The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Volume 07

Out of the forest there sounded from time to time a muffled, crashing noise; it lasted but a few seconds, accompanied by a long echo on the mountain sides, and was repeated about every five or eight minutes. Frederick paid no attention to it; only at times, when the noise was exceptionally loud or long continued, he lifted his head and glanced slowly down the several paths which led to the valley.

Day was already dawning; the birds were beginning to twitter softly and the dew was rising noticeably from the ground. Frederick had slid down the trunk and was staring, with his arms crossed back of his head, into the rosy morning light softly stealing in. Suddenly he started, a light flashed across his face, and he listened a few moments with his body bent forward like a hunting dog which scents something in the air. Then he quickly put two fingers in his mouth and gave a long, shrill whistle. "Fido, you cursed beast!" He threw a stone and hit the unsuspecting dog which, frightened out of his sleep, first snarled and then, limping on three feet and howling, went in search of consolation to the very place from which the hurt had come.

At the same moment the branches of a near-by bush were pushed back almost without a rustle, and a man stepped out, dressed in a green hunting jacket, with a silver shield on his arm and his rifle cocked in his hand. He cast a hurried glance over the glen and stared sharply at the boy, then stepped forward, nodded toward the shrubbery, and gradually seven or eight men came into sight, all in the same costume, with hunting knives in their belts and cocked weapons in their hands.

"Frederick, what was that?" asked the one who had first appeared. "I wish the cur would die on the spot. For all he knows, the cows could chew the ears off my head."

"The scoundrel has seen us," said another. "Tomorrow you'll go on a trip with a stone about your neck," Frederick went on, and kicked at the dog. "Frederick, don't act like a fool! You know me, and you understand me too!" A look accompanied these words, which had an immediate effect.

"Mr. Brandes, think of my mother!"

"That's what I'm doing. Didn't you hear anything in the forest?"

"In the forest?" The boy threw a hasty glance at the forester's face.

"Your woodchoppers—nothing else."

"My woodchoppers!" The naturally dark complexion of the forester changed to a deep brownish red. "How many of them are there, and where are they doing their job?"

"Wherever you have sent them; I don't know."

Brandes turned to his comrades. "Go ahead; I'll follow directly." When one by one they had disappeared in the thicket, Brandes stepped close up to the boy. "Frederick," he said in tones of suppressed rage, "my patience is worn out; I'd like to thrash you like a dog, and that's no worse than you deserve. You bundle of rags, without a tile in your roof to call your own! Thank God, you'll soon find yourself begging; and at my door, your mother, the old witch, shan't get as much as a moldy crust! But first both of you'll go to the dungeon!"

Frederick clutched a branch convulsively. He was pale as death, and his eyes looked as if they would shoot out of his head like crystal bullets—but only for a moment. Then the greatest calmness, bordering on complete relaxation, returned. "Sir," he said firmly, in an almost gentle voice, "you have said something that you cannot defend, and so, perhaps, have I. Let us call it quits; and now I will tell you what you wish. If you did not engage the woodchoppers yourself, they must be the 'Blue Smocks,' for not a wagon has come from the village; why, the road is right before me, and there are four wagons. I did not see them, but I heard them drive up the pass." He faltered a moment. "Can you say that I have ever hewn a tree on your land, or even that I ever raised my axe in any other place but where I was ordered to? Think it over, whether you can say that?" A confused muttering was the forester's only answer; like most blunt people, he repented easily. He turned, exasperated, and started toward the shrubbery. "No, sir," called Frederick, "if you want to follow the other foresters, they've gone up yonder by the beech-tree."

"By the beech-tree!" exclaimed Brandes doubtfully. "No, across there, toward Mast Gorge."

"I tell you, by the beech-tree; long Heinrich's gun-sling even caught on the crooked branch; why, I saw it!"

