Tales of the Wonder Club Volume II Part 11

"Ah!" sighed the headsman, "what between the crockery-seller and----"

Here he put his finger to his lip and looked round the room suspiciously.

"What is the matter?" asked the student.

"Hus.h.!.+" said the headsman, "it isn't always safe to talk of mischievous people--they are apt to appear. You know the saying, 'Talk of the devil.'"

"Well," said my ancestor, "but what has that to do with your broken crockery?"

"Hus.h.!.+" answered his host, looking round him half-timidly; then whispered, "I have a certain mischievous lodger that does my crockery more harm than either the crockery-seller or my boy upstairs when he's fractious."

"Ah!" exclaimed the traveller in surprise, "you have a lodger in your house?"

"Ay!--a lodger who never pays his rent, and who drives me to my wit's end by shying my crockery at my head. Look here, what a cut he gave my wrist once in one of his pranks. I shall bear this mark to my grave." So saying, he bared his wrist and displayed a deep, livid wound, long since healed, but which left behind a scar which nothing could efface.

"An ugly cut, to be sure," remarked the Englishman. "But why on earth do you not get rid of so playful a lodger?"

"Get rid of him! I only wish the devil I could. He comes here uninvited and---- But let us not talk of him, or he may pay us another of his pleasant visits, when you will be able to make his acquaintance. He never stands upon ceremony, but comes just whenever he likes. He may be in the room now, for what I know. I shall be off to bed."

My ancestor gazed round the room, vainly endeavouring to discover in some hidden nook the object of his host's terror, when, marvellous to relate! a dish on the top shelf was pitched, as if by some invisible hand, from its post, and shattered into pieces against the opposite wall, nearly hitting him on the head as it pa.s.sed.

The traveller stared first at the shelf, then at his host, and turned pale.

"Good Heavens!" he cried. "What was that?"

"What was it? Ay! You may well ask what it is," answered his host, peevishly. "What in the devil's name should it be but that pest of a 'Poltergeist' again. I told you you would make his acquaintance ere long."

"A what?--a '_Poltergeist_'?"

"Ay, Poltergeist--a malignant spirit, whose chief delight seems to be to strike terror into the house of a poor honest headsman, and smash all his crockery that he has to pay for out of his hard-earned wages."

"Holy Virgin!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed my ancestor, crossing himself (for he was a good Catholic). "A malignant spirit! Saints protect us!"

But the words were hardly out of his mouth when cras.h.!.+ went another plate upon the floor, just grazing his host's auburn head as it pa.s.sed.

"Oh! come now, my fine fellow," said our host, in a tone of mild remonstrance; "a little of that goes a long way."

Then turning to his guest, he remarked:

"I wonder why he honours me especially with his visits, and not other people. I shouldn't wonder if he is someone that I have had the honour of decapitating, and he comes to pay me an occasional visit in order to impress upon me that he hasn't forgotten the little service I did him."

A large pointed knife that lay peacefully on the table was then suddenly and powerfully thrown from the traveller's side, and remained with the point sticking in the panel of the door opposite.

"Ho! ho!" cried the headsman; "this is getting warm work. Now, my good friend, do let me entreat you to be more moderate in your manifestations, and if you are quiet, to-morrow I will send you a companion."

This promise, so far from quieting our spiritual guest, seemed to infuriate him more than ever, for the bottle of schnaps, more than half full, was now raised in the air and dashed to pieces on the table, the candle being overturned at the same time, and falling flame downwards on to the spirit spilt on the table, it ignited, and in a moment everything was in a blaze.

"Fire! Fire!" cried the headsman, in a voice that roused up his wife and child, who came tumbling downstairs in no time, to learn what was the matter.

There is no knowing what mischief might not have taken place had not my ancestor, with great presence of mind, s.n.a.t.c.hed up his damp clothes from before the fire, and succeeded in extinguis.h.i.+ng the flame.

"What _is_ the matter, Franz?" exclaimed our host's better half, appearing at the door just as matters were being set to rights again.

"Oh, nothing," said her fond spouse, "only that d----d Poltergeist again, who seems bent upon burning us all in our beds before he has done with us."

"Hus.h.!.+" said his wife, "don't swear, or he may do as you say in real earnest. Come to bed now, or to-morrow you won't be able to get up in time. Remember----"

"Ah, true; I must have my night's rest, as it would not do for my hand to tremble to-morrow when I mount the scaffold. _Gute nacht, mein Herr._"

And our worthy host followed his partner out of the room, leaving my ancestor to his reflections.

"Well," soliloquised my relative, "of all the strange adventures that ever occurred to me, this beats all. Oh! there is not the slightest doubt that what I have just witnessed is the work of the infernal powers--some diabolical agency.

"When I see a knife jump up from the table by itself without anyone near and deliberately fix itself in the panel of the door before my very eyes; when I see a bottle of spirit overturned and broken in pieces, and then a candle after that knocked over as if on purpose to ignite the spirit, and withal no way of accounting for such a phenomenon; moreover, when I see plates and dishes hurled from one end of the room to the other, and apparently aimed at people's heads, and yet the perpetrator of such pranks has the power of making himself invisible to the naked eye, then, I say, this is not through human agency, but something superhuman, and as it is not exactly an angelic mode of proceeding, it must be the reverse."

My ancestor shuddered, and crossed himself. The manifestations, however, had ceased for the night, and in five minutes our weary traveller was fast asleep.

His dreams that night were not of the pleasantest. He imagined that he mounted the scaffold with a crowd of eager eyes gazing at him, amongst whom were his friends and travelling companions. His host, the Scharfrichter, stood brandis.h.i.+ng his terrible two-handed sword, and in another moment his head would have been off, but at the critical time the dream changed, and he was being pelted with crockery in the midst of a cemetery at night by innumerable sheeted "poltergeister."

These and such-like visions were flitting before his brain, when a loud thump at the door brought him back to earth again. There was the Scharfrichter before him, not in dressing gown and slippers, as on the previous evening, but attired in doublet and hose of a blood red, a black _barello_ with scarlet c.o.c.k's feather.

"Now then, mein Herr," said the headsman, taking down his fearful instrument from the wall, "time's up."

My ancestor, only just awake, rubbed his eyes and imagined that he was really and truly called away to execution, and that his last hour had come.

The executioner, seeing that he hesitated, added: "If you want to witness the cunning of my hand, now's your time."

My relation gave a sigh of relief when he began to recollect that his own head was quite safe, and that he was only called to witness the execution of another man.

"But I can't go; I have sprained my ankle," pleaded the Englishman.

"Oh, I don't intend to walk myself," replied the executioner. "I have my horse and cart ready, and can give you a lift."

"Oh, if that's the case," said the student, "I shall be glad to go, as I wish to meet my friends in the towns.h.i.+p."

"Come on, then," and the headsman a.s.sisted the Englishman into the cart.

As they were about starting, a little red-haired ruffian of about ten, stout and well-built, and bearing a striking likeness to our host, appeared on the threshold.

"Papa, you'll bring me home a football, won't you?" said the youth.

"Ay, my boy, that will I, a good sized one," answered his father.

"That's your son?" asked the student of his host. "Ah, a fine little fellow. Here, my little man," said he to the child, and slipping a small coin into his little fat fist, he patted him on the cheek and stepped into the cart.

"Ah, he's a fine boy," said our host with a paternal pride, as he whipped on his horse. "There is nothing of the milksop about him. _He's_ not afraid of the devil himself."

"You do well to be proud of him. I'll warrant you buy him many a pretty toy," observed the Englishman.