An Old Story of My Farming Days Volume Iii Part 1

An Old Story of My Farming Days.

Vol. III.

by Fritz Reuter.

CHAPTER I.

The day after Christmas was pa.s.sed very busily in Mrs. Behrens' house in Rahnstadt. Louisa was continually to be seen running up and down stairs, for she was finis.h.i.+ng the arrangement of her father's room.

Whenever she thought it was quite ready, and looked really nice, she was sure to find something to improve, some alteration that must be made to ensure perfection. Dinner-time came, but her father had not arrived, though she had prepared some little dainties especially for him. She laid a place for him, however, as perhaps he might come before they had finished dinner.--"I don't know why it is," she said to little Mrs. Behrens, "but I feel as if some misfortune were going to happen."--"What?" cried Mrs. Behrens, "you've only lived in town for three months, and you have presentiments already like a tea-drinking town-lady! What has become of my light-hearted country-girl?" and as she said this, she stroked her foster-child's cheek with a tender touch and loving smile.--"No," answered Louisa, taking the kind hand, and holding it tight between her own, "such indefinite presentiments never trouble me. Unfortunately it is a very definite fear lest my father should weary of the inactivity of a town-life, after what he has been accustomed to in the country."--"Why, child, you talk as if Rahnstadt were a great city; no--thank G.o.d!--the geese go about bare-foot here just the same as at Pumpelhagen, and if your father likes to see farming-operations going on around him, he has only to watch the two manure-carts belonging to our neighbour on the right, and the three belonging to our neighbour on the left. If he wants to talk about farming he need only go to our landlord Mr. Kurz, who will be too happy to harangue him about grazing fields and town-jails till he's as sick of these subjects as we are."--Louisa laughed, and when the dinner-things were cleared away, she said: "Now, mother, suppose you lie down and have a little nap, while I go down the Gurlitz road, and see if I can't meet my father."

She put on her cloak, and a warm hood, and set off down the road, which had always been her favourite walk since she came to Rahnstadt, for it was the one that led to the place where she had been so happy. When she had time she used to go to the hill from which she could see Gurlitz village, t he church, the parsonage, and the church-yard, and when she had a little more time she used to run down to the parsonage to see Lina and G.o.dfrey, and have a talk about the old days and the new. She walked on and on; her father was not in sight; the east-wind blew in her face, and made her cheeks bright and rosy, so that her lovely face, framed in her dark cloth hood, looked for all the world like a sunny springday which gives the promise of hope and joy to man. But her eyes were full of tears. Was it because of the rude east-wind? Was it because she was looking so keenly down the road in search of her father? Was it because of her thoughts? It could not be the east-wind, for she was now standing still, and gazing out into the west with her eyes full of tears. It could not have been the keenness of her search for her father, for she was now looking straight over at the place where the sun was setting behind the black pines on the horizon like a red ball of fire. It must have been her thoughts that made her weep.

Such thoughts as come to the young making their joy and sorrow, which sometimes crown their brows with gladness unspeakable, and at others make them weep in agony, when they suddenly feel the thorns in what they had thought was only a garland of roses. Why was she gazing towards the west? She knew that he whom she loved was there, and her heart repeated the words of the poet:

"Haste westward, ever westward ho Thou boat at my behest!

E'en dying, I should long to go Where all my hope doth rest!"

She blushed, when she found what she was saying to herself, and how she was dreaming of happy days to come.

She reached the place where her father had stood a couple of hours before, and had drunk his cup of sorrow to the very dregs. She stood still, and looked down upon Pumpelhagen and Gurlitz, and let the thought of all the love she had been blessed with overflow her heart.

Where the poor old father had stood and cursed those who had so cruelly injured him, the daughter now stood and prayed, weeping tears of love and grat.i.tude, and her prayers and tears washed away the curse from the tablet on which all human events are noted down.

The distance from Rahnstadt to Gurlitz is five miles, and as the winter-sun was setting, Louisa could linger no more, she had to go home at once. But she saw a man coming towards her from Gurlitz, perhaps it was her father. She waited a few minutes. No, it was not her father, so she walked on a short way, and then looked round again. This time she saw it was uncle Brasig, who was trying to overtake her.--"Bless me, Louisa! What are you doing here? Do you find it a pleasant amus.e.m.e.nt standing on the public road in a wind like this? Aren't you coming down to the parsonage?"--"No, uncle Brasig, not to-day. I only came to meet my father."--"He pa.s.sed long ago. Preserve us all! Where can he be?"--Brasig suddenly remembered Hawermann's strange manner, but when he saw how anxious Louisa looked, he said to comfort her: "We farmers have often to change our plans; we have to go here, there and everywhere. Perhaps he turned to the right here and went to Gulzow, and perhaps he has got to Rahnstadt by this time and is seeing about some business. But I," he added, "am going with you, childie, I have something to do in Rahnstadt, where I am going to spend the night. You see I want to win the nine s.h.i.+llings back from that over-wise man, Kurz, the shopkeeper, which he got out of me at that confounded game Boston. This is club-night."