The forester turned into the path designated. Frederick had not changed his position the whole time; half reclining, with his arm wound about a dry branch, he gazed immovably after the departing man, as he glided through the thickly wooded path with the long cautious steps characteristic of his profession, as noiseless as a lynx climbing into the hen-roost. Here and there a branch sank behind him; the outlines of his body became fainter and fainter. Then there was one final flash through the foliage; it was a steel button on his hunting jacket; and now he was gone. During this gradual disappearance Frederick's face had lost its expression of coldness, and his features had finally become anxious and restless. Was he sorry, perhaps, that he had not asked the forester to keep his information secret? He took a few steps forward, then stopped. "It is too late," he mused, and reached for his hat. There was a soft pecking in the thicket, not twenty paces from him. It was the forester sharpening his flint-stone. Frederick listened. "No!" he said in a decisive tone, gathered up his belongings, and hastily drove the cattle down into the hollow.

About noon, Margaret was sitting by the hearth, boiling tea. Frederick had come home sick; he had complained of a violent headache and had told her, upon her anxious questioning, how he had become deeply provoked with the forester—in short, all about the incident just described, with the exception of several details which he considered wiser to keep to himself. Margaret gazed into the boiling water, silent and sad. She was not unaccustomed to hear her son complain at times, but today he seemed more shaken than ever. Was this perhaps the symptom of some illness? She, sighed deeply and dropped a log of wood she had just lifted.

"Mother!" called Frederick from the bedroom. "What is it? Was that a shot?"

"Oh, no! I don't know what you mean."

"I suppose it's the throbbing in my head," he replied. A neighbor stepped in and related in a low whisper some bit of unimportant gossip which Margaret listened to without interest. Then she went. "Mother!" called Frederick. Margaret went in to him. "What did Huelsmeyer's wife say?"

"Oh, nothing at all—lies, nonsense!" Frederick sat up. "About Gretchen Siemers; you know the old story well enough!—there isn't a word of truth in it either."

Frederick lay down again. "I'll see if I can sleep," he said.

Margaret was sitting by the hearth. She was spinning and thinking of rather unpleasant things. The village clock struck half-past eleven; the door opened and the court-clerk, Kapp, came in. "Good day, Mrs. Mergel," he said. "Can you give me a drink of milk? I'm on my way from M." When Mrs. Mergel brought what he wished, he asked "Where is Frederick?" She was just then busy getting a plate out and did not hear the question. He drank hesitatingly and in short draughts. Then he asked, "Do you know that last night the 'Blue Smocks' again cleared away a whole tract in the Mast forest as bare as my hand?"

"Oh, you don't mean it!" she replied indifferently.

"The scoundrels!" continued the clerk. "They ruin everything; if only they had a little regard at least for the young trees; but they go after little oaks of the thickness of my arm, too small even to make oars of! It looks as if loss on the part of other people were just as gratifying to them as gain on their own part!"

"It's a shame!" said Margaret.

The clerk had finished his milk, but still he did not go. He seemed to have something on his mind. "Have you heard nothing about Brandes?" he asked suddenly.

"Nothing; he never enters this house."

"Then you don't know what has happened to him?"

"Why, what?" asked Margaret, agitated.

"He is dead!"

"Dead!" she cried. "What, dead? For God's sake! Why, only this morning he passed by here, perfectly well, with his gun on his back!"

"He is dead," repeated the clerk, eyeing her sharply, "killed by the 'Blue Smocks.' The body was brought into the village fifteen minutes ago."

Margaret clasped her hands. "God in Heaven, do not judge him! He did not know what he was doing!"

"Him!" cried the clerk—"the cursèd murderer you mean?"

A heavy groan came from the bedroom. Margaret hurried there and the clerk followed her. Frederick was sitting upright in bed, with his face buried in his hands, and moaning like one dying. "Frederick, how do you feel?" asked his mother.

"How do you feel?" repeated the clerk.

"Oh, my body, my head!" he wailed.

"What's the matter with him?" inquired the clerk.

"Oh, God knows," she replied; "he came home with the cows as early as four o'clock because he felt sick." "Frederick, Frederick, answer me! Shall I go for the doctor?"

"No, no," he groaned; "it is only the colic; I'll be better soon." He lay down again; his face twitched convulsively with pain; then his color returned. "Go," he said, feebly; "I must sleep; then it will pass away."

"Mistress Mergel," asked the clerk earnestly, "are you sure that Frederick came home at four and did not go away again?"

