CHAPTER XIII.
Next day--it was Sunday morning--when Bräsig awoke, he gave himself a comfortable stretch in the soft bed. "A luxury," he said to himself, "that I've never before enjoyed, but I suppose one would soon get accustomed to it." Just as he was about to get up the housemaid came in, and taking possession of his clothes, placed a black coat, waistcoat and pair of trousers over the back of a chair in their stead.
"Ho, ho!" he said with a laugh as he examined the black suit; "It's Sunday, and this is a parsonage; but surely they never think that I'm going to preach to-day!" He lifted one article of clothing after the other curiously, and then said: "Ah! I see now, it's because mine were wet through in the ditch last night, so they've given me a suit belonging to his Reverence. All right then!--here goes." But it did not go so easily after all! And as for comfort, that was totally out of the question. The trousers were a very good length, but were frightfully tight. The lower buttons of the waistcoat could neither be coaxed nor forced into the button-holes, and when he put on the coat, there was an ominous cracking somewhere between the shoulders. As for his arms, they stood out from his body as if he were prepared to press the whole world to his faithful heart on this particular Sunday.
After he was dressed he went down stairs, and joined Mrs. Behrens in the parlour. As to his legs, he looked and walked very much as he had done ever since he had received his pension; but as to the upper part of his body! Mrs. Behrens burst out laughing when she saw him, and immediately took refuge behind the breakfast table, for he advanced with his arms outstretched as if he wished to make her the first recipient of his world-embrace.--"Keep away from me, Bräsig!" she laughed. "If I had ever imagined that my pastor's good clothes would have looked so ridiculous on you I'd have let you remain in bed till dinner-time, for your own things won't be washed and dried before that."--"Oh, ho!" laughed Bräsig, "that was the reason you sent me these things, was it? I thought perhaps you wanted to dress me up for another randyvoo to-day."--"Now, just listen to me, Bräsig!" said little Mrs. Behrens, blushing furiously. "I forbid you to make such jokes. And when you're going about in the neighbourhood--you have nothing to do now except to carry gossip from one house to another--if you ever tell any one about that wretched rendezvous of last night--I'll never speak to you again."--"Mrs. Behrens, you may trust me not to do that," here he went nearer the clergyman's wife with both arms outstretched, and she once more retreated behind the table. "Indeed, you've nothing to fear. I'm not a Jesuit."--"No, Bräsig, you're an old heathen, but you ar'n't a Jesuit But if you say anything about it .... Oh me! Hawermann must be told, my pastor says so. But if he asks about it, don't mention my name, please. Oh, dear! If the Pomuchelskopps were ever to hear of it, I should be the most miserable of women. God knows, Bräsig, that what I did, I did for the best, and for the sake of that innocent child. I've sacrificed myself for her."--"That's quite true," answered Bräsig with conviction, "and so don't let fretting over it give you any grey hairs. Look here. If Charles Hawermann asks me how you came to be there, I'll say--I'll say--h'm!--I'll say that you had arranged a randyvoo with me."--"You! Fie, for shame!"--"Nay, Mrs. Behrens, I don't see that. Am I not as good as the young grey-hound any day? And don't our ages suit better?" And as he spoke he looked as innocently surprised at her displeasure as if he had proposed the best possible way out of the difficulty. Mrs. Behrens looked at him dubiously, and then said, folding her hands on her lap: "Bräsig, I'll trust to you to say nothing you ought not to say. But Bräsig--dear Bräsig, do nothing absurd. And .... and .... come and sit down, and drink a cup of coffee." She took hold of his stiff arm and drew him to the table, much as a miller draws the sails of a windmill when he wants to set it going.
"Thank you," said Bräsig. He managed to get hold of the handle of the cup after a struggle, and lifted it as if he were a juggler and the cup were at least a hundred pounds in weight, and as if he wanted to make sure that all the audience saw it properly. Then he tried to sit down, but the moment he bent his knees a horrible cracking noise was heard, and he drew himself up again hastily--whether it was the chair or the trousers that cracked he did not know. He therefore drank his coffee standing, and said: it didn't matter, for he hadn't time to sit down, he must go to Mrs. Nüssler at once because of her letter.--Mrs. Behrens implored him to wait until his clothes were dry, but in vain; Mrs. Nüssler's slightest wish was regarded by him as a command, and was inscribed as such in the order-book of his conscience. So he set out for Rexow along the Pümpelhagen road, the long tails of his clerical garment floating behind him. His progress was as slow and difficult as that of a young rook learning to fly.