When they had gone a little further they met a dog-cart coming towards them from Rahnstadt. It was Christian Degel with Dr. Strump. The doctor ordered Christian to stop: "Have you heard the news?" he asked. "Mr.

von Rambow has met with an accident with his fowling-piece; he has shot himself in the arm. But I hav'n't time to wait, the coachman is late enough as it is, for I was out when he came for me. Drive on."--"What is the meaning of this?" cried Louisa. "My father leave Pumpelhagen when the family are in distress! He could never have done that."--"But it may have happened after he left," said Brasig, though when he remembered how Hawermann had looked in the morning, he did not believe that it could have been the case. Louisa was more uneasy than before and walked on quickly. She could not understand why her father was so late, nor could she understand how he could have left Pumpelhagen at all, after such an accident, and yet she felt that the two strange facts were somehow connected.

Meanwhile Hawermann had arrived at Mrs. Behrens' house in Rahnstadt. He had left the high road and had gone round by a field-path, that he might have time to regain his composure before meeting his daughter.

When he reached Mrs. Behrens' house he had regained his self-command, but the struggle had fatigued him so much that he looked ten years older than usual when Mrs. Behrens saw him. She was making the coffee when he entered the room, and was so startled by the change in his appearance that she allowed the coffee to boil over, and sprang to meet him, exclaiming: "Good G.o.d! Hawermann, what's the matter? Are you ill?"--"No--Yes, I think so. Where's Louisa?"--"She went to meet you, didn't you see her? But sit down, do. How very tired you look!"--Hawermann seated himself and looked round the room as if to make sure that he and Mrs. Behrens were alone.--"Hawermann, please tell me what is the matter," she said, taking his nerveless hands between her own.--"It is all over with me now. I must go through the world as a useless, dishonoured man."--"Oh, don't! Don't! Don't say that!"--"I had grown accustomed to the thought that my work was done, though it was hard to bear at first. But the misery of losing my honest name is more than I can endure; it crushes me."--"But who wants to deprive you of that?" asked Mrs. Behrens looking at him affectionately.--"The people who can do it most thoroughly, Mr. von Rambow and his wife," said the old man, and then he began to tell her all that had happened in a weak, broken voice; but when he got to the part when Mrs. von Rambow had also deserted him, had turned her back upon him, and had let him be ordered out of the room as a thief and a cheat, his anger broke out again; he sprang to his feet and began to pace the room with flas.h.i.+ng eyes and clenched fists, as though he wanted to fight against the world. "Oh,"

he cried, "that is not all. They have hit me harder than they knew.

They have wrecked my child's life as well as mine. There, read that, Mrs. Behrens," and he gave her Frank's letter.--She read it, the paper trembling in her hands from nervous excitement, and while she read it, he stood before her, his eyes fixed on her face the better to read her thoughts. "Hawermann," she said, taking his hand, when she had finished, "don't you see the finger of G.o.d in this. One cousin has sinned against you, and the other makes it right."--"No, Mrs. Behrens,"

he replied sternly, "I should be the scoundrel the world will call me from henceforth, if I were to let a good and trustful man take a wife with a stained name into his house. Poor and honest, let me be that; but dishonourable, never."--"Oh me!" cried Mrs. Behrens, "why isn't my pastor here? If my pastor were only here, he could have told us what to do."--"Indeed he could," said Hawermann sadly. "I _cannot_ do it," he exclaimed, "Louisa must decide for herself, and you must help her. You have been able to teach her to distinguish right from wrong as I never had the chance of teaching her. If she thinks it right and honourable to enter into this engagement in spite of what has happened, and you agree with her, I will give my consent. I will not influence her in any way, and will not even see her until she has decided. Here is Frank's letter to her. Give it to her after you have told her what has happened. It was all exactly as I told you. I'm going to my room now; I'll have nothing to do with her decision." He left the room, but came back again to say: "If you think it is for her happiness, never mind me! Forget what I said about it's being impossible. I will do what I can to hide my dishonoured name." He left the room once more, and as he went upstairs, he said to himself: "I can't do otherwise, I can't do otherwise." When he threw himself upon the sofa in his little room, and saw how his daughter had arranged everything for his pleasure and comfort, he covered his eyes with his hand and murmured: "And I must do without all this perhaps." Then with a deep sigh: "And why not? Why not? If it is for her happiness," he exclaimed aloud, "I'll never see her again." The door-bell rang, he heard Brasig's voice, and then his daughter's; then all was still; he listened intently for any sound, Mrs. Behrens was telling about it, and Louisa was suffering the pain of hearing the story. At last footsteps were to be heard coming slowly and heavily upstairs. Brasig came in, he looked as calm and solemn as if he had seen the dead rise from their graves and come to meet him; his eyebrows, which were usually raised as high as his hair when he heard of anything extraordinary, now hung low down over his eyes. He seated himself beside his friend on the sofa, and merely said: "I know it, Charles. I know all."

