Schmule had an unexpected visitor on the first day that he was able to get out of bed. Fat Gregor, the young Baron's valet, came to see him. He brought the boy two ducats, and told him that his master was ready and willing to pay both the doctor and apothecary, if he would forbear making any complaint to the magistrate of his conduct.
"Go!" cried Schmule—that was all that he said—but his remaining eye glared so savagely at Gregor, that the latter thought discretion the better part of valor, and beat a hasty retreat. As soon as he got back to the castle, he went to his master, and said: "Beg your pardon, Herr Baron, you've sent the Jew stark-staring mad as well as knocked out his eye—he was more like a wild beast than anything else."
When Schmule was able to go out again, his first walk was to the court of justice. The leader of the synagogue offered to go with him, but he said he wanted to go alone. "Thank you," he said; "but it isn't necessary. I am no longer a child—that blow has made me ten years older. Besides that, I only want justice."
He went to the judge and made his complaint. The trial began, and was carried on as—well as all such trials were in those days. What chance had a poor Jewish boy against a Polish noble long ago? None! But the trial had one merit: it was short. The persons interested in it were not long kept in suspense as to what the verdict was to be. All was settled in the space of a month. Schmule was then cited to appear before the court, and the Herr Mandatar said to him very sternly: "Your story was a lie, Jew! You did not get out of the Herr Baron's way, but insisted on pressing close up to the horse, and so you were accidentally struck by the riding-whip. You may be thankful that Baron Wladislaus has been good enough to pardon you for making such a calumnious charge against him, otherwise you might have been tried for perjury! Now—go!"
Schmule went home.
When he entered his mother's kitchen, the good woman was so startled by the look on his face, that she exclaimed, in terror: "Child, child! what is the matter? Has anything worse happened?"
"Yes," he answered, "something much worse—justice has been denied me." His voice here died away into an indistinct murmur, but at last his mother heard him say: "I will do as the Herr Mandatar advised me—I will be grateful for Baron Wladislaus's kindness...."
"Son!" cried the old woman, in a voice of agony. "I know what you're going to do. I can read it in your face. You're going to steal into the castle and murder him in his sleep!..."
"No," replied Schmule, with a smile. "That wouldn't do at all, for they would hang me for murder, and who would take care of you then? No, my vengeance must be of another kind—I must become a rich man."
"God has darkened your understanding, my son," moaned the old woman. But she wept still more bitterly when Schmule told her that he had made up his mind to go to Barnow. He sold the only things that belonged to him, which would not be required now that he was going away—his bed and bedding. The sale of these articles brought him five gulden in all, because at the last moment he threw in some prayer-books that he did not want. As he was going away he promised to send his mother a share of his earnings.