As he passed Pümpelhagen, Hawermann saw him, and called him to stop, adding: "Bless me, Zachariah, why are you dressed so oddly?"--"An accident, nothing but an accident. You remember that I fell into the muddy water in the ditch last night. But I haven't time to stop now, I must go to your sister."--"My sister's business can wait better than mine, Bräsig. I've noticed lately that a great many things are going on behind my back, that I'm not wanted to know. It wouldn't have mattered so much, but that I saw last night that both the parson and his wife are better informed than I am, and that these good people want to hide the true state of the case from me out of the kindness of their hearts."--"You're right, Charles. It is out of kindness."--"Certainly, Bräsig, and I am not mistrustful of them, but I can't help thinking that it's something that concerns me very nearly, and that I ought to know. What were you doing yesterday evening?"--"I, Charles? I was just having a randyvoo with Mrs. Behrens in the ditch."--"And the parson?"--"We knew nothing of what brought him, Charles. He took us by surprise when he came."--"What had Mr. von Rambow to do with it?"--"He caught your grey-hound by the scruff of the neck, and perhaps threw me into the water by accident."--"What had Fred Triddelfitz to do with it?" asked Hawermann impressively, "and what had Louisa's hat and shawl got to do with it?"--"Nothing more than that they didn't fit Mrs. Behrens at all, for she's far too stout to wear them."--"Zachariah," said Hawermann, stretching his hand towards his friend over the low hedge, "you are trying to put me off. Won't you tell me what is the matter, we are such old friends--or is it that you must not tell me?"--"The devil take the randyvoo and Mrs. Behrens' anxiety," cried Bräsig, seizing Hawermann's hand and shaking it vehemently over the hedge and amongst the tall nettles that grew there, till the smart of the stings made them both draw back. "I'll tell you, Charles. The parson's going to tell you himself, so why shouldn't I? Fred Triddelfitz fell in love with you sometime ago, most likely because of the good fatherly advice you have often given him, and now it seems his love for you has passed on to your daughter. Love always passes on, for example with me from your sister to Mina."--"Do be serious, Bräsig!"--"Am I not always in earnest, Charles, when I speak of your sister and Mina?"--"I am sure you are," cried Hawermann, seizing his friend's hand again in spite of the nettles, "but, tell me, what had Frank to do with it?"--"I think that he must have fallen in love with you too, and that his love has also passed on from you to your daughter."--"That would be a great pity," cried Hawermann, "a very great pity. God only knows how it's to be stopped."--"I'm not so sure, Charles, that you're right in thinking it a misfortune, for he has two estates ...."--"Don't talk about that Bräsig, but come in and tell me all that you know."
As soon as Bräsig had told as much as he knew of the affair, he set off down the foot-path that led to Rexow. Hawermann stood and watched him till he was out of sight, and then said to himself; "He's a good man, his heart's in the right place, and if I find that it is so, I will .... but .... but ....!"--He was not thinking of Bräsig when he said this, but of Frank.----
On this Sunday morning young Joseph was sitting in his easy chair beside the parlour-fire waiting to be called to breakfast. Lina and Mina had spread the cloth and arranged dishes of ham, sausages, bread, and butter neatly on the table, and now that everything else was ready, Mrs. Nüssler came in carrying a skillet with hot buttered eggs: "Come along, Joseph," she said, "don't let the eggs get cold," and then she left the room again to see that all was going on rightly outside.
The eggs were still bubbling and sputtering in the skillet--but young Joseph did not move. Whether it was because he had not yet finished his pipe, and felt that he ought not to be deprived of his customary smoke before breakfast, or whether it was because he had fallen into a brown study over the two letters which were lying open on his knee, cannot be known with any certainty. But whatever the cause may have been he did not move, and kept staring straight before him at one particular spot under the stove. And on that spot at which he was staring lay young Bolster, who was staring back at him. Young Bolster was the last descendant of the Bolster family, and had been born and brought up in, the house since old Joseph's time; When he was spoken to he was called "Bolster," but he was always spoken of as the "crown-prince," not for his own sake, no, but for Joseph's sake, for this was the only joke--if indeed it might be called one--that he had been able to make on the dog after long consideration.