They sat for a long time silent in the half-darkness. At last Brasig took Hawermann's hand in his, and said: "Charles, we have known each other for fifty years. You remember at old Knirkstadt's? What a happy life we had when we were young, always contented with our lot and merry hearted. And except for a few silly tricks I played with you, we have nothing to reproach ourselves with. Charles, it is a pleasant thing in one's old age, when one's conscience only reproaches one with follies, and not with wickedness." Hawermann s.h.i.+vered and drew away his hand.

"Charles," said Brasig, "a good conscience is a great blessing in one's old age, and it's a remarkable thing, a very remarkable thing, that these good consciences always cling to each other in their old age, and that nothing can divide them from each other. Charles, my dear old boy!" and he fell upon his friend's neck and wept bitterly.--"Brasig,"

entreated Hawermann, "don't make me more miserable than I am, my heart's heavy enough as it is."--"And why, Charles? What makes it heavy? Your heart is as pure as Job's, and should be as light as a lark which soars up to heaven, for the story about the confounded.... No, I don't mean that; I was going to say.... Pshaw! what was it we were talking about? Oh, to be sure, it was about the conscience. The conscience is a very strange thing, Charles. For instance, take Kurz's, for he has one as well as you or I, and I believe that it will enable him to appear in the presence of G.o.d at the Last Day, and that it will justify him, but still it doesn't justify him in my eyes, for he peeps at the cards, when he's playing at Boston; he has what may be called a penny-conscience, for in great things he's most scrup'lous; for example; with Mrs. Behrens' house rent, but if he can take a hair's breadth off a yard, or give just the least atom short weight, he's not ashamed to do it, that's to say when he can manage it, which isn't always. I wanted to say, Charles, that you'll have to see a good deal of him, while you're here. You'll find the pleasure of his acquaintance quite as so, so, as his conscience, for he will try to discuss farming matters with you, and that's as unpleasant as driving in a cart without springs. I'm afraid you'll find it a little dull, so I think that as soon as I've got the young parson's spring sowing done, and everything is in order, I'll come here to you, and then we'll be able to cheer each other up. I can go out to Gurlitz again when the harvest begins, that that poor boy, the parson, mayn't get into any difficulty. Indeed I'm sure there's no danger of that, for, George, is a thoughtful sort of fellow, and takes a good deal of the management upon himself--thank G.o.d for that--and also that Lina backs him up when it's necessary. When the first year is over you'll see that G.o.dfrey will pitch all his Methodistical trash overboard, but we must give him time to learn that there are certain worldly matters which are better suited to man than hymn-books are. And then I'll come to you, Charles, and we'll enjoy life as much as if we were in Paris, and you'll see that the last quarter of our life-time will be the best part of the whole ox."--Here he threw his arm round his friend's shoulder and went on talking to him, mixing up the past and the future, and making them into a regular medley just as a mother does, when she tries to change the current of her child's thoughts.

The moon shone in at the window, and what can better soothe a wounded spirit than the soft light of the moon, and the love of an old friend who clings to us through good and evil report. I have always thought that the clear bright suns.h.i.+ne is most suited to lovers, while the calm moonlight is best for friends.h.i.+p.

While they were sitting together the door opened, and a slender figure came softly into the room and remained standing in the full light of the moon. The girl's arms were crossed upon her breast, and her pale face looked like that of a white marble statue against the dark wall: What can have happened to thee, thou poor child?

