The Piper Part 6

ANOTHER They might come back!

OLD URSULA [calling from her window]

Piper! I want the tune that charmed the rats!

If they come back, I'll have my grandson play it.

PIPER I pipe but for the children.

ILSE [dropping her doll and picking it up]

Oh, do pipe Something for Fridolin!

HANSEL Oh, pipe at me!

Now I'm a mouse! I'll eat you up! Rr--rr!--

CHILDREN Oh, pipe! Oh, play! Oh, play and make us dance!

Oh, play, and make us run away from school!

PIPER Why, what are these?

CHILDREN [scampering round him]

We're mice, we're mice, we're mice! . . .

We're mice, we're mice! We'll eat up everything!

MARTIN'S WIFE [calling]

'T is church-time. La, what will the neighbors say?

ILSE [Waving her doll]

Oh, please do play something for Fridolin!

AXEL'S WIFE Do hear the child. She's quite the little mother!

PIPER A little mother? Ugh! How horrible.

That fairy thing, that princess,--no, that Child!

A little mother?

[To her]

Drop the ugly thing!

MARTIN'S WIFE Now, on my word! and what's amiss with mothers?

Are mothers horrible?

[The PIPER is struck with painful memories.]

PIPER No, no. But--care And want and pain and age. . .

[Turns back to them with a bitter change of voice]

And penny-wealth,-- And penny-counting.--Penny prides and fears-- Of what the neighbors say the neighbors say!--

MARTIN'S WIFE And were you born without a mother, then?

ALL Yes, you there! Ah, I told you! He's no man.

He's of the devil.

MARTIN'S WIFE Who was your mother, then?

PIPER [fiercely]

Mine!--Nay, I do not know. For when I saw her, She was a thing so trodden, lost and sad, I cannot think that she was ever young, Save in the cheris.h.i.+ng voice.--She was a stroller; My father was a stroller.--So, you have it!

And since she clave to him, and hunger too, The Church's ban was on her.--Either live, Mewed up forever,--she! to be a nun; Or keep her life-long wandering with the wind; The very name of wife stript from her troth.

That was my mother.--And she starved and sang; And like the wind, she roved and lurked and shuddered Outside your lighted windows, and fled by, Storm-hunted, trying to outstrip the snow, South, south, and homeless as a broken bird,-- Limping and hiding!--And she fled, and laughed, And kept me warm; and died! To you, a Nothing; Nothing, forever, oh, you well-housed mothers!

As always, always for the lighted windows Of all the world, the Dark outside is nothing; And all that limps and hides there in the dark; Famis.h.i.+ng,--broken,--lost!

And I have sworn For her sake and for all, that I will have Some justice, all so late, for wretched men, Out of these same smug towns that drive us forth After the show!--Or scheme to cage us up Out of the sunlight; like a squirrel's heart Torn out and drying in the market-place.

My mother! Do you know what mothers are?-- Your children! Do you know them? Ah, not you!

There's not one here but it would follow me, For all your bleating!

AXEL'S WIFE Kuno, come away!

[The children cling to him. He smiles down triumphantly.

PIPER Oho, Oho! Look you?--You preach--I pipe!

[Reenter the men, with KURT and JACOBUS, from the Rathaus, murmuring dubiously.

[The PIPER sets down JAN and stands forth, smiling.

JACOBUS [smoothly]

H'm! My good man, we have faithfully debated Whether your vision of so great a sum Might be fulfilled,--as by some miracle.

But no. The moneys we administer Will not allow it; nor the common weal.

Therefore, for your late service, here you have Full fifteen guilders, [Holding forth a purse]

and a pretty sum Indeed, for piping!

KURT [ominously]

Take them!

JACOBUS Either that, Or, to speak truly, nothing!

[The PIPER is motionless]

Come, come. Nay, count them, if you will.

KURT Time goes!

PIPER Ay. And your oath?

KURT No more; Enough.

[There is a sound of organ music from the Minster.]

VERONIKA [beseechingly]

Ah, Kurt!

KURT [savagely to the crowd]

What do ye, mewling of this fellow's rights?

He hath none!--Wit ye well, he is a stroller, A wastrel, and the shadow of a man!

Ye waste the day and dally with the law.

Such have no rights; not in their life nor body!

We are in no wise bound. Nothing is his.

He may not carry arms; nor have redress For any harm that men should put on him, Saving to strike a shadow on the wall!