She stared in his face. "Ask any child on the street. And go away?—I wish to God he could!"

"Didn't he tell you anything about Brandes?"

"In the name of God, yes—that Brandes had reviled him in the woods and reproached him with our poverty, the rascal! But God forgive me, he is dead! Go!" she continued; "have you come to insult honest people? Go!"

She turned to her son again, as the clerk went out. "Frederick, how do you feel?" asked his mother. "Did you hear? Terrible, terrible—without confession or absolution!"

"Mother, mother, for God's sake, let me sleep. I can stand no more!"

At this moment John Nobody entered the room; tall and thin like a bean-pole, but ragged and shy, as we had seen him five years before. His face was even paler than usual. "Frederick," he stuttered, "you are to come to your Uncle immediately; he has work for you; without delay, now!"

Frederick turned toward the wall. "I won't come," he snapped, "I am sick."

"But you must come," gasped John; "he said I must bring you back."

Frederick laughed scornfully. "I'd like to see you!"

"Let him alone; he can't," sighed Margaret; "you see how it is." She went out for a few minutes; when she returned, Frederick was already dressed. "What are you thinking of?" she cried. "You cannot, you shall not go!"

"What must be, must," he replied, and was gone through the door with John.

"Oh, God," sobbed the mother, "when children are small they trample our laps, and when they are grown, our hearts!"

The judicial investigation had begun, the deed was as clear as day; but the evidence concerning the perpetrator was so scanty that, although all circumstances pointed strongly towards the "Blue Smocks," nothing but conjectures could be risked. One clue seemed to throw some light upon the matter; there were reasons, however, why but little dependence could be placed on it. The absence of the owner of the estate had made it necessary for the clerk of the court to start the case himself. He was sitting at his table; the room was crowded with peasants, partly those who came out of curiosity, and partly those from whom the court hoped to receive some information, since actual witnesses were lacking—shepherds who had been watching their flocks that night, laborers who had been working in near-by fields; all stood erect and firm,, with their hands in their pockets, as if thus silently manifesting their intention not to interfere.

Eight forest officers were heard; their evidence was entirely identical. Brandes, on the tenth day of the month, had ordered them to go the rounds because he had evidently secured information concerning a plan of the "Blue Smocks"; he had, however, expressed himself but vaguely regarding the matter. At about two o'clock at night they had gone out and had come upon many traces of destruction, which put the head-forester in a very bad humor; otherwise, everything had been quiet. About four o'clock Brandes had said, "We have been led astray; let us go home." When they had come around Bremer mountain and the wind had changed at the same time, they had distinctly heard chopping in the Mast forest and concluded from the quick succession of the strokes that the "Blue Smocks" were at work. They had deliberated a while whether it were practical to attack the bold band with such a small force, and then had slowly approached the source of the sound without any fixed determination. Then followed the scene with Frederick. Finally, after Brandes had sent them away without instructions they had gone forward a while and then, when they noticed that the noise in the woods, still rather far away, had entirely ceased, they had stopped to wait for the head-forester.

They had grown tired of waiting, and after about ten minutes had gone on toward the scene of devastation. It was all over; not another sound was to be heard in the forest; of twenty fallen trees eight were still left, the rest had been made way with. It was incomprehensible to them how this had been accomplished, since no wagon tracks were to be found. Moreover, the dryness of the season and the fact that the earth was strewn with pine-needles had prevented their distinguishing any footprints, although the ground in the vicinity looked as if it had been firmly stamped down. Then, having come to the conclusion that there was no point in waiting for the head-forester, they had quickly walked to the other side of the wood in the hope of perhaps catching a glimpse of the thieves. Here one of them had caught his bottle-string in the brambles on the way out of the wood, and when he had looked around he had seen something flash in the shrubbery; it was the belt-buckle of the head-forester whom they then found lying behind the brambles, stretched out, with his right hand clutching the barrel of his gun, the other clenched, and his forehead split with an axe.

These were the statements of the foresters. It was then the peasants' turn, but no evidence could be obtained from them. Some declared they had been at home or busy somewhere else at four o'clock, and they were all decent people, not to be suspected. The court had to content itself with their negative testimonies.

