CHAPTER XIII.
A TROOP OF HOBGOBLINS.
"Let me carry the clothes; give me his clothes," said Adam, as they went along.
"No, I cannot part with them, they are all I now have belonging to him, and I have the new boots in the bundle, that he never wore, and in my hurry I brought his little wooden horse, too."
"Does he like horses? then he will like me also."
"Oh! do not speak so lightly; remember that he may be dead."
"The child may have lost himself in the wood, and yet not be dead; and who knows whether he may not be at home at this moment, having gone of his own accord, or some one have brought him home."
As a token of gratitude for these consoling words, Martina placed the bundle of clothes on Adam's arm, saying, "Carry them for me." When they passed by a weeping willow close to the road, which looked very singular, its drooping branches all hung with snow and glittering in the torchlight, Martina continued: "Do you see that tree? When our Joseph was not quite three years old, I was walking here with him, and on seeing the leaves hanging down, he said, 'Mother! that tree is raining leaves.' He often spoke such strange things, that it was quite puzzling to know whether one was on earth or in heaven, and what one could do, or ought to do with him; and he is grown so strong, so very strong; I was obliged to use all my strength when I wished to hold him—and now to die such a death! it is too dreadful. Joseph! Joseph! my darling Joseph! Oh! where are you now? I am here, your mother and your father too. Joseph! Joseph! oh come! Call him, Adam, can't you shout out his name?"
"Joseph! Joseph!" called Adam with his powerful voice, "My child! come to me; Joseph! Joseph!" and Adam, who once trembled to pronounce the child's name even secretly, now shouted it loudly in the wood. Soon, however, he desisted, and said, "It is no use, Martina; try to be quiet, or you will make yourself ill."
"If my Joseph is dead, I don't care to live either; I care for nothing more in this world."
"I cannot believe that, Martina; surely you have some love for me still."
"Oh heavens! don't wrangle with me just now," said Martina sorrowfully. For a long time neither spoke a word. Häspele proved a good mediator, for he came up to Martina and begged her to take a mouthful of the Kirschwasser that he had most thoughtfully brought for Joseph.
"No, no, I need nothing. I cannot take what the child may require."
"Do take a single mouthful," entreated Adam, as tenderly as his rough voice could be modulated. "Remember, our Joseph cannot drink it all if we find him."
"If we find him? Why do you say that? You know something, and are keeping it from me; I feel sure that you know he is dead."
"I know nothing whatever—as little as you do yourself. I do beg you will take one mouthful of the Kirschwasser."
"Ah! if my Joseph had it, it might restore him to life. I need nothing—leave me in peace." But Adam persisted till Martina took some, and this was a good opportunity for him to get hold of her hand again, and then they pursued their way hand in hand.
Martina spoke very low, and told Adam what a singularly reserved boy Joseph was; and that he had often whispered things to her, that he might have quite well said loud out before everybody; but his peculiarity was, to prefer saying things secretly; and no doubt he had something secret to tell his father, and then he would have been able to discern how it made you creep, when Joseph with his warm breath said something close to your ear. "His warm breath is now frozen," added she, wringing her hands.
Soon she suddenly seized Adam's arm, saying passionately, "Look! there is the very rock, where once on a time I wished to die along with him, when Leegart found me. If we had died together then, before he came into the world, it might have been better for both of us. Oh! where is he now? perhaps he is lying two steps from us, and yet we cannot see him, and he cannot hear us. I will go from hill to hill, to the top of every rock, and down into every valley, to seek my boy."
"Try to be more composed," said Adam, kindly; but Martina's excitement every instant increased, and she turned hastily to him saying:—
"You are to blame! a father can deny his child, and pass him by as if he were nothing to him in this world—but a mother—never! You did this!"
"Why do you reproach me at such a moment as this?"
"I do not reproach you. Why are you so cruel?"
"I am neither unkind nor cruel—only do try to command your feelings; from this day forth all your sorrows shall cease. Come closer to me, my Martina!"
"No, no, I cannot rest!" cried Martina, suddenly, after having leant on Adam for a few minutes—"I cannot—Oh, gracious Father! do with me what thou wilt, only do not deprive me of my child, my Joseph; he is innocent; I alone am guilty—this man and I."
She went some steps from Adam, as if she could not bear his vicinity; she no longer shed tears, but she sobbed convulsively with dry eyes, as if her heart would break.
The scene in the wood was like the procession of the "Wild Huntsman;" the men with torches and lanterns, and their eager shouts and cries, and cracking of whips, and ringing of bells; and the dogs, too, carrying lanterns round their necks, and rushing along the ravines barking, and then galloping up the hills, still barking and pressing forwards, till recalled by the voice of their masters. It was fortunate that such good order was maintained. No one could recognise his neighbour, for each man was a moving mass of snow, and the hills and rocks looked down by the torchlight in amazement, at the men who had come there to shout out, and seek a young child.