So, as I have just said, the two young people, young Joseph and young Bolster, stared hard at each other. They were both plunged in deep thought, the one about the letters, and the other about the savoury smell of the eggs in the skillet. Joseph never moved a hair's breadth; but the crown-prince sometimes rubbed his paw gently over his thoughtful face, and raising his pointed nose in the air, refreshed himself with a sniff at the good things on the table. At last he crept out from under the stove, put on a look of polite entreaty, and tried to attract Joseph's attention by wagging his tail. But young Joseph never moved a muscle, and young Bolster saw that he was not conscious of his presence, so he advanced to the table, looking round slyly out of the corner of his eye as he did so; but more from fear of Mrs. Nüssler's coming than of young Joseph's seeing what he was about. He then rested his head on the breakfast-table, and indulged in the pleasures of hope, like a great many other young people. But though hope is all very well for a time, every one likes his hope to be realized after having shown a proper amount of patience. The crown-prince, therefore, placed his feet--only his forefeet--on the chair, and so got a little nearer the object of his desire. His nose touched the plate on which the rosy slices of ham were lying.--Ah! young people!--And then he snatched a bit as quickly as we used to steal a kiss from sweet red lips when we were young.
"Bolster!" cried young Joseph as reproachfully as a mother could have done when she saw her daughter kissed so unceremoniously. But still he did not move, and Bolster--either because he thought he had a right to kiss all the sweet red lips in his kingdom, or because he had grown a hardened offender--looked at him impudently, wiped his mouth, and licked his lips for more. Joseph stared at him without moving, and in another moment Bolster was standing on the chair, this time with his hind legs also, and had set to work to finish the dish of sausages.--"Bolster!" cried young Joseph. "Mina, Bolster's eating up the sausages!" but still he did not move.--The crown-prince moved, however; as soon as he had finished the plate of sausages he went to the principal dish, the skillet containing the buttered eggs.--"Mother, mother!" cried young Joseph, "he's eating up all the eggs now!"--Meantime young Bolster had burnt his nose in the hot skillet; he started back, and in so doing upset the skillet, and knocked the bottle of kümmel over with his tail. The whole table shook, but still young Joseph did not move. He contented himself with shouting: "Mother! Mother! That beast of a dog is eating up all the eggs!"
"What are you bellowing at in your own house, young Joseph?" cried a voice at the door, and then some one came in who frightened Joseph considerably. He was so much startled that he let his pipe fall out of his mouth, raised both his hands, and exclaimed: "All good spirits praise God, the Lord!--Is that you reverend Sir, or is it you, Bräsig?"
Yes, it was Bräsig, or at least it was very like him, as Joseph would have seen if he had had time to look. But he had not time, for the new-comer had caught Bolster in the very act of pilfering, and was now rushing about the room, looking in every corner for a stick with which to chastise the delinquent, his long black coat tails streamed behind him as he ran, and his angry red face showed between the high collar of his black coat, and his tall black hat which had fallen half over his eyes with the violence of his exertions. He looked for all the world like one of those terrible bogies with which nurses frighten naughty children. Young Joseph was no longer a child, but he was really alarmed; he started up from his chair, and holding on to the back of it tightly, kept shouting: "Reverend Sir!--Bräsig!--Bräsig!--Reverend Sir!"--But the crown-prince was still very young and so he was frightened out of his wits. The door was shut so that he could not make his escape that way. He rushed wildly round the room, till at last, springing at the window, he dashed right through it into the road, carrying a great part of it along with him.
The noise was enough to waken the dead, so why did Mrs. Nüssler not come in from the kitchen? She did not appear till Bräsig shoving his hat out of his eyes with one hand, and pointing at the broken window with the other, said: "It's all your fault, young Joseph! That poor creature the crown-prince didn't know that he was doing any harm. All the good kümmel spilt!"--"Good gracious!" cried Mrs. Nüssler, letting her hands fall limply by her side. "What's the meaning of all this, Joseph? Law, Bräsig! How very odd you do look to be sure!"--"Mother," said young Joseph, "the dog and Bräsig ..... What could I do?"--"For shame, young Joseph," cried Bräsig, beginning to walk up and down the room, the long tails of his coat almost sweeping the pool of kümmel as he passed it, "Who is master in this house? Is it you or young Bolster?"--"But, Bräsig, whatever induced you to make such a guy of yourself?" asked Mrs. Nüssler.--"Ah!" replied Bräsig, looking at her reproachfully, "what was to be done? I fell into the water yesterday evening during a randyvoo with Mrs. Behrens, and my clothes were still too wet to put on this morning. And then the letter I got from you yesterday telling me that you wanted to consult me about family matters! How else could I have come?--And is it my fault that the parson is as long as Lewerenz's child, as thin as a mere slip of a girl, and has a larger head than I happen to have got? Why did Mrs. Behrens lend me her husband's clothes, and why did all the stupid labourers, who saw me in the distance on the path leading to Gürlitz church, call out: 'Good-morning, reverend Sir' when I was coming here in the kindness of my heart to help you out of your family difficulties?"--"Bräsig," said young Joseph, "I swear ....."--"Swear not at all, young Joseph, for you will go to the bad place if you do. Do you call it a family council when the kümmel is lying in a pool on the floor, and I have to go about in the parson's clothes?"--"Bräsig, Bräsig," said Mrs. Nüssler, who hardly recognised the friend of her youth in the angry little man, and who had been busily engaged in picking up the bits of broken glass, and straightening the table-cloth, &c., "that's a small matter. See now, I've got everything neat and tidy again."--Bräsig could not keep up his anger when Mrs. Nüssler spoke so kindly to him, so he merely growled out in a low voice: "Hang it, young Joseph, I used to hope that you'd grow wiser in time and cease to need leading strings, but what's bred in the bone comes out in the blood! Well now, tell me what's the matter?"