Frederick was called in. He entered with a manner in no respect different from his usual one, neither strained nor bold. His hearing lasted some time, and some of the questions were rather shrewdly framed; however, he answered them frankly and decisively and related the incident between himself and the forester truthfully, on the whole, except the end, which he deemed expedient to keep to himself. His alibi at the time of the murder was easily proved. The forester lay at the end of the Mast forest more than three-quarters of an hour's walk from the ravine where he had spoken with Frederick at four o'clock, and whence the latter had driven his cows only ten minutes later. Every one had seen this; all the peasants present did their utmost to confirm it; to this one he had spoken, to that one, nodded.

The court clerk sat ill-humored and embarrassed. Suddenly he reached behind him and, presenting something gleaming to Frederick's gaze, cried: "To whom does this belong?" Frederick jumped back three paces, exclaiming, "Lord Jesus! I thought you were going to brain me."

His eyes had quickly passed across the deadly tool and seemed to fix themselves for a moment on a splinter broken out of the handle. "I do not know," he added firmly. It was the axe which they had found plunged in the head-forester's skull.

"Look at it carefully," continued the clerk. Frederick took it in his hand, looked at the top, the bottom, turned it over. "One axe looks like another," he then said, and laid it unconcernedly on the table. A blood-stain was visible; he seemed to shudder, but he repeated once more with decision: "I do not know it." The clerk of the court sighed with displeasure. He himself knew of nothing more, and had only sought to bring about a possible disclosure through surprise. There was nothing left to do but to close the hearing.

To those who are perhaps interested in the outcome of this affair, I must say that the story was never cleared up, although much effort was made to throw light upon it and several other judicial examinations followed. The sensation which the incident had caused and the more stringent measures adopted in consequence of it, seemed to have broken the courage of the "Blue Smocks"; from now on it looked as though they had entirely disappeared, and although many a wood-thief was caught after that, they never found cause to connect him with the notorious band. Twenty years afterwards the axe lay as a useless corpus delicti in the archives of the court, where it is probably resting yet with its rust spots. In a made-up story it would be wrong thus to disappoint the curiosity of the reader, but all this actually happened; I can add or detract nothing. The next Sunday Frederick rose very early to go to confession. It was the day of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin and the parish priests were in the confessionals before dawn. He dressed in the dark, and as quietly as possible left the narrow closet which had been consigned to him in Simon's house. His prayer-book, he thought, would be lying on the mantelpiece in the kitchen, and he hoped to find it with the help of the faint moonlight. It was not there. He glanced searchingly around, and started; at the bedroom door stood Simon, half-dressed; his rough figure, his uncombed, tangled hair, and the paleness of his face in the moonlight, gave him a horribly changed appearance. "Can he possibly be walking in his sleep?" thought Frederick, and kept quite still. "Frederick, where are you going?" whispered the old man.

"Uncle, is that you? I am on my way to confession."

"That's what I thought; go, in the name of God, but confess like a good Christian."

"That I will," said Frederick.

Think of the Ten Commandments: 'Thou shalt not bear witness against thy neighbor.'"

"Not false witness!"

"No, none at all; you have been badly taught; he who accuses another in his confession is unworthy to receive the Sacrament."

Both were silent. "Uncle, what makes you think of this?" Frederick finally asked. "Your conscience is not clear; you have lied to me."

"I? How?"

"Where is your axe?"

"My axe? On the barn-floor."

"Did you make a new handle for it? Where is the old one?"

"You'll find it at daylight in the woodshed."

"Go," he continued scornfully. "I thought you were a man; but you are like an old woman who thinks the house must be on fire as soon as she sees smoke rising from her pot. See," he went on, "if I know anything more about this story than that doorpost there, may I never hope for salvation. I was at home long before," he added. Frederick stood still, oppressed and doubtful. He would have given much to be able to see his uncle's face. But while they were whispering, the sky had clouded over.

"I am very guilty," sighed Frederick, "because I sent him the wrong way; although—but still, I never thought it would come to this, no, certainly not! Uncle, I have you to thank for a troubled conscience."

