"Nothing will come out of it", I said. "This man wants trashy novels, exciting love-stories, nothing else. I won't write this kind of stuff. He'd probably think that I'd be so dishonourable, to piece together a colportage novel out of the gibberish the people have said about me, which would surely earn him a lot of money, but be my destruction. There, he's mistaken. I have entirely different purposes and goals!"
Father agreed with me. When he had reached the hill before the town and saw it lying before us, he pointed at the next village, at a single, newly build house at a distance from the others and asked me:
"Do you know this over there?"
"Isn't this the place where that fire had been?"
"Yes. A few days after you were gone, they found out who had started it. The perpetrator was very swiftly sentenced. He got to prison even before you did. Mother will tell you about it."
"Oh no! I don't want to know anything, nothing at all. Ask her to keep silent about this!"
As early as the very same night, I found out that the local police sergeant had been boasting in the public bar, how harshly he would receive and supervise me for the next two years; he would not let me out of his sight for a single day! He came as soon as the next morning and took on such a haughty posture, that really no person being treated in such a manner could be blamed if he would be turned back to life of crime by this. He asserted that he was my superior for two years, with whom I had to report daily. Than, he pulled a book with the relevant articles of the law out of his pocket, to lecture me on my duties. I did not say a word, but opened the door and motioned him to leave. When he hesitated to comply, I left. I went to the mayor and put an end to this matter. I demanded a passport to travel abroad, and when I was informed that this could not be done as easy as this, I went on my way as early as the next day without any passport.
On the train, I sat in an otherwise empty compartment. I went across the border. Then, suddenly, raging mad voices started to scream loudly inside of me, shouting and roaring like in a village inn, where the farm-hands are beating each others up with the legs of the chairs. There were hundreds of characters and hundreds of voices, who made this sound. I past times, it would have horrified me; but today I kept cool. These reminiscences of the morasses, who did not want to set me free, had lost their power over me. I did not react to them, and thus, they were to turn quiet one after another all by themselves.
Where this journey took me and what happened on it, shall be reported in the second volume. In the meantime, Münchmeyer came to ask for me. I was already gone. So, he payed the royalties and went back home without having achieved anything further. About three quarters of a year later, he appeared again, and not alone, but with his brother. This time, he found me at home, because I had returned to write my "Geographical Sermons" and to have them printed. His brother had been a tailor and had after that also become a colporteur. The business had been running well up to that time, even extraordinarily well; but now it was in danger of collapsing all of a sudden. They needed someone to save them, and this was supposed to be me, me out of all persons! This was incomprehensible to me, because I have had never anything to do with Münchmeyer before and also did not want to have anything to do with him and neither knew him nor the situation he was in. He explained it to me. He was a cleverly calculating, very eloquent man, and his brother assisted him in such an excellent manner that I did not simply tell them to leave, but allowed them to state their case. But after they had done this, I was -- -- -- in their web, though I had never thought it possible before that I could ever engage in any kind of business with the "colportage".
Münchmeyer had worked his way up and now owned a not too small printing-office with a large composing room, stereotype printing, etc. But what he published was indeed the lowest form of colportage. He talked about a so-called "Black Book" with lots of stories about criminals, about a so-called "Venustempel" <Temple of Venus>, which would be a real goldmine, and about a few other productions of the same kind. But for today, he was concerned with a weekly magazine, which he published under the title "Der Beobachter an der Elbe" <The Observer by the River Elbe>. Founder and editor of this magazine was an author from Berlin by the name of Otto Freytag, a very skilful, hard working, but in business matters extremely dangerous person. This man had turned against him, had suddenly run out of the office, had taken all manuscripts with him, and now wanted to publish a magazine very similar to the "Observer by the River Elbe", to destroy him. "If I don't get another editor right away, who is better than that person and can take him on, I'm lost!" Münchmeyer concluded his report.