"See, how all the village loved him!" said Martina to Adam, relating to him how the boy had wakened her on the previous night, three times, to ask which way his father would come; and she reproached herself severely for having listened to Leegart, and sent him out of the house alone; she might have known that something dreadful was sure to occur on this day.
Adam was sadly perplexed, and did not know what to say; and he was more sad than ever when he thought of the Forest Mill, where they were all sitting waiting for him, and remembered the treachery towards Martina he had been persuaded to commit this very day.
Suddenly a cry of joy was heard—"What is it? what is it?" "God be praised, they have found him!" "Where? where?" The smith came up, out of breath, to Adam and Martina. "Here is his cap; we shall find him now, sure enough."
Martina seized the dripping cap, and shed scalding tears over it. "Heavens! he is now without a cap, and the snow is lying on his head, if he is still in life."
Martina passed her hand over her face, and stared at the smith, who certainly looked a strange monster. He had not taken time to wash his sooty face, and now the snow had drawn all sorts of strange figures on it, and his red beard was hanging full of icicles.
"You must remain on the straight road, that we may be able to find you immediately," said the smith, and turning to go away, he added, "I think this night we have earned from you the right to be well supplied with good liquor at your wedding."
It must certainly be a set of hobgoblins dispersed in the forest; and there was a man in the wood who saw them, as large as life. Speidel-Röttmann, who had followed his son, had made a false step, and rolled down the precipice. When he reached the bottom he became sober all at once. He had received no injury whatever. He went on a long way on the frozen stream, and the rocks and trees towered above him like gigantic monsters. Fresh snow fell thickly on him every instant, and at last he became so confused, that he did not know whether he was going up or down the stream. He tried to break the ice with a stone, to find out in what direction the current of the stream was flowing, so that he might know which way to proceed, but he could not loosen one of the stones. The whole world seemed iron-bound, and no help near. Well! here at last is an opening, here is a path in the forest. He climbs up, often slipping backwards, and almost entirely hidden by masses of snow; but he does not lose heart. Speidel-Röttmann's strength is now to be put to the proof. He succeeds in getting to the top of the rising ground—he is right: here is a path. As he grasps the ground for the last time, he stumbles over something; it is a pipe—it is Adam's pipe. So he must have gone this way; now he will come up with him—which way is he gone? right, or left? The traces of his footsteps have been already effaced by the falling snow. Speidel-Röttmann takes the path to the right; then it suddenly seems to him that the left must certainly be the best way, so he turns back; and then goes forward again, up and down, as if a will-o'-the-wisp were leading him hither and thither. Hark! a sound of horns, and whips, and barking of dogs;—what can it be? Heavenly powers! it is the Wild Huntsman! It is himself, on his gallant grey, with his spectre followers, shouting, and yelling, and blowing the horn; and in the midst of the hubbub there are screams as if from thousands of little children; and if any unlucky being were to look up at him as he dashes past, he would cut his head as clean off as if it were a turnip. All the terrors of the infernal regions assail Speidel-Röttmann. He had, indeed, often boasted that the talk about witches, and spectres, and hobgoblins, was only lies and nonsense; but now every hair on his head stands on end; he remembers that in bygone days men were quite as wise as at present, and they believed it all. "Here he comes! Forgive me for not believing a word of it till now. I will—" Speidel-Röttmann rushes along the path into the wood, and throws himself down on the ground on his face, that the Wild Huntsman may gallop over him without throttling him. So he lies still and hears the fiends rush past. He clutches the snowy moss with his hand, and the moss does not give way. It is a comfort that something in the world still holds fast. Hold on! hold on! or you may be in a moment lifted up in the air, and placed on the top of a tree, or who knows where? and your face twisted entirely round, and you must go about with it in that fashion as long as you live. And he feels as if he were mocked, and some one said to him, "Is not this wood your own property? but in spite of all your foresters, and all your keepers, you cannot prevent the Wild Huntsman galloping through it. Do you hear a child's voice? do you know that voice?"
Speidel-Röttmann has entirely lost his head—the snow in which he had buried his face melts from the warmth of his breath, but something melts also in his hard heart; and face to face with death, he calls out from the snowy moss, "Joseph!" as if that word had the power to save him. "I solemnly vow I will," he goes on muttering to himself. It has suddenly flashed across his thoughts, that there lived a child on earth to whom he had been guilty of great injustice, and that it is for this he hears such groans and cries in the air. He wishes to call back his son, who is in turn striving to recall his son. This is like a chain attached to another chain, and so the links go on.
