On a Friday night, just a week from the Friday our brother had seen this thing, the midnight services being over, and the Brethren and Sisters having returned to their Kammers to rest their weary heads on their hard wooden blocks, we were startled by the ringing of the Kloster bell. Clear and loud it pealed through the cold quietness of the night. Like a flash, though I had not thought of it before, I cried out to Brother Obed, who had the adjoining cell, "'Tis Brother Martin," though not more than a half-hour had expired since we had returned, he with us, from our midnight devotions.
Suddenly the pealing notes ceased, and then came the slow, solemn tolling of the bell, a custom followed ever after on the death of any of our number, until forty-eight were measured out, which I knew was about our brother's age. His cell was on the floor below, where I hastened as soon as the last year of his life had been tolled. A number of the Brethren, with bowed heads, stood sadly in the narrow Kammer, in the still narrower doorway and corridor. I had been filled, ere I saw him, with a dread that his death agony might have had its terrors increased a thousand-fold by the awful memory of the witch; for I knew he had never forgotten it. But when I looked down on the slight form and peaceful face resting on the hard bench and still more mortifying pillow, I saw no trace of any overpowering, death-dealing vision. Instead, his face, though greatly wasted and altered, was as composed as though he had merely fallen asleep in the arms of his beloved. The little window looking out from his Kammer, as soon as the last spark of life had died out, had been opened so that his soul could take its flight unhindered and unmolested to that place of pure delights "where the wicked cease from troubling and the weary are at rest."
At the funeral, which was the following midnight, as we carried the body out of the Berghaus a bucket of water was poured upon the sill and swept up, and the door immediately closed so that his spirit could not return again to its earthly home, and to make further assurance against such a return three crosses were marked upon the door jamb with red earth.
We buried him who had thus passed away in the prime of his life, down in the meadow nigh to where in later years we built our Brother house. It was a dark, stormy night, no moon and no stars to lighten up the gloom of the sky or the still deeper darkness in our hearts; but with our fagot torchlights sputtering fitfully, almost blown out by the wind at times, we laid him to rest at the midnight hour with all the honors and rites and ceremonies of our holy order.
Thus, on this weird, stormy night, in such contrast to the peace and gentleness of this earnest, zealous warrior of the faith who for almost nine years had abided with us, we left in the meadow his mortal remains, but took back with us the remembrance of his godly services and his truth and fidelity unto his profession and brotherhood during his short life.
CHAPTER IX
A LOVE FEAST
But when a lady chaste and fair,
Noble, and clad in rich attire,
Walks through the throng with gracious air,
As sun that bids the stars retire—
Then where are all thy boastings, May?
What hast thou beautiful and gay
Compared with that supreme delight?
We leave thy loveliest flowers and watch that lady
bright.
—Song of Walter Von der Vogelweide.