CHAPTER XIX.
Why the Miller again looked into the tops of his boots; how a pint became a bushel; why Heinrich said good-bye, and why Friedrich considered that women were getting cheap.
The next morning, when the Miller had got out of bed, he again sat resting his head on his hands and looking thoughtfully into the tops of his boots.
"Mother," asked he at last, "did I quarrel with Heinrich last night, or did I dream it?"
"Why, father," replied his wife, "you kept embracing him and calling him your dear son, and you promised Friedrich he should have plenty of money when you became a rich man, and said it would not be so very long either before that time came."
"Then, mother, I was a fool."
"That's what I told you last night, but you would not believe it."
"Lord save me!" cried the Miller; "there is no end to these stupid tricks of mine!"
Friedrich came in.--"Good morning, Miller; good morning, Dame. I only came in to tell you, Miller, I had thought over the matter. I will let the money which you promised me yesterday evening stay with you at interest for some time longer, till I want it."
"Hm!" said the old Miller, moving uneasily on his chair.
"Yes," said Friedrich; "but there was another thing I wanted to ask you: will you let me leave at Easter? I know it's rather before my time."
"Why? What do you want to do?"
"I want to get married."
"What? You marry?"
"Yes, Miller, I am going to marry Bailiff Besserdich's Hanchen, who is now in service at the Schloss; and I thought if Heinrich Voss marries our Fieka, and our fathers-in-law have nothing against it, we could be married on the same day."
This was too much for the Miller: "You rascal...!" He jumped up and seized one of his boots.
"Stay, Miller;" said Friedrich, drawing himself up, "that word's neither fit for you nor fit for me. How things stand with me, I have known for three days, and how they stand with Heinrich and our Fieka I came to know yesterday afternoon; I was lying behind them in the waggon and heard everything they said."
"It would be a good thing, father," said the Miller's wife.
"You don't understand anything about it," cried the Miller, and strode about the room savagely.
"Well, Miller," said Friedrich, and he went to the door, "think the matter over; my father-in-law has been going about thinking of it ever since the day before yesterday."
"I will give you your character at once," cried the Miller after him, "but you are not to leave before midsummer."
Why was the old Miller so angry? He liked Heinrich very well; he had himself often thought during the last few days, that Heinrich and Fieka might do for one another; and he had called him his "dear son" only last night. But that was just it. Last night the punch had made him a rich man, and this morning he was looking into the tops of his boots--a beggar; even if Itzig would be put off till Easter, it would be but a short reprieve.
"Father," said his wife, "this is the best thing that could happen to us and to our Fieka."
"I tell you, mother," cried the Miller, and it was fortunate he had not got his boot on or he would have stamped on the floor with rage, "I tell you, you don't understand anything about it. What? I am to give my child to Joe Voss's son, who is at law with me, and who travels about the country with a great bag of money,--my best, my dearest child--and I am to say to him: 'there she is, but I can give you nothing with her for I am a beggar?' No, wife, no! Why, I should have to borrow the very clothes in which my only child,--my little Fieka,--was married.--No, no! I must get right again first."
It often happens so in the world. Some piece of good fortune hangs close before our eyes, and when we stretch out our hand to seize it, our arm is held by a chain, forged, without our having been aware of it, in times long past, the ends of which are fastened far behind us, so that we cannot get it off. The Miller's chain was his law-suit and his bad management in former years, and now when he tried to seize the good fortune which seemed within his reach, it held him back; and he fretted and fumed in vain. He might perhaps cut the chain in two, but then he would be obliged to drag about one end of it all his life like a runaway convict, and his honour would not suffer this. One cannot help pitying the old man. He avoided everybody, and worked alone in the mill and the stable, as hard as if he thought he could, in this one day, make good all the neglects of past years.
At last he was freed from his toil. My uncle Herse arrived,--but in the dress of a plain burgher to-day: "Good day, Voss; well, our affairs are all right."
But the Miller was not to be so easily satisfied to-day, and he said shortly: "Yes, for whoever thinks so, Herr Rathsherr."
"When I say it, Miller Voss," said the Herr Rathsherr, as he fetched a packet of papers from his carriage, and went with the Miller into his room, "when I say it, you may believe it, for I am here to-day as a Notary Public."