"Well, go and confess!" whispered Simon in a trembling voice. "Desecrate the Sacrament by tale-bearing, and set a spy on poor people who will manage to find a way to snatch their bit of bread from between their teeth, even if he is not permitted to talk—go!" Frederick stood, undecided; he heard a soft noise; the clouds cleared away, the moonlight again fell on the bedroom door; it was closed. Frederick did not go to confession that morning.

The impression which this incident had made on Frederick wore off only too soon. Who doubts that Simon did everything to lead his adopted son down the same paths that he was following? And Frederick possessed qualities which made this only too easy: carelessness, excitability, and, above all, boundless pride, which did not always scorn pretense and ended by doing its utmost to escape possible disgrace, by trying to realize what it first had pretended to possess. He was not naturally ignoble, but he fell into the habit of preferring inward to outward shame. One need only say that he habitually made a display while his mother starved.

This unfortunate change in his character was, however, the work of many years, during which it was noticed that Margaret became more and more quiet on the subject of her son, and gradually came to a state of demoralization which once would have been thought impossible. She became timid, negligent, even slovenly, and many thought her brain had suffered. Frederick, on the other hand, grew all the more self-assertive; he missed no fair or wedding, and since his irritable sense of honor would not permit him to overlook the secret disapprobation of many, he was, so to speak, up in arms, not so much to defy public opinion as to direct it into the channel which pleased him. Externally he was neat, sober, apparently affable, but crafty, boastful, and often coarse—a man in whom no one could take delight, least of all his mother, and who, nevertheless, through his audacity, which every one feared, and through his cunning, which they dreaded even more, had attained a certain preeminence in the village. The preëminence came to be acknowledged more and more as people became conscious of the fact that they neither knew him nor could guess of what he might be capable. Only one young fellow in the village, Will Huelsmeyer, who realized his own strength and good circumstances, dared to defy him. Since he was also readier with his tongue than Frederick, and could always make a pointed joke, he was the only one whom Frederick did not like to meet.

Four years had passed. It was the month of October; the open autumn of 1760, which filled every barn with corn and every cellar with wine, had also lavished its riches on this corner of the earth, and more intoxicated people were seen and more fights and stupid tricks were heard of than ever before. Everywhere there were festivities; Blue Mondays were the fashion, and whoever had laid aside a few dollars quickly wanted also a wife to help him feast today and starve tomorrow. A big, noteworthy wedding took place in the village, and the guests could expect more than the one violin, generally out of tune, than the single glass of whiskey, and higher spirits than they themselves brought along. Since the early morning all had been astir; clothing had been aired in front of every door, and all day B. had looked like a frippery-stall. Since many outsiders were expected, everybody was anxious to uphold the honor of the village.

It was seven o'clock in the evening and everything was in full swing; fun and laughter were rampant on every side, and the low rooms were crowded to suffocation with blue, red, and yellow figures, like pen-folds into which too large a herd had been huddled. On the barn floor there was dancing—that is, whoever succeeded in capturing a two-foot space twirled around on it and tried to make up by shouting for what was lacking in motion. The orchestra was brilliant, the first violinist as a recognized artist drowned out the second, and a great bass-viol with three strings was sounded ad libitum by dilettantes, whiskey and coffee flowed in abundance, all the guests were dripping with perspiration—in short, it was a glorious affair.

Frederick strutted about like a cock in his new sky-blue jacket and asserted his position as the first beau of the village. When the lord of the manor and his family arrived he happened to be sitting behind the bass-viol, sounding the lowest string with great strength and much decorum. "John," he called imperiously, and up stepped his protégé from the dancing-floor, where he too had tried to swing his awkward legs and shout a cheer. Frederick handed him the bow, made his wishes known by a proud nod, and joined the dancers. "Now, strike up, musician, the 'Pape van Istrup!'" The favorite dance was played, and Frederick cut such capers before the company that the cows in the barn drew back their horns and a lowing and a rattling of chains sounded from their stalls. A foot high above the others, his blond head bobbed up and down like a pike diving out of the waters, on every side girls screamed as he dashed his long flaxen hair, by a quick movement of the head, into their faces as a sign of admiration.