Brasig went out of the room silently, and Hawermann covered his eyes with his hand as if they pained him, pained him to the heart. The girl threw herself down by his side, clasped him in her arms, and laid her pale face against his. Not a word was said by either of them for a long, long time, but at last the old man heard a low whisper at his ear: "I know what you think it right to do; I am your child--am I not?--your dear child?" Hawermann put his arm round his dear child and drew her closer to him. "Father, father!" she cried, "we can never part! My foster-father, who is now with G.o.d, told me how you wanted to keep me with you when you were in such sorrow, although that good woman, the labourer's wife, offered to take charge of me. Now that you are again in sorrow do you really wish to part from me? Do you think that I could let you go?" and pressing him in her arms, she said: "Your name is my name, your honour is my honour, your life is my life."

They talked a long time together in the sweet moonlight, but what they said no one else has a right to know, for when a father and child speak to each other heart to heart and soul to soul, G.o.d is with them, and what they say is between themselves, the world has no part in it.

Down stairs in the parlour it was very different. Mrs. Behrens was sitting in her arm-chair weeping bitterly. The dear good woman was torn in two by conflicting opinions, and her heart was sore for Hawermann and his sorrows; but when she foresaw the terrible struggle she was obliged to cause in the heart of her adopted daughter, and when she saw it awake, and saw faith and courage get the victory in spite of misery, she felt as if she herself had brought all these misfortunes on the head of her darling--remorse and compa.s.sion filled her heart, and she burst into bitter tears as soon as she was left alone.--Brasig on the other hand had left all his compa.s.sion upstairs, he had expended all that he had upon Hawermann, and now his wrath, which he had before restrained with infinite difficulty, burst forth, and as he entered the dark room, he exclaimed: "The infamous Jesuitical packages! What do they mean by blotting the fair fame of such a man as Charles Hawermann?

It's a Satanic deed! It's just like one man holding the cat, while the other impales it! Curse the ...."--"Brasig, Brasig, _please_ don't!"

cried little Mrs. Behrens. "Don't let us have any of your unchristian ways here."--"Do you call that unchristian? It sounds to me like a song of the holy angels in paradise, when I say that sort of thing about the infernal plots of these Jesuits."--"But, Brasig, we are not their judges."--"I know quite well, Mrs. Behrens, that I am not a judge, and that you hav'n't a seat on the munic.i.p.al board; but still you can't expect me to look at vermin with the same pleasure as at beautiful canary-birds! No, Mrs. Behrens, toads are toads, and Pomuchelskopp is the chief toad that has squirted its venom over us. What do you say to the trick he has been trying to play me lately? You see, he has put up a fence across the foot-path that leads to the glebe, and which has been in existence for a thousand years for anything I know, and has sent me a message that if ever I cross that fence he'll have my boots pulled off and let me hop away home through the snow in my stockings like a crow. Do you call that a Christian sentiment? But I'll go to law with him. The fellow daring to even me to a crow! And parson G.o.dfrey must go to law with him also, for trying to deprivate him of the use of the foot-path. And young Joseph must go to law with him, for he has said, several times, and publicly too, that young Joseph was an old fool, and young Joseph is not obliged to take that quietly. You must also go to law with him for not having built you a dowager-house, as he was obliged to do by law, at least one or two old people have told me so. Then Charles Hawermann must go to law with Mr. von Rambow. We must all get up a rev'lution against those Jesuits, and if everyone will agree with me, we might all drive to Gustrow to-morrow to see the Chancellor, and summons the whole lot of them on a bit of parchment. We can engage five barristers, that'll be one for each of us, and then, 'Hurrah for the lawsuit!'" If Brasig had had any idea that Louisa had to suffer more than anyone else from "the Jesuits," he would have insisted on engaging a barrister to plead her cause also, but he had not the remotest notion of her misery.--Mrs. Behrens tried to calm him down, but she found it a very difficult task, for the misfortunes of his old friend had caused him much mingled anger and sorrow, and all the small rages proper for a farmer, and the irritability brought on by gout and losing at cards combined to augment his rage.--"I came here,"

he said, "to amuse myself because it was club-day, and because I wanted to win back the nine s.h.i.+llings from that old sharper Kurz, that he fleeced me of with his confounded trickery, and now the devil is holding his d--d telespope before my eyes that I may the better see some utterly vile human actions! And that's to be my amus.e.m.e.nt! Now, Mrs. Behrens, if you don't mind I'd like to spend the night here, for I shouldn't make much of that stupid game, Boston, this evening, and it might be as well for me to sleep in Charles' room so as to be able to cheer him up whenever he gets low."--Mrs. Behrens replied that she would be much obliged to him if he would do so, and she spent the rest of the evening trying to calm down the irrascible old man. Neither Hawermann nor Louisa came back to the parlour, and when Brasig went upstairs he found that Louisa had gone to her own room.

