy gazed thoughtfully at the ground for a time, and then asked:
"The fields too?"
"The fields?" repeated Marx, in surprise. "The fields? The fields are a
different matter." He glanced as he spoke, at the field of oats he had
sown in the autumn, and which now bore blades a finger long. "The fields
are man's work and belong to him who tills them, but the forest, stream
and meadow were made by God. Do you understand? What God created for
Adam and Eve is everybody's property."
As the sun rose higher, and the cuckoo began to raise its voice, Ulrich's
name was shouted loudly several times in rapid succession through the
forest. The arrow he had been shaping flew into a corner, and with a
hasty "When it grows dusk, Marxle!" Ulrich dashed into the woods, and
soon joined his playmate Ruth.
The pair strolled slowly through the forest by the side of the stream,
enjoying the glorious morning, and gathering flowers to carry a bouquet
to the little girl's mother. Ruth culled the blossoms daintily with the
tips of her fingers; Ulrich wanted to help, and tore the slender stalks
in tufts from the roots by the handful. Meantime their tongues were not
idle. Ulrich boastfully told her that Pater Benedictus had seen his
picture of her father, recognized it instantly, and muttered something
over it. His mother's blood was strong in him; his imaginary world was a
very different one from that of the narrow-minded boys of the Richtberg.
His father had told him much, and the doctor still more, about the wide,
wide world-kings, artists and great heroes. From Hangemarx he learned,
that he possessed the same rights and dignity as all other men, and
Ruth's wonderful power of imagination peopled his fancy with the
strangest shapes and figures. She made royal crowns of wreaths,
transformed the little hut, the lad had built of boughs, behind the
doctor's house, into a glittering imperial palace, converted round
pebbles into ducats and golden zechins--bread and apples into princely
banquets; and when she had placed two stools before the wooden bench on
which she sat with Ulrich her fancy instantly transformed them into a
silver coronation coach with milk-white steeds. When she was a fairy,
Ulrich was obliged to be a magician; if she was the queen, he was king.
When, to give vent to his animal spirits, Ulrich played with the
Richtberg boys, he always led them, but allowed himself to be guided
by little Ruth. He knew that the doctor was a despised Jew, that she
was a Jewish child; but his father honored the Hebrew, and the foreign
atmosphere, the aristocratic, secluded repose that pervaded the solitary
scholar's house, exerted a strange influence over him.
When he entered it, a thrill ran through his frame; it seemed as if he
were penetrating into some forbidden sanctuary. He was the only one of
all his playfellows, who was permitted to cross this threshold, and he
felt it as a distinction, for, in spite of his youth, he realized that
the quiet doctor, who knew everything that existed in heaven and on
earth, and yet was as mild and gentle as a child, stood far, far above
the miserable drudges, who struggled with sinewy hands for mere existence
on the Richtberg. He expected everything from him, and Ruth also seemed
a very unusual creature, a delicate work of art, with whom he, and he
only, was allowed to play.
It might have happened, that when irritated he would upbraid her with
being a wretched Jewess, but it would scarcely have surprised him,
if she had suddenly stood before his eyes as a princess or a phoenix.
When the Richtberg lay close beneath them, Ruth sat down on a stone,
placing her flowers in her lap. Ulrich threw his in too, and, as the
bouquet grew, she held it towards him, and he thought it very pretty;
but she said, sighing:
"I wish roses grew in the forest; not common hedgeroses, but like those
in Portugal--full, red, and with the real perfume. There is nothing that
smells sweeter."
So it always was with the pair. Ruth far outstripped Ulrich in her
desires and wants, thus luring him to follow her.
"A rose!" repeated Ulrich. "How astonished you look!"
Her wish reminded him of the magic word she had mentioned the day before,
and they talked about it all the way home, Ulrich saying that he had
waked three times in the night on account of it. Ruth eagerly
interrupted him, exclaiming:
"I thought of it again too, and if any one would tell the what it was,
I should know what to wish now. I would not have a single human being
in the world except you and me, and my father and mother."
"And my little mother!" added Ulrich, earnestly.
"And your father, too!"
"Why, of course, he, too!" said the boy, as if to make hasty atonement
for his neglect.
CHAPTER V.
