Entering I saw about a dozen men sitting at a table which ran along under the windows; on it stood a bowl of punch over which a particularly stately man seemed to preside.
I bowed and asked to be allowed to sit down with them, which request was readily granted. "You are keeping watch here, I suppose," I said, turning to the stately man; "it is dirty weather outside; the dikes will have all they can do!"
"Yes, indeed," he replied; "but we here, on the east side, think we are out of danger now; it is only over on the other side that they are not safe. The dikes there are built, for the most part, after the old pattern; our main dike was moved and rebuilt as long ago as in the last century. We got chilled out there a little while ago, and you are certainly cold too," he added, "but we must stand it here for a few hours longer; we have our trustworthy men out there who come and report to us." And before I could give the publican my order a steaming glass was pushed towards me.
I soon learnt that my friendly neighbor was the dikegrave. We got into conversation and I began to tell him my singular experience on the dike. He grew attentive and I suddenly noticed that the conversation all around us had ceased. "The rider of the white horse!" exclaimed one of the company and all the rest started.
The dikegrave rose. "You need not be afraid," he said across the table; "that does not concern us alone. In the year '17 too it was meant for those on the other side; we'll hope that they are prepared for anything!"
Now the shudder ran through me that should properly have assailed me out on the dike. "Pardon me," I said, "who and what is this rider of the white horse?"
Apart from the rest, behind the stove, sat a little lean man in a scant and shabby black coat. He was somewhat bent and one of his shoulders seemed to be a little crooked. He had taken no part whatever in the conversation of the others, but his eyes, which in spite of his sparse gray hair were still shaded by dark lashes, showed clearly that he was not sitting there merely to nod off to sleep.
The dikegrave stretched out his hand towards him. "Our schoolmaster," he said, raising his voice, "will be able to tell you that better than any of the rest of us here—only in his own way, to be sure, and not as correctly as Antje Vollmers, my old housekeeper at home, would do it."
"You're joking, Dikegrave," came the somewhat thin voice of the schoolmaster from behind the stove, "to put your stupid dragon on an equality with me!"
"Yes, yes, Schoolmaster!" returned the other; "but tales of that kind you know are said to be best preserved among the dragons!"