"I yield! set me free! keep the child!" With these words he at last ventured to raise his head a little. The noise and shouts and cries sounded now further away.
"Who are you? who are you?" cries suddenly a figure, seizing him roughly, not like a man, but like an evil spirit, or the claws of a wild beast, so savage is the grasp.
"I am a miserable sinner! I am the Röttmann—let me go; be merciful!"
"So, I have got hold of you at last!" exclaimed the figure, and knelt down on his breast. "You shall die, for you have killed my grandson, and disowned him, and left him to want and misery."
"How? what? is it you, David?"
"Yes, you shall know first who is going to split your head with this axe—it is I, Schilder-David. Yes, accursed Goliah, I have got you down on the ground, and you shall die."
Speidel Röttmann's strength and courage revived, after a very short deliberation. "Oh, ho! not much fear of him!" and his hand speedily followed his thoughts. He seized with one hand the man who was kneeling on him, and with the other drew forth the sharp knife he always carried on him, and cried out, "Let go, David! let go: or I'll stab you to the heart!"
"Your evil deeds are come to an end," cried David, snatching the knife out of his hand; but Röttmann succeeded in getting on his feet, and David quickly lay under him on the ground.
"Now, do you see!" exclaimed Röttmann, triumphantly, "I can give you the finishing stroke."
"Do so, root out the whole family—you have killed my Joseph, kill me too."
"Stand up! I will do you no harm," answered Röttmann; "I don't know whether it is you that are bewitched, or myself, or the whole world. What on earth brings you here?—who are those in the forest?"
David, breathing hard all the time, told what had occurred; but adding, "I have no business to talk to you at all; both you and your son deserve to die. I will not say another word to you; one of us shall remain on this spot; stab me if you like, I shall be glad to leave this wicked world for I have nothing left to care for now in it." With these words Schilder-David rushed on Speidel-Röttmann, but the latter seized the old man's arms with such a powerful grasp, that they were as immoveable as if fastened into a vice.
"I pity you," said Röttmann.
"I don't want your pity; you are not worthy to be spoken to by an honest man, you hard-hearted villain! you carry your head high enough; and why not? for the door into Hell is so high, that you need not stoop to get through it."
"Abuse me as much as you please, I am stronger than you; but now listen to what I am about to say. You see that no one can force me to do a thing; no man in the world can do that; but I wish to tell you this. I need not stick to what I said, for no mortal man heard me, and as for the Wild Huntsman and the hobgoblins, it is all nonsense and superstition, and if I don't choose, I shall be none the worse. It is no one's business but my own, and you have no right to know why, and how, and where, I made the promise. This is my wood, and I am master here, and if I find you here at night with your axe I can seize you, or shoot you down if you try to escape—just as I think fit; but—this is not what I wished to say; only once more remember that no one can force my will, but I give in of my own accord, so that is settled; and here is my hand on it; if the child is still alive, if we find him indeed at all, either living or dead, you have my hand on it, I have nothing to say against it."
"Against what!"
"You have my consent. When I reflect on the matter, I never was so opposed to it; I was obliged to agree with my wife. I was wandering here in the wood for I don't know how long, and when I fell down the ravine, I thought the rocks covered with snow would fall on me to crush me, and all at once I seemed to hear a child's voice calling 'Father! father!' Now I know what it was, and I can't tell you how that voice went to my heart, and I said to myself, if ever I can, I will; my Adam shall marry his Martina. I promise faithfully he shall."
"It is too late to shut the stable door when the horse is stolen. There is no more happiness or luck in the world. If you had but known the child! he was an angel from Heaven! but alas! he is dead by this time, and who knows where he is? There was a time when I thought I could not bear to look any one in the face on account of the child, and now I wish to leave this world because the boy is no longer in it. If I was not worthy of such a grandson, you are far less so. I will have no peace between us, you or I must die. Kill me on the spot I say, for then I shall see my Joseph again in the next world."
David once more rushed on Röttmann, who, however, again held his arms in such a fierce gripe that he could not stir. It seemed as if a miracle must have occurred to soften Speidel-Röttmann's heart, for he contrived at last to persuade David to go along with him to look for Joseph.
"Joseph! your grandfather calls!" shouted David. Speidel-Röttmann echoed the cry, and David looked round in astonishment several times to see if it was really true that Speidel-Röttmann was calling to his grandchild. David was the only person, who, contrary to orders, had gone alone; now he had found a companion, and such a strange one!
The horn sounded from the hill, the torches and lanterns wandered in all directions, the dogs barked, and rushed up and down the hill, the herd bells rung, and the two grandfathers both went along, as if they had walked all their lives together in peace and amity; at last they saw a light shining at a distance; the light did not move, it must be in some house; so they directed their steps towards it.