The sun was shining brightly on the little windows of the Israelite's
sitting-room, which were half open to admit the Spring air, though
lightly shaded with green curtains, for Costa liked a subdued light, and
was always careful to protect his apartment from the eyes of passers-by.
There was nothing remarkable to be seen, for the walls were whitewashed,
and their only ornament was a garland of lavender leaves, whose perfume
Ruth's mother liked to inhale. The whole furniture consisted of a chest,
several stools, a bench covered with cushions, a table, and two plain
wooden arm-chairs.
One of the latter had long been the scene of Adam's happiest hours, for
he used to sit in it when he played chess with Costa.
He had sometimes looked on at the noble game while in Nuremberg; but the
doctor understood it thoroughly, and had initiated him into all its
rules.
For the first two years Costa had remained far in advance of his pupil,
then he was compelled to defend himself in good earnest, and now it not
unfrequently happened that the smith vanquished the scholar. True, the
latter was much quicker than the former, who if the situation became
critical, pondered over it an unconscionably long time.
Two hands more unlike had rarely met over a chess-board; one suggested a
strong, dark ploug-ox, the other a light, slender-limbed palfrey. The
Israelite's figure looked small in contrast with the smith's gigantic
frame. How coarse-grained, how heavy with thought the German's big, fair
head appeared, how delicately moulded and intellectual the Portuguese
Jew's.
To-day the two men had again sat down to the game, but instead of
playing, had been talking very, very earnestly. In the course of the
conversation the doctor had left his place and was pacing restlessly to
and fro. Adam retained his seat.
His friend's arguments had convinced him. Ulrich was to be sent to
the monastery-school. Costa had also been informed of the danger that
threatened his own person, and was deeply agitated. The peril was great,
very great, yet it was hard, cruelly hard, to quit this peaceful nook.
The smith understood what was passing in his mind, and said:
"It is hard for you to go. What binds you here to the Richtberg?"
"Peace, peace!" cried the other. "And then," he added more calmly,
"I have gained land here."
"You?"
"The large and small graves behind the executioner's house, they are my
estates."
"It is hard, hard to leave them," said the smith, with drooping head.
"All this comes upon you on account of the kindness you have shown my
boy; you have had a poor reward from us."
"Reward?" asked the other, a subtle smile hovering around his lips.
"I expect none, neither from you nor fate. I belong to a poor sect,
that does not consider whether its deeds will be repaid or not. We love
goodness, set a high value on it, and practise it, so far as our power
extends, because it is so beautiful. What have men called good? Only
that which keeps the soul calm. And what is evil? That which fills it
with disquiet. I tell you, that the hearts of those who pursue virtue,
though they are driven from their homes, hunted and tortured like noxious
beasts, are more tranquil than those of their powerful persecutors, who
practise evil. He who seeks any other reward for virtue, than virtue
itself, will not lack disappointment. It is neither you nor Ulrich, who
drives me hence, but the mysterious ancient curse, that pursues my people
when they seek to rest; it is, it is.... Another time, to-morrow. This
is enough for to-day."
When the doctor was alone, he pressed his hand to his brow and groaned
aloud. His whole life passed before his mind, and he found in it,
besides terrible suffering, great and noble joys, and not an hour in
which his desire for virtue was weakened. He had spent happy years here
in the peace of his simple home, and now must again set forth and wander
on and on, with nothing before his eyes save an uncertain goal, at the
end of a long, toilsome road. What had hitherto been his happiness,
increased his misery in this hour. It was hard, unspeakably hard, to
drag his wife and child through want and sorrow, and could Elizabeth,
his wife, bear it again?
He found her in the tiny garden behind the horse, kneeling before a
flower-bed to weed it. As he greeted her pleasantly, she rose and
beckoned to him.
"Let us sit down," he said, leading her to the bench before the hedge,
that separated the garden from the forest. There he meant to tell her,
that they must again shake the dust from their feet.
