CHAPTER II
[A GENIUS]
Never had any one felt surer that he had a genius for a son than did Konrad Kurt. Not only that the lad was a thorough botanist, and knew every secret of gardening, but there was not a piece of work on all the farmstead, from the cow-house to the kitchen, which he had not soon learned to know all about. It was easy to see that he had been brought up in some back premises, among gardeners, cooks, and dairy people, and had been well taught into the bargain.
Nothing would serve him but to go on board the ships, and boats, and learn how to manage them, for he had never lived in a seaport town before.
And then how he learned Norse, in only a week or two! First and foremost the art of swearing. His father convulsed himself with laughter over all the oaths which the lad began to make use of with the funniest accent. Then, what stories he would tell! Even before he had properly learned the language, he could interest the work-people in a way which was really extraordinary, and he was therefore allowed to play any tricks he liked; it was all looked upon as fun.
When he spoke Norse easily, how he would gammon them! It was his father's delight to steal behind one of the high hedges and listen to him. The boy would tell them what the English Court was like, where he had been as page; it was he who, with some of his companions, used to walk before the lovely young Queen, while behind came all the bigwigs. Probably he had seen something of the sort at the theatre, or in some picture. Then the tremendous warlike achievements he had seen in India, when he was over there or a little tour with the Queen of England. The father stood hidden, and admired the vivid colours in which the boy painted it all, although he still knew so little Norse. The father enticed his son to go on telling him adventures. He drank no more whisky toddy; the boy himself inebriated him. What a genius! ah! what a genius!
There was a continual chasing away of cats from the garden; they came up from the town after the birds; and John, as this last Master Kurt was called, having one day captured one of the most determined of the depredators, ordained that the murderer should be crucified. As not one, even of the youngest of the labourers, would help him in this, he temporarily fastened up the cat, giving her plenty to eat, while he himself went to fetch some rough boys from the harbour.
Such extraordinary sounds of glee soon afterwards reached his father's ear, that he hastened to see what it might portend, especially as some more dubious notes were mingled with the cries of delight. He found the executioners performing an Indian dance before the victim, a poor bleeding cat, fastened to the storehouse door. The boy's inordinate delight hindered him from seeing his father, whose first thought on this occasion was not that his son John was a genius; although, when he came to think it over, he must confess that it was a very remarkable invention, and decidedly well done into the bargain. It is no easy thing to crucify a cat.
However, another occasion came when he thought differently.
As the weather was excessively bad, his father had forbidden John to go down to the garden, and the boy took his revenge by attacking his father's finest apple-tree, a young one, which was in fruit for the first time. He set to work to saw it right through at the roots, and covered it up again with earth. His father was by no means so struck this time, nor did he say much about the invention. He entirely forgot to think of his son as a genius, to such an extent indeed that he talked to him in his room, with a new well-twisted birch rod in his hand. The boy never guessed, could not grasp, that his father was going to flog him, and when this utterly incredible, this impossible thing did happen, he rushed towards the door, with a look of mad terror in his face. His father was as supple and active as he, and sprang on him like a tiger, flung the boy on to the floor, and began beating him with an absolutely wild pleasure. John screamed, prayed, promised, begged for mercy. He got up on his knees, sprang up, and threw himself down again, his eyes seemed to start out of his head, and his cries became nothing more than a continuous, meaningless sound, his face turning almost black. The maids, servants, and workmen came rushing in from the passage, and tore open the doors. Kurt became frantic at this interruption. He rushed first to one door, then to another, shutting them in the faces of those who stood there. He had become almost as crazed as his son, who, in the meantime, had contrived to make his escape.