When Brasig took leave of his old friend on the next morning, he said: "You may leave it all in my hands, Charles, I'll drive over to Pumpelhagen, and get your things. You shall have all your belongings though it makes me ill to cross the threshold of the house where you were so badly treated."

On the same morning Hawermann sat down to write to Frank; he told him honestly and clearly what had happened at Pumpelhagen, even to the terrible ending of his stay there, and the accusation which had been made against him, and said that he and his daughter were of one mind in declining the offer Frank had made. He wanted to tell the young man of his warm friends.h.i.+p for him, but somehow the words would not come as easily as usual, and when written seemed rather forced. He ended by entreating Frank to leave him and his daughter to go their way alone, to forget them, and allow them to live out the rest of their lives by themselves.

Louisa also wrote, and when she had sent Mrs. Behrens' maid out in the evening to post her letter, she went to the window, and watched the servant as if she were taking a last long leave of what was very dear to her, and then looking at the setting sun, she murmured:

"E'en dying, I should long to go Where all my hope doth rest!"

She did not blush to-day when she said these words, as she had done only yesterday; her face was pale, and when the last rays of the setting sun were hidden behind the houses, she sighed heavily, and slow tears gathered in her eyes and rolled down her white cheeks. She did not weep for her own sorrow, but for his.

As soon as Brasig reached the parsonage, Lina ran out to meet him, exclaiming: "Oh, uncle Brasig, I'm so glad that you've come. Such dreadful things have happened here, I don't mean _here_, but at Pumpelhagen. Dr. Strump has been here--George was taken ill suddenly last night--so I had the doctor's gig stopped in the village as he was coming back from Pumpelhagen, and he told us such a frightful story--I don't mean the doctor, for one could hardly get a word out of him on the subject--but his coachman said that--oh _do_ come in, there's such a draught here," and she drew the old bailiff into the parlour. When there, she told him that the people said her dear uncle Hawermann had shot Alick, and had then gone away no one knew where, but most probably to take his own life. Brasig comforted her by a.s.suring her that Hawermann was alive, and after having convinced her of that, he asked how Mr. von Rambow was getting on. Lina told him that Dr. Strump did not think him dangerously wounded, and then Brasig went to see George who was apparently suffering from congestion of the lungs. After that it was time for him to go to Pumpelhagen for Hawermann's things as it was about twelve o'clock, so he set out in search of a man who could act as coachman instead of George.

He asked several of the villagers to go with him, and help him to bring away the things, but they all refused on one pretext or another, and he soon found that he would have to go alone. But at the last moment old Ruhrdanz, the weaver, came forward, and said: "I don't care what he says; if he chooses to make a scene he can do so, it's nothing to me, I'll go with you, Mr. Brasig."--"What do you mean by making a scene, Ruhrdanz?" asked Brasig.--"You see, sir, he has forbidden us to do any kind of work for the parsonage people, we ar'n't even allowed to go a single step in their service."--"Who forbade you to do so?"--"Why _he_ did. Our master Pomuchelskopp."--"The infamous Jesuit!" muttered Brasig below his breath.--"He told us that if we disobeyed him we might feed our cattle on saw-dust, for he would give us neither hay nor straw, and we might burn stones to warm ourselves, for he would give us neither wood nor peats."--Brasig grew more and more furious every moment, and the old weaver, having got into the full swing of talk, went on: "And then you see we've to be ready night and day when he wants us. I myself have been from home all the Christmas holydays, and only got back at ten o'clock last night."--"Where were you?"--"At the old station in Ludwigsl.u.s.t."--"What were you doing there?"--"I wasn't doing any thing there."--"Why you must have been sent on business?"--"Yes, I was sent on business, but nothing came of it, as there were no papers."--"What _do_ you mean?"--"You see, I was sent to the station with a ram, and I got there all right. I found a fellow waiting for me, so I said to him: 'Good-morning,' I said, 'here he is.'--'Who?' he asked.--'The ram,' I said.--'What has he come for?' he asked.--'I don't know,' I said.--'Are there any papers?" he asked.--'No,' I said, 'there are no papers about him.'--'You fool,' he said, 'are you sure that there are no papers?"--'Yes,' I said, 'the ram has no papers.'--'Confound you!' he said. 'Hav'n't _you_ brought me some papers yourself?'--'What?' I said.

'I? What's the good of _my_ having papers? I'm not to be sold to you here.' Then the fellow grew very rude and had me turned out and the ram after me, and so there we were both left standing before the station.