"Yes," said Mrs. Nüssler ...... "Yes," said young Joseph, and his wife stopped thinking that Joseph was really going to explain, but he only added: "It all depends upon circumstances!" So she went on: "You know that Godfrey Baldrian, who is Joseph's nephew, is a very religious young man and has been working hard preparing to become candidate for a living--but you must often have seen him here?"--"Yes," said Bräsig with a nod, "he's a very good young man, a sort of Methodist, and wears his hair combed straight down behind his ears to make him look like the pictures of our Lord. He tried to convert me once when he saw me going out to fish on a Sunday morning."--"That's the very man I mean. Well, he hasn't quite finished with the university yet, and his father, the school-master, wants us to let him come here for a time that he may study without interruption. And we wanted to ask you whether we ought to consent to this arrangement."--"Why not? Methodists are quiet, well-behaved people who only care about the conversion of others, and you, Mrs. Nüssler, will provide them with an object, and young Joseph is--thank God!--not to be converted by me and young Bolster."--"That's all very well, Bräsig, but the thick end of the wedge is coming. You see that Rudolph Kurz, another nephew of Joseph's, is also studying for Holy Orders, and we have had a letter from his father to say that as he understands that Godfrey is going to lodge with us for a time, he would like us to take his son too. Now Rudolph has been amusing himself in Rostock instead of working, and his father thinks he'll be able to read better in a quiet place like this. But I just ask you how that's possible? If he didn't learn in Rostock where he had all sorts of learned professors to help him, do you think that he'll do any better when there's only Joseph and me?"--"I know him too," answered Bräsig, "he's a very nice young fellow. Before he went to the university he caught me half-a-dozen perch in the black pool, the smallest of which weighed a pound and a half."--"Yes, of course, you know him. It was he who brought Mina safely down to us, when she was a silly little thing of six years old and had climbed up the ladder to the roof to see the stork's nest. I remember yet how she stood up there clapping her hands with glee while we stood below in an agony of fright. He could do that sort of thing quite well, but as for book learning, he never took kindly to that! Rector Baldrian tells me that he has been fighting a great deal in Rostock. Only fancy they fought with swords, and he, Rudolph, was one of them. The duels were about the daughter of a rich merchant at Rostock."--"Do you really mean to tell me that!" cried Bräsig. "Bless me! So they really fought a duel for the sake of a merchant's pretty daughter! Ah, young Joseph, women are the cause of all the mischief that goes on in the world."--"Yes, Bräsig, that's quite true; but what's to be done now?"--"I don't see much difficulty in answering," replied Bräsig. "If you don't want the two young divinity students, write and say so; but if you want them, write and tell them to come. You've plenty of room for them, and can easily provide them with enough to eat and drink. As for their books, you'll have to look out a place for them to be stowed; and I should think they'd have a great number. If you are only going to take one of the young men, I advise you to choose the fighter, for I'd much rather be fought with than converted."--"That's all very fine, Bräsig, but you see we have consented to take Godfrey Baldrian, and the Kurzes would be angry if we were to refuse to receive their son."--"Very well then, take them both."--"But, Bräsig, the two little girls .... they've just been confirmed .... Come, Joseph, speak."--And Joseph began: "It all depends upon circumstances. Look here, Bräsig, Mina was--as you know--brought up to be a governess, and my old mother always used to say that it never did to have a governess and a divinity student in the same house."--"Ha, ha! Young Joseph! I understand you now. You mean that they'd fall in love. Pooh! nonsense! Little round-head in love!"--"Nay, Bräsig, don't think it such a ridiculous idea!--I am their mother and so I ought to know. I wasn't as old as the twins when ...."--Mrs. Nüssler stopped abruptly for Bräsig's face grew very long, and he looked at her enquiringly.--Fortunately Joseph came to the rescue by saying: "Give Bräsig something to drink, mother. Bräsig, you see it might quite well happen, and what are we as their parents to do?"--"Let them alone, young Joseph! Why does God send young folks into the world, if He doesn't intend them to love each other? But the little round-heads!"