She had lost the power of speech on the rack in Portugal, and could only
falter a few unintelligible words, when greatly excited, but her hearing
had remained, and her husband understood how to read the expression of
her eyes. A great sorrow had drawn a deep line in the high, pure brow,
and this also was eloquent; for when she felt happy and at peace it was
scarcely perceptible, but if an anxious or sorrowful mood existed, the
furrow contracted and deepened. To-day it seemed to have entirely
disappeared. Her fair hair was drawn plainly and smoothly, over her
temples, and the slender, slightly stooping figure, resembled a young
tree, which the storm has bowed and deprived of strength and will to
raise itself.
"Beautiful!" she exclaimed in a smothered tone, with much effort, but
her bright glance clearly expressed the joy that filled her soul, as she
pointed to the green foliage around her and the blue sky over their
heads.
"Delicious-delicious!" he answered, cordially. "The June day is
reflected in your dear face. You have learned to be contented here?"
Elizabeth nodded eagerly, pressing both hands upon her heart, while her
eloquent glance told him how well, how grateful and happy, she felt here;
and when in reply to his timid question, whether it would be hard for her
to leave this place and seek another, a safer home, she gazed at first in
surprise, then anxiously into his face, and then, with an eager gesture
of refusal, gasped "Not go--not go!" He answered, soothingly:
"No, no; we are still safe here to-day!"
Elizabeth knew her husband, and had keen eyes; a presentiment of
approaching danger seized upon her. Her features assumed an expression
of terrified expectation and deep grief. The furrow in her brow
deepened, and questioning glances and gestures united with the
"What?--what?" trembling on her lips.
"Do not fear!" he replied, tenderly." We must not spoil the present,
because the future might bring something that is not agreeable to us."
As he uttered the words, she pressed closely to him, clutching his arm
with both hands, but he felt the rapid throbbing of her heart, and
perceived by the violent agitation expressed in every feature, what deep,
unconquerable horror was inspired by the thought of being compelled to go
out into the world again, hunted from country to country, from town to
town. All that she had suffered for his sake, came back to his memory,
and he clasped her trembling hands in his with passionate fervor. It
seemed as if it would be very, very easy, to die with her, but wholly
impossible to thrust her forth again into a foreign land and to an
uncertain fate; so, kissing her on her eyes, which were dilated with
horrible fear, he exclaimed, as if no peril, but merely a foolish wish
had suggested the desire to roam:
"Yes, child, it is best here. Let us be content with what we have. We
will stay!--yes, we will stay!" Elizabeth drew a long breath, as if
relieved from an incubus, her brow became smooth, and it seemed as if the
dumb mouth joined the large upraised eyes in uttering an "Amen," that
came from the inmost depths of the heart.
Costa's soul was saddened and sorely troubled, when he returned to the
house and his writing-table. The old maid-servant, who had accompanied
him from Portugal, entered at the same time, and watched his
preparations, shaking her head. She was a small, crippled Jewess, a
grey-haired woman, with youthful, bright, dark eyes, and restless hands,
that fluttered about her face with rapid, convulsive gestures, while she
talked.
She had grown old in Portugal, and contracted rheumatism in the unusual
cold of the North, so even in Spring she wrapped her head in all the gay
kerchiefs she owned. She kept the house scrupulously neat, understood
how to prepare tempting dishes from very simple materials, and bought
everything she needed for the kitchen. This was no trifling matter for
her, since, though she had lived more than nine years in the black
Forest, she had learned few German words. Even these the neighbors
mistook for Portuguese, though they thought the language bore some
distant resemblance to German. Her gestures they understood perfectly.
She had voluntarily followed the doctor's father, yet she could not
forgive the dead man, for having brought her out of the warm South into
this horrible country. Having been her present master's nurse, she took
many liberties with him, insisting upon knowing everything that went on
in the household, of which she felt herself the oldest, and therefore the
most distinguished member; and it was strange how quickly she could hear
when she chose, spite of her muffled ears!
To-day she had been listening again, and as her master was preparing to
take his seat at the table and sharpen his goose-quill, she glanced
around to see that they were entirely alone; then approached, saying in
Portuguese:
"Don't begin that, Lopez. You must listen to me first."
"Must I?" he asked, kindly.
"If you don't choose to do it, I can go!" she answered, angrily. "To be
sure, sitting still is more comfortable than running."
"What do you mean by that?"
"Do you suppose yonder books are the walls of Zion? Do you feel inclined
to make the monks' acquaintance once more?"