'Ugh! Ugh!' coughed the old ram. We were turned out into the road because he had no papers, and I had none either. What was to be done? I drove him home again, and when I got back last night, there was a frightful scene. I thought our master would have eaten me up he fell upon me so viciously. But it wasn't my fault. If the man ought to have had papers they should have sent him some. But of this I'm sure, that if our master wasn't such a great man and didn't happen to be so much too strong for us, and if we only stuck to each other properly we'd manage to take him down a peg. As for his hop-pole of a wife, she's a thousand time worse than he is. It was only last spring that she nearly beat my neighbour Kapphingst's girl to death. She beat the girl three times with her broom-stick, and then locked her up in the shed without food. And why? Because a hawk had carried off one of her chickens. It wasn't the girl's fault that the hawk carried off the chicken, nor was it my fault that I wasn't given any papers."--Brasig listened to the weaver's story, and although only yesterday he had wanted to bring about a revolution against Pomuchelskopp, he was now silent, for he would never have forgiven himself, if he had thoughtlessly helped to excite the labourers against their master.

They got to Pumpelhagen at last, and stopped at the farm-house door.

Fred Triddelfitz sprang out, and ran up to Brasig: "Oh, Sir, Sir," he cried, "it wasn't my fault that Mary Moller packed the book by mistake amongst my things, and I knew nothing about it till I was changing my clothes at Demmin."--"What book?" asked Brasig quickly.--"Why, Hawermann's book, about which there has been such a row."--"And that book," cried Brasig, seizing Fred by the collar and shaking him till his teeth chattered, "you took to Demmin with you, you infamous grey-hound that you are." Then pus.h.i.+ng him towards the house: "Come in, and show me the book."--Fred brought it tremblingly, and Brasig s.n.a.t.c.hed it out of his hands: "Do you know what you have done, you infamous grey-hound? You have brought the man, who tried in all kindness and gentleness, to make a responsible human being of you, and who always covered your follies with a silken mantle, to misery and shameful suspicion."--"Oh, _don't_ Mr. Brasig," entreated Fred turning deadly pale, "indeed it wasn't my doing; Mary Moller packed the book with my things, and I galloped home with it from Demmin this morning as hard as I could."--"Mary Moller," cried Brasig, "what have you got to do with Mary Moller? Oh, if I were your father or your mother, or even your aunt, I'd thrash you till you ran round the wall like a squirrel.

What have you got to do with that stupid old woman Mary Moller? Do you think that galloping on the public road is the way to make good your folly? Is your innocent horse to suffer for your sins? But now come away, come away. You must appear in Mrs. von Rambow's Court of Justice.

You must tell all about it there, and then you can explain the mystery about Mary Moller." When he had said this he set off to the manor house, and Fred followed him slowly, like hard times when they come into the land, and his heart was full of grief and pain.

"Will you let your mistress know that this young man and I want to speak to her," said Brasig to Daniel Sadenwater, pointing at the same time to Fred. Daniel made a half bow, and went. Fred waited, and amused himself by making a face, in the same way as he used to do at Parchen, when he was called before the headmaster of his school to answer for some piece of mischief. Brasig meanwhile was pulling up his boots in the corner, the better to show their yellow tops, and at the same time holding the book tightly under his arm. When Mrs. von Rambow crossed the hall on her way to the drawing-room, Brasig followed her, his face quite red with inward excitement, and with stooping. Fred came slowly after, looking pale and anxious.--"You have something to say to me, Mr. Brasig," said the lady turning from one to the other of her visitors.--"Yes, Madam, but under the circ.u.mstances, I'd be much obliged by your first listening to what this apothecary's son, this ...."--"infamous grey-hound" he was about to have said, but stopped himself in time--"has to say; he has a nice little story to tell you."--Mrs. von Rambow looked enquiringly at Fred, who began to stammer out something very like what had really happened, turning red and pale as he spoke. The only thing he left out was Mary Moller's name, and he concluded his story thus: "So the book got into my portmanteau by accident."--"Out with it about Mary Moller," interrupted Brasig, "the truth must be made known."--"Yes," said Fred, "Mary Moller packed my things for me as I had so much to do that day."--Mrs. von Rambow had grown very uneasy: "Then," she said, "it was all owing to a wretched mistake?"--"Yes, Madam," answered Brasig, "and here's the book. Look, Hawermann's account is balanced in the last page, and besides his sal'ry, you see that he has to be paid sixty pounds. You may be sure that it's all right, for Charles Hawermann never added up wrong in his life; he was always better at accounts from a boy than I was."--Mrs. von Rambow took the book with a trembling hand, and as she looked at the column of figures on the last page, the thought flashed into her mind, that as Hawermann was proved innocent in this particular, he might be equally innocent of the other charge brought against him, and in which she herself had never believed. Fred's story bore truth on the face of it, and so she saw that she had done the old bailiff a grievous wrong. But he had shot her husband! She had an excuse for her conduct in that. She said: "What made him shoot at Alick?"--"Madam," said Brasig, raising his eyebrows and putting on his gravest expression, "allow me to say that that is a false accusation.