--"It's easy for you to talk, Bräsig," said Mrs. Nüssler quickly, "but you shouldn't speak of a serious matter so lightly. Hatch a common looking egg and perhaps a basilisk creeps out!"--"Let it!" cried Bräsig.--"Let it, do you say?" exclaimed Mrs. Nüssler, "then I don't agree with you. Joseph isn't of a nature to be anxious about anything. He wouldn't care if all the maids in the house were to fall in love, throw up their places and marry; while I--good gracious!--I have my hands full in trying to keep everything straight, and in holding my eyes open to see what they want to hide from me, for I know that a good deal goes on behind my back that ought not to be."--"But why not consult me?" asked Bräsig.--"You," said Mrs. Nüssler smiling, "you don't understand that kind of thing."--"What!" cried Bräsig. "I not understand, and yet I was once engaged to three women ...."--He got no further, for Mrs. Nüssler's face lengthened as much as his own had done a short time before, and she looked at him so enquiringly, that he swallowed his glass of kümmel at a single gulp to hide his embarrassment--"It's a silly affair altogether," he said after a pause, "and it's all young Joseph's fault."--"Mine, Bräsig! What had I to do with it?"--"What? I'll tell you. You let the crown-prince eat up your breakfast before your very eyes; you allow two divinity students to come and live in your house, and then you don't know how to get out of the scrape you've got yourself into. I--I give in--about the little round-heads, and the devil take the students! I'll watch the duellist; do you keep your eye on the Methodist, for he's the worst of the two."--"That's all that can be done," said Mrs. Nüssler, getting up from her chair.
The two divinity students took possession of their new quarters at Michaelmas, and at the same time Frank went to the agricultural college at Eldena. As Frank walked down the path outside the parsonage garden for the last time, a lovely face peeped through the hedge at him, from the same place where Fred had disposed of the bread and beer.
When Louisa went into the parlour that evening, Mrs. Behrens took the tall handsome girl upon her knee, kissed her, and pressed her to her heart.--Women never can let well alone!
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 1]: Translator's note. Stemhagen, properly Stavenhagen, Reuter's birth-place.
[Footnote 2]: Translator's note. The feudal-system was kept up longer in Mecklenburg than elsewhere, the peasantry belonged to the estate, and always continued to work on it. A Mecklenburg squire often beat his labourers when he was angry with them.
[Footnote 3]: Translator's note. In Mecklenburg the cows are always milked in the fields.
[Footnote 4]: Translator's note. The Kammer is the chief government office in Mecklenburg, and Mr. von Rambow was a member of it.
[Footnote 5]: A mortgage or lien.
[Footnote 6]: Translator's note. "ing" is used instead of "chen" as a diminutive in Mecklenburg.
[Footnote 7]: Translator's note. I have changed Thou and You into Christian name, &c., as it sounds better in English.
[Footnote 8]: Translator's note. Daring the spring cleaning.
[Footnote 9]: Translator's note. "It is the custom in Scandinavia, as with us, for friends to exchange presents, good wishes, and visits on Christmas-day and New-year's-day..... If 'St. Nicholas' in the Rhenish Provinces, 'Knecht Ruprecht' in Northern and Central Germany announce the arrival of these holidays to children, whom they reward or punish according to circumstances, the 'Julklapp,' takes their place in Pomerania, bestows welcome gifts, and recalls the memory of the highest god of our forefathers." From "Unsere Vorzeit" by Dr. W. Wagner, vol. I. part II. page 138.
[Footnote 10]: Translator's note. Knecht Ruprecht.
[Footnote 11]: Translator's note. Bad Stuer. Stuer belongs to the von Flotow family, one of the oldest families in Mecklenburg, and the hydropathic establishment was put up by Rausse who has written a number of well known books on hydropathy. J. Duboc's "Auf Reuter'schem Boden."
[Footnote 12]: Translator's note. "Quey," Scotch for heifer, used here because it was the only word of that meaning into which "fée" could be changed. Caroline makes "kleine Fée"--"lütt Veih."
[Footnote 13]: Translator's note. This story is founded on fact, and during Reuter's last visit to Stuer (from the 13th of December 1868 till the 29th of January 1869) he discovered to his great amusement that he had been given the very room in which the director of the establishment told him the hero of the tale had been attacked by a neighbour's bees while he was lying helpless in the "packing" sheets. Sec Duboc's "Auf Reuter'schem Boden" in Westermann's "Monats-Hefte."
[Footnote 14]: Translator's note. A yellow flower.
[Footnote 15]: Translator's note. A common saying in Mecklenburg, the origin of which is unknown.