"Mother," said the Miller, "leave us by ourselves; but give us a light first, Fieka."
Now, there was no exact necessity for this, seeing, that it was broad daylight; but the Miller had noticed that, when a court of justice was being held, the Herr Amtshauptmann always had a wax-light burning by him, and so he determined to have a light, thinking it was safer, because it made everything more complete. And he went to his cupboard and fetched out a pair of spectacles and put them on, which was also unnecessary, for he could not read writing; but he thought he should be able to pay better attention in spectacles. Finally, he drew a table into the middle of the room, and brought forward a couple of chairs.
When they were alone and seated before the table and the light, the Herr Rathsherr read aloud, in a clear voice, a paper in which the Jew promised to wait till Easter, the Herr Rathsherr being bail for the Miller. And, when he had read it, he laid the paper by his side and looked at the Miller with a face which seemed to say, "What do you think of that?"
The Miller hummed and hawed, and scratched his head.
"Miller Voss," said my uncle angrily "what do you mean with your 'hms' and 'haws'? There is my seal underneath. Do you see, it's a stalk of hirse. because my name is 'Herse'; I could also have a portcullis on it, if I liked, because in French that's 'herse'--but I am not fond of the French. And here, round it, is my authority: 'Not:Pub:Im:Cæs.', and here is the Jew's signature 'Itzig', and what is written is written."
"That's what the Herr Amtshauptmann says," said the Miller and he looked a great deal more cheerful, "what's written is written."
"It's of no consequence to me what he says. It is I, Miller Voss, I, who am, through my office appointed to make written writing fast and secure by my seal. And this paper frees you from all difficulties till Easter."
"Yes, Herr Rathsherr, and I thank you for it;--but then?"
It was now my uncle's turn to hum and haw: "Hm, what then?--Well--Yes--Well, Miller," and his good old face threw its official look out of window and put on human kindness for spectacles, and looked benevolently at the Miller and the whole world: "Well, Miller Voss, I have procured you breathing-time till Easter, and, maybe, I can give you further help; I have come on purpose to set matters right. But, in order for me to do so, you must tell me exactly how you stand, and show me all your papers."
So the Miller told and told, and went on till any other head than my uncle Herse's would have been quite lost in the maze; and he brought out so many papers that anyone else would have been alarmed; but my uncle was very thorough in business matters and was fond of solving riddles and mysteries. He listened to, and read, everything with patience, though not with much profit to his undertaking.
"Is this all, Miller Voss?" he asked at last.
"Yes," said the Miller, and he looked as down as a potatoe-field when the night frost has gone over it; "and this is my contract with the bailiwick of Stemhagen."
My uncle took the contract, and read it through, looking, in his turn, like a parsnip-field that has been cut up by the hail. But, all at once he jumped up:--"Why, what is this? Miller, your difficulties are at an end. In a couple of years you will be a millionaire. The whole town and bailiwick of Stemhagen is bound to have its corn ground at your mill; here it is in paragraph four. And what says paragraph five? 'For every bushel that the Miller grinds he has a right to take one bushel as payment.'"
"A pint, Herr Rathsherr," cried the Miller; and he, too, jumped up now. "For every bushel one pint."
"No, a bushel. Here it is: for every bushel one bushel as payment; and what is written is written, and here is the Amtshauptmann's seal."
"Herr Rathsherr, my head is swimming. Herr, that is only a mistake."
"Mistake or no mistake, what is written is written; the old Amtshauptmann said so himself."
"That he did," said the Miller; "yes, that he did, I can swear to it."
And now the Miller saw before him a prospect of deliverance from the Jew's clutches, and of many, many bushels of corn and of many, many bright thalers; for was not the whole bailiwick obliged to bring corn to his mill?
"This is a good thing, Herr Rathsherr," he cried; "but----but----"
"What do you mean with your buts, Voss?" cried my uncle indignantly. "The thing is plain and clear."
"Yes, Herr Rathsherr, I only mean, what is to be done with the sacks?"
"With the sacks?--What sacks?"
"Why, the sacks in which the corn is brought to me. I get all the corn, but who gets the sacks?"
