It was in October, before All Saints' Day. A strong wind had blown from the southwest all day; in the evening the crescent moon was in the sky, dark brown clouds drove past and a medley of shade and dull light flew across the earth; the storm was growing. In the dikegrave's room the empty supper table still stood; the men had been sent into the stable to look after the cattle; the maids were busy in the house and in the attics seeing that the doors and windows were securely fastened so that the storm should not gain an entrance and do damage. Hauke stood beside his wife at the window; he had just swallowed down his supper; he had been out on the dike. He had gone there on foot early in the afternoon; here and there, where the dike looked weak, he had had pointed stakes and sacks of clay or earth piled up; everywhere he had left men to drive in the stakes and make dams with the sacks in front as soon as the tide should begin to damage the dike. The largest number he had placed at the corner towards the northwest at the intersection of the old and new dikes; their instructions were not to leave the places assigned to them except in case of necessity. That was what he had left behind him and then, scarcely a quarter of an hour ago, he had come back to the house wet and disheveled and now, his ear fixed on the gusts of winds that rattled the leaded panes, he gazed out absently into the wild night; the clock behind the pane of glass in the wall was just striking eight. The child, who was standing beside her mother, started and buried her head in her mother's dress. "Klaus!" she called, crying, "where is my Klaus?"
She might well ask, for this year, as indeed the year before, the gull had not flown away for the winter. Her father did not heed the question, but her mother lifted the child in her arms. "Your Klaus is in the barn," she said, "he has a warm place there."
"Warm?" said Wienke, "is that good?"
"Yes, that's good."
The master still stood at the window. "It won't do any longer, Elke," he said; "call one of the girls, the storm will break in the panes; the shutters must be screwed on!"
A GENTLEMAN OF THE OLD SCHOOL
Jacob Alberts
At her mistress's word the maid had run out; they could see from the room how her skirts were blown about; but when she unfastened the catch the wind tore the shutter out of her hand and threw it against the window so that a few broken panes flew into the room and one of the lights flared and went out. Hauke himself had to go out to help and it was only with great difficulty that the shutters were at last got into place. When they opened the door again to come into the house a gust of wind followed them that made the glass and silver in the cupboard shake and clatter; upstairs in the house above their heads the beams trembled and cracked as if the gale were trying to tear the roof off the walls. But Hauke did not come back into the room. Elke heard him walking across the floor towards the stable. "The white horse! The white horse, John; quick!" She heard him call the order; then he came into the room, his hair tumbled but his gray eyes sparkling. "The wind has shifted!" he cried, "to the northwest, at half spring-tide! No wind; we have never experienced such a storm!"