"Fie, fie, Rahel, listening again? Go into the kitchen!"
"Directly! Directly! But I will speak first. You pretend, that you are
only staying here to please your wife, but it's no such thing. It's
yonder writing that keeps you. I know life, but you and your wife are
just like two children. Evil is forgotten in the twinkling of an eye,
and blessing is to come straight from Heaven, like quails and manna.
What sort of a creature have your books made you, since you came with the
doctor's hat from Coimbra? Then everybody said: 'Lopez, Senor Lopez.
Heavenly Father, what a shining light he'll be!' And now! The Lord have
mercy on us! You work, work, and what does it bring you? Not an egg;
not a rush! Go to your uncle in the Netherlands. He'll forget the
curse, if you submit! How many of the zechins, your father saved, are
still left?"
Here the doctor interrupted the old woman's torrent of speech with a
stern "enough!" but she would not allow herself to be checked, and
continued with increasing volubility.
"Enough, you say? I fret over perversity enough in silence. May my
tongue wither, if I remain mute to-day. Good God! child, are you out
of your senses? Everything has been crammed into your poor head, but
to be sure it isn't written in the books, that when people find out what
happened in Porto, and that you married a baptized child, a Gentile,
a Christian girl......"
At these words the doctor rose, laid his hands on the servant's shoulder,
and said with grave, quiet earnestness.
"Whoever speaks of that, may betray it; may betray it. Do you
understand me, Rahel? I know your good intentions, and therefore tell
you: my wife is content here, and danger is still far away. We shall
stay. And besides: since Elizabeth became mine, the Jews avoid me as an
accursed, the Christians as a condemned man. The former close the doors,
the latter would fain open them; the gates of a prison, I mean. No
Portuguese will come here, but in the Netherlands there is more than one
monk and one Jew from Porto, and if any of them recognize me and find
Elizabeth with me, it will involve no less trifle than her life and mine.
I shall stay here; you now know why, and can go to your kitchen."
Old Rahel reluctantly obeyed, yet the doctor did not resume his seat at
the writing-table, but for a long time paced up and down among his books
more rapidly than usual.
CHAPTER VI.
St. John's day was close at hand. Ulrich was to go to the monastery the
following morning. Hitherto Father Benedict had been satisfied, and no
one molested the doctor. Yet the tranquillity, which formerly exerted so
beneficial an effect, had departed, and the measures of precaution he now
felt compelled to adopt, like everything else that brought him into
connection with the world, interrupted the progress of his work.
The smith was obliged to provide Ulrich with clothing, and for this
purpose went with the lad and a well-filled purse, not to his native
place, but to the nearest large city.
There many a handsome suit of garments hung in the draper's windows,
and the barefooted boy blushed crimson with delight, when he stood before
this splendid show. As he was left free to choose, he instantly selected
the clothes a nobleman had ordered for his son, and which, from head to
foot, were blue on one side and yellow on the other. But Adam pushed
them angrily aside. Ulrich's pleasure in the gay stuff reminded him of
his wife's outfit, the pink and green gowns.
So he bought two dark suits, which fitted the lad's erect figure as if
moulded upon him, and when the latter stood before him in the inn, neatly
dressed, with shoes on his feet, and a student's cap on his head, Adam
could not help gazing at him almost idolatrously.
The tavern-keeper whispered to the smith, that it was long since he had
seen so handsome a young fellow, and the hostess, after bringing the
beer, stroked the boy's curls with her wet hand.
On reaching home, Adam permitted his son to go to the doctor's in his new
clothes; Ruth screamed with joy when she saw him, walked round and round
him, and curiously felt the woollen stuff of the doublet and its blue
slashes, ever and anon clapping her hands in delight.
Her parents had expected that the parting would excite her most
painfully, but she smiled joyously into her playmate's face, when he bade
her farewell, for she took the matter in her usual way, not as it really
was, but as she imagined it to be. Instead of the awkward Ulrich of the
present, the fairy-prince he was now to become stood before her; he was
to return without fail at Christmas, and then how delightful it would be
to play with him again. Of late they had been together even more than
usual, continually seeking for the word, and planning a thousand
delightful things he was to conjure up for her, and she for him and
others.