"Hm," said my uncle, "that's a difficult question in law, Miller. I did not think of it, and there's nothing about it in the contract, but, if you'll follow my advice, you'll keep them yourself for the present, for what says the Lubeck law: 'beati possidentes,' that is in German, 'what a man has, that he's got.' Now, Miller, I have helped you out of everything. But one thing I insist upon: silence!--Not a soul must be spoken to about this matter. Do you hear?--not a soul. I will speak to Itzig. He must take corn, instead of money, and by Easter the debt will all be cleared off, and then, Miller Voss...."
"And then, Herr Rathsherr?..."
"Then--it will all be overplus--But, Miller, the affair remains a secret."
The Miller promised, and the Herr Rathsherr set off home again, and Heinrich and Fieka saw him nod from his carriage to the Miller, and lay his finger on his lips.
"Keeping secrets is not one of my gifts, Fieka," said Heinrich: "I shall go to your father and speak to him."
"Do so," said Fieka. But if she had known the state the Miller was in, she would certainly have told him to wait.
The old Miller was in a strange mood. That morning he had been a beggar, and had been unwilling to give his child away, because he had no dower for her. Now he was a rich man, and his only daughter had no need to take the first who came; she might become a fine lady as well as anybody else. The change had come too quickly, he did not rightly know what had happened to him; and there now arose, too, a secret fear in him, lest all might not be as it ought to be, and great anxiety lest what he was going to do might not be right. "But," said he to himself, "the Amtshauptmann himself said 'what is written is written;' and the Rathsherr must know better than me what is right."--If it was difficult for him, in ordinary times, to come to a decision, it was quite impossible at a moment like this.
When Heinrich made his offer therefore, the Miller began to talk about the lawsuit, and said Heinrich was not at all to suppose that he was a ruined man. Many had tried to drown him, but he still swam at the top.
Heinrich then said that he had no evil intentions, that he had thought to himself that the Miller would give him his Fieka, and would sell him his lease, and that his father and mother-in-law might live with him in peace and quietness for the rest of their lives.
But at this the old Miller fired up: yes, Heinrich would like that; he could readily believe it. But nobody should cry "Fish" before they had caught any; he was not going to let himself be taken in by anyone, let alone a young man like Heinrich. His lease, indeed! His lease! he would keep it himself, though a king should come and court his Fieka!
For such a speech Heinrich was not at all prepared after what had already passed. The blood mounted into his face also, and he said sharply, that the Miller must say "yes" or "no," would he give him his daughter or not.
The Miller turned round abruptly and looked out of window, and said "No."
Heinrich also turned round, and went out of the room, and half an hour afterwards Friedrich drove into the yard with Heinrich's waggon; and, at his call, Heinrich and Fieka came out of the garden. Fieka looked very pale but also quite firm, and said: "Heinrich, what I have said I will keep to, and you too will keep to it."--He nodded his head, and pressed her hand, stepped up to the Miller's wife who was standing at the door, said a few parting words to her, got into the waggon, and drove slowly away.
When he was some little distance from the Mill, he heard some one calling after him, and on turning round to look, he saw Friedrich coming towards him across the corner of a rye-field: "Where are you driving to, Heinrich?"
"To Stemhagen."
"Shall you stop the night there?"
"Yes, I thought I would stay for the night at Baker Witte's, for I have something to speak to the Herr Amtshauptmann about."
"I must say, that's a good idea of yours, Heinrich, and I have something to do at the Schloss this evening too; and, maybe, I shall have something to say to you, so don't drive off from Witte's till I come. I shall not be there till late, however, when everything is quiet here."
Heinrich promised he would wait for him, and drove on again towards Stemhagen. On the road he met Baker Witte who was driving with corn to the Mill and said:--"Well, Heinrich, put up at my house, I shall be at home again by evening, and then we can have a bit of a chat together."