It was your husband who got the gun, and when Hawermann tried to take it from him, it went off. That's the whole truth, for Hawermann himself told me, and he never lies."--She knew that well, and she also knew that she could not say the same of her husband. In the first excitement he had certainly declared: "He is not a murderer;" but ever since then, he had said that Hawermann had shot him. She sat down and covered her eyes with her hand. She tried to regain her self-control, but it was only with a great effort that she roused herself to say: "You have come, I suppose, to receive the money for the bailiff, but my husband is ill, and I cannot disturb him by asking for it just now. I will send it."--"No, Madam, I hav'n't come for that," answered Brasig, drawing himself up to his full height, "I came here to tell the truth, I came here to defend my friend, my old school-fellow of sixty years ago."--"That was unnecessary if your friend has a good conscience, which I believe he has."--"I see, Madam, that you don't understand human nature. Every man has two consciences, one of which is within him and of that no devil can deprive him; but the other is external, and is known as his good name, and that can be stolen from him by any rascal who has power and cleverness enough to do it. When his good name is taken from him, the man dies morally, for no one lives for himself alone, but also for the world. Evil reports are like the thistle-down which the devil and his accomplices sow in our fields. The better the ground, the more the weeds flourish, and when they are in seed the wind comes--no one knows whence it cometh, or whither it goeth--and carries the thistledown with it, scattering it over the land, and next year the field is full of thistles. Then people come and abuse the land, but no one will lend a hand to pull up the weeds, for each man is afraid of hurting his fingers. And you, lady, have also feared the p.r.i.c.ks. That was what pained my friend Charles Hawermann most of all, when he was turned out of the house as a cheat and a thief. That is what I came to tell you--and now farewell--I will say no more." He then left the room, and Fred slunk after him.

And Frida? Where was the high spirited young woman with the wise eyes and clear judgment, who could see what ought to be done so calmly and decidedly? She was changed now, her calm judgment was gone, and uneasiness had taken its place, and a veil of sorrow had fallen over her eyes, which hindered them seeing as clearly as before. "Oh," she exclaimed aloud. "Another untruth! All these suspicions were only born of lies, self-deception and unmanly weakness! My anxiety about him and my love for him, have made me partic.i.p.ate in his guilt; have made me wound the n.o.blest heart that ever beat for me. But I will tell him all," and she sprang to her feet, "I will tear the net in which I am entangled." Then falling back in her chair again, she went on sadly: "No, not now; I can't yet; he is too ill." Ah me! She was right: self-deception and lies had gained ever more power and strength, and her true heart would find it very difficult to keep itself uninfluenced by its surroundings, and to distinguish between what was real and what merely seemed to be real.

When Brasig got back to his carriage, he found that Ruhrdanz had collected nearly all of Hawermann's possessions with the help of Christian Dasel, and the rest of the things were very soon got together. As Brasig was getting into the carriage beside Ruhrdanz, Fred Triddelfitz pulled him back, and said: "Mr. Brasig, please tell Mr.

Hawermann that I am innocent; that it wasn't my fault."--Brasig was not going to have answered him at first, but catching sight of his miserable face, was sorry for him, and said: "Yes, I'll tell him that; but see that you improve." And then he drove away.

After they had gone a short distance Ruhrdanz said: "It's nothing to me, Sir, and that's why I speak of it, but who ever would have thought it! I mean about Mr. Hawermann."--"What are you talking about?"--"Oh, nothing! I mean that he should have gone away so suddenly, and then the shooting!"--"That's all nonsense," said Brasig angrily.--"I said so too. Sir, but Christian, the groom who helped me to pack told me it was true. He said the quarrel was all about some confounded papers, for Hawermann's papers wer'n't right. Yes, that was it, the confounded papers!"--"Hawermann's papers were all right."--"That's just what I said, Sir, but then there's the shooting. Our young master Gustavus was telling the story all over the village this morning."--"Gustavus,"

cried Brasig furiously, "is a young rascal, a puppy! A puppy whose ears ar'n't shorn yet!"--"That's just what I said, and I hope you won't be angry with me, Sir; but still he's the best of the lot up at the manor.