Evening had long since set in, and the baker had been some time at home, but Heinrich was still up at the Schloss with the old Herr. Friedrich, too, had arrived and had gone up to the Schloss, and old Witte said to Strüwingken, "Something has happened at the Mill, you'll see. I don't think much of the Miller's wife sitting crying, for her tears run easily, but I don't at all like to see Fieka going about so quiet and saying nothing to all the fooleries and scoldings of the old Miller; and he has got one of those queer fits upon him this morning which you can make nothing of. When I asked him how soon I should come for the flour, he said he must first look at his lease; and when I said I wanted it next week, he said it was all the same to him, he should act according to his lease; and when I was driving away, he called out after me that, if anything strange should happen to the flour, I was only to go to Rathsherr Herse, and he would explain the matter to me,--that is if he thought proper."
"Why he must be mad," said Strüwingken.
At that moment Heinrich came in, looking calm and indifferent; and on the baker beginning to talk about the flour, and of the queer reception he had met with, Heinrich abruptly broke in with: "Will you do me a favour, Witte?"
"Why not?" said the baker.
"Look here, many people come to your place; and you have room in your stable. I want to sell my horse and waggon, will you help me with it."
"Why not?" said Witte again; "but, Heinrich," added he after a while, and you could almost imagine you saw how he was collecting his thoughts together inside his brain, and weaving them into a long chain so as to spin out the conversation. "But, Heinrich, there's no hurry about it.--Horses--horses--you see they are cheap now. Why?--Well--what do I know?--Why, because no one feels sure that the French won't take them out of the stables overnight. But, you'll see, they'll get dear; for, you'll see in a few weeks we shall all be marching against the French."
"I have just heard the same from a man who must know much more about it than you or I. But it's just for that reason I want to be rid of them."
"Yes," said Friedrich, who had come into the room during the Miller's speech; "horses will get dear and women cheap. There will be a great call for horses when the war begins, and little for women; and when it's over, and half the young men are killed, there'll be still less. And it's going to begin. Yesterday, at Brandenburg, a fellow took me aside, who looked as if he had tried the blue beans,[[5]] and he said to me that from my appearance I must have carried a musket, and, if I liked, he knew of a place for me. I said I would think about it; but to-day is not yesterday, and today I don't need to think about it. I deserted from the Prussians, but only because I had to rock the cradle for my Captain's children; and yesterday I only wanted to think it over, because I expected I should soon have to rock children; of my own. But to-day I need think no more; I shall enlist against the French. And, Witte, I have no one in the world to look after my things, so when you hear that I have left the Mill, will you see about my box? And now, good-bye. I must go back to the Mill this evening." So saying he departed.
Heinrich followed him: "Friedrich, what does this mean?"
"What does it mean?" said Friedrich. "I will tell you. 'What the one looks the other feels.' The same thing has happened to us both, only your Fieka cries and my Hanchen laughs. I am not young enough for her. Well, it doesn't much matter; I was not too old for that fellow at Brandenburg, but what is one man's owl is another's nightingale."
"Don't speak so loud, Friedrich," said Heinrich in a low voice. "You are going to turn soldier and so am I."
"What! You?"
"Hush! Yes, I. I have no friends or relations far and wide, and stand alone in the world. I have spoken to the Herr Amtshauptmann, and he has promised to keep an eye on my property. I can let my Mill at Parchen any day, and I am going to sell my horse and waggon."
"Hurrah!" cried Friedrich, "your hand, comrade! Dumouriez! The very first morning, I said you had the making of a soldier in you."
"Yes, that's all very well," replied Heinrich. "I have got the will, but how about carrying it out?"
"When anyone has it in his mind to do something wrong, comrade," said Friedrich, "the Devil is always at hand to show him the way. And the Almighty will not do less. He will show us the right way, now, for this is for our country. Look,--I can't, I must stay till Easter--but do you drive over at once to Brandenburg, and ask at the Inn, where we were, for a tall man with a grey moustache and a scar across the right cheek, you will be sure to find him. Present yourself to him and report me as 'Friedrich Schult;' say that I have served, but you need not say that I deserted once from rocking children. And, when all is settled, let me know, and then I'll come."
"So let it be!" cried Heinrich. "And, Friedrich, greet Fieka from me, and tell her she's not to be surprised at what I may do. I will keep to what I said."
"I'll give your message. And now, goodnight."
"Good-night." And as Heinrich still stood there listening to Friedrich's footsteps, he heard round the corner "Dumouriez! Accursed patriots!"