You see, my father's sister's son came here from the Prussian district near Anklam last week, and he told us what sort of a man our squire is.

He always had some human skin sticking to the end of his cane, he was so fond of thras.h.i.+ng folk, but the Prussians would stand it no longer.

The people had him up before the county-court or the country-court--I forget what the thing's called--and the Landgrave punished him severely. I only wish that we had a Landgrave like that close at hand, for the Chancellor's office is too far away."--"Yes," cried Brasig crossly, "if you had a Landgrave like that, you'd have rare doings."--"That's just what I say, Sir; but Mr. Pomuchelskopp once went too far, he beat a woman who was in the family way very brutally, and--don't be angry with me. Sir--I think that was a horrible thing to do. The king happened to hear of it, and commanded that he should be imprisoned for life at Stettin with hard labour. Then his wife went to the king and fell at his feet, and his majesty granted her request on condition that he wore an iron ring round his neck for the rest of his life, and that he did convict's work at Stettin jail for a month every autumn. He was there this autumn. He was also banished from Prussia, and so he came here. Now tell me, Sir, where do you think he will go if he is chased away from here?"--"Where the pepper grows, for all I care," cried Brasig.--"That's just what I say, Sir; but--don't be angry with me--I don't believe that they'll take him there even, for you see he has money to buy himself off, though indeed there are his papers against him. If the king sees from his papers that he has to wear an iron ring round his neck, and that that's the reason he wears such a large handkerchief round his throat, he won't let him buy himself off."--"Ah, then you see you'll have to keep him," said Brasig.--"Yes, of course that'll be the way of it; we'd have to keep him because he'd be given into our charge. Tche!" he said to the horse and then they drove on at a slow trot through the village of Gurlitz, Brasig thinking deeply.--What a strange world it is! he thought. A fellow who is well known to be a rascal has the power to take the good name from an honourable man, and the world believes the evil speaking of the bad man, while it turns a deaf ear to the a.s.severations of him whom he calumniated. Brasig believed, from what he had heard of the stories Gustavus had been telling that Pomuchelskopp was doing his utmost to spread evil reports of Hawermann.--"It's scand'lous," he said to himself as he got out of the carriage at Mrs. Behrens' door in Rahnstadt, "but wait Samuel! I've got the better of you once in preventing you having the glebe, and I'll get the better of you again.

But first of all I'll have the law of you for likening me to a 'crow'."

CHAPTER II.

New year's day 1846 had come with all its pleasures. The Rahnstadt people congratulated themselves on the cold weather outside, and on their warm rooms. There was a great deal of sledging in the morning, and many salt herrings were eaten because of Sylvester, Eve. Amongst the young people there was much talking of this and that thing they had noticed at the ball on the previous evening, and the fathers and mothers talked, not of what had happened at the ball, but of what was going on in the world. The story of the quarrel between Hawermann and Mr. von Rambow was one of the chief subjects of conversation at all the dinner tables in the town. As every house has its own style of cookery, every house spices its gossip to suit its own palate, and Slus'uhr and David added the one pepper and the other garlic to make the Pumpelhagen dish of scandal more appetising. So it came to pa.s.s that in Rahnstadt and its neighbourhood the story was now so highly seasoned that it satisfied all who partook of it, more especially as each individual had thrown into it some of his favourite spice. It was said that Hawermann had been cheating the young squire and his late father for years, and had ama.s.sed such a large fortune that he had impoverished Mr. von Rambow; that he had got possession of half of the money stolen by the labourer Regel, for which reason he had a.s.sisted the thief to escape, and had at the same time provided the man with an estate pa.s.s to help him on his way. No one had quite made up his mind as to what part Joseph Nussler had taken in the business. At last Mr. Frederic Triddelfitz, son of the apothecary, a very clever young man, had discovered the roguery on one occasion when he was privately looking through the farm book. He had told the housekeeper, Mary Moller, what he had found out, and they had both agreed that Triddelfitz must take possession of the book until Hawermann was gone. The young man had therefore taken the book to Demmin with him, intending to hand it over to Mr. von Rambow on the first opportunity. Hawermann had missed the book next day, and had taken it into his head that Mr. von Rambow had seized it, so he had gone to him and told him he was a thief and that he must give him back his book. The squire had refused to admit that he had it, and so he had rushed at him with a gun. The squire had then tried to get the gun away from him, but it had gone off and Mr. von Rambow was now lying wounded to death. Hawermann was hidden away somewhere in the town. The story current in the town was much the same as this, and everyone wondered why the mayor did not put such a dangerous man in irons instead of letting him go at large.