“‘They call me Benz,’ I replied, and, although Arnulph had constantly warned me never to say who I was, unless asked, I thoughtlessly added: ‘and I am the headsman’s boy.’
“I shuddered at the words as I spoke them, and expected Elizabeth to shrink from me with disgust. Instead of that she said, quite friendly,
“‘Sit down by me, Benz, and help me to watch the linen.’
“I thought myself in heaven; since dear mother had left me, I had never known the joy of a smile from a sweet face. In a moment we two children were the best of friends, sat hand in hand beside each other, laughed and chattered unceasingly, and forgot the whole world besides. I asked little Elizabeth who were her parents. She looked at me in amazement with her great black eyes, knew not what I meant, and was only the more bewildered by my attempted explanation. At last I heard my father’s whistle; kissed my new friend, and ran into the house. On my way home, I told my father what had happened, and he said the little maid was an orphan, whose mother had died in the house, and whom old Sarah had taken charge of. A father, however, she had never had, at least to his knowledge. Thenceforward, I went nowhere so willingly as to the town. I no longer cared that the passengers avoided us, and that boys pursued us with scoff and insult. I knew that a kind greeting and a loving kiss awaited me, and little Elizabeth was soon as dear to me as my blessed mother; so that, in my dreams, their two figures blended into one. It was very different afterwards, when the heavenly purity, in whose full glory my mother had departed, had left Elizabeth for ever.
“Thus, I came to the age of twelve, and grew a tall strong lad, skilful and active; already I was so expert with the sword that with a horizontal cut I sent the blade between blocks piled on each other, and without in the least injuring them. I also tied a noose with a dexterity that filled Arnulph with proud joy, and he declared me fully qualified to officiate upon the scaffold. It happened one day that my father, plagued with the gout, ordered me to go alone to the town, and to fetch the tribute from the well-known house of the Elephant. He made me promise not to let the women caress me, and to lose none of the bright pfennings they had to give me. I obeyed his orders, and brought him home the full amount. But I did not tell him what had happened to me by the way. When the boys, who usually ran after us, saw that I was alone, they ventured much nearer than formerly; and amongst them I particularly remarked a fair-haired lad, who had always been the most spiteful and violent of them all, and whom his companions sometimes called Engolf, sometimes by the nickname of Bully-bird. He was the son of a patrician, of the noble Herr Hahn of Baumgarten, and was somewhat older than myself. This time he followed me to the very threshold of the house, and just as the door was opened he struck at me. I warded his blow, and returned it with one upon the nose, which knocked him down, and gave me time to enter the house.”
Berthold’s persecutors awaited his exit to take their revenge, but he provided himself with a stick for defence, and, moreover, Elizabeth showed him an opening in the garden wall, choked with bushes and rubbish, and leading into a timber-yard, through which he passed unseen, and of which he thenceforward availed himself on his frequent visits to his playfellow. Engolf, however, watched him, and at last, on a certain afternoon, as he turned into the timber-yard, he heard a shout of “Huzza! the hangman’s boy!” and was set upon by a number of lads, from whom he escaped with difficulty, and severely beaten, by the help of Elizabeth, who dragged him into the garden as he fell senseless from a blow on the head. In the house of the Elephant he lay for some time, too ill for removal, carefully tended by his child-mistress, and by the wretched but kind-hearted women. About that period, however, the “Lutheran heresy” had begun to take root in the town, and a certain Dr Neander preached furiously against gambling and drunkenness, and against such establishments as that in which Berthold was confined by his wounds; “against all those things, in short, which, according to old usage and to the emperor’s statutes, paid tribute to the headsman. This pleased the women beyond measure; with yellow envy they had long seen their husbands, lovers, and sons, wager away their fair white groschen at skittles and dice and cards; the headsman‘s daughters in the Rosenthal were a yet sharper thorn in their eyes; and now, supported by the preacher‘s frantic harangues, they raised such an infernal outcry that a noble councillor trod our rights under foot for the sake of peace, forbade all games of chance, and sent his officers to seize the loose women at the Elephant, and put them across the frontier. This occurred just at the time I lay ill in the Rosenthal.” Berthold was carried home to his stepmother, who would not receive him, and Arnulph made him a bed in the hounds’ kennel, for which piece of humanity his violent mistress beat him, and procured his dismissal. And throughout the book we hear no more of the rough but well-meaning journeyman hangman. Berthold’s father came to visit his son and dress his wounds, but the henpecked headsman dared not take him into his house. The poor boy lay suffering and hungry, tormenting himself on account of Elizabeth, whom the authorities had removed from the Rosenthal, and given in charge to people of better repute than those who had had care of her infancy; but who those people were, and where he should seek his little friend, Berthold knew not. And when he recovered, his stepmother and her son ill-treated him, and drove him from their presence; and, Arnulph having left, he had no friend or companion but the shaggy hounds with which he slept.
At this point of his youthful tribulations, Master Hammerling ceases to discourse of himself, and abruptly transports us to the sign of the Thistle, an isolated public house, consisting partly of the ruins of an old watch-tower, and much frequented by students, who on bright summer evenings loved to sit under the trees and lie upon the grass before its door, until the tolling bell warned them to return to the town before gates and bridges were closed for the night. This inn was kept by a strange old couple, childless, avaricious, and, as it was reported, passing rich, who went by the names of Father Finch and Mother Blutrude. They professed great poverty, and were furious if any doubted it, which few cared to do, since a certain rash scoffer had suddenly fallen sick, and gradually withered away and expired, in consequence, it was supposed, of certain unholy incantations of Mother Blutrude. The fear of her incantations, however, did not deter a reckless and debauched student from laying a plan for appropriating her concealed treasures. He found means to ingratiate himself with the old people, and to conceal himself in a nook at the top of the old tower, whence he saw them in the dead of night counting a large sum in silver coin. He only waited their departure to possess himself of the store, when he heard them talk of removing to the same place a large amount of Hungarian ducats they had bestowed elsewhere, and he resolved to wait where he was for this richer booty. He waited so long, that hunger, thirst, want of sleep and greed of gold bewildered his weak brain, and drove him mad. With delirious eagerness he filled his cap and pockets with the silver, rushed down the high steep staircase, forced the door with his foot, and bursting into the public room, seized Father Finch by the throat, and demanded his gold. The guests came to the rescue, dollars and crowns were scattered on the floor, and at last the madman was dragged away to prison, whilst old Finch drove every one from his house, barred the door, and set to work with his wife to collect the treasure. Benz and his son were in the town when the lunatic student was carried by, and soon afterwards a boy came running in with news that Father Finch had committed suicide from anxiety and despair. Straightway the headsman ordered one of his men to fetch his great sword and get ready his cart, and then he took the road to the Thistle, followed by an inquisitive mob, pressing as close to his heels as their aversion to his calling would allow. He went to exercise one of the most remarkable privileges of his office. What this was may best be told in the words of Mr Chézy’s hangman.
“We found the old house surrounded by gaping idlers, whom nothing short of my father’s presence could have induced to open a path. They gave way before his threatening gesture and raised voice, and we reached a loft where the gray-headed sinner hung from a strong staple, his stiffened feet almost touching an iron chest, from which Blutrude, who, cowered in a corner, never diverted her gaze. Soon after us came councillors, writers, and bailiffs, then a man bearing the sword, which the headsman took, and after cutting down the dead, he drew a circle round the corpse as far as his weapon’s point could reach. Then he raised his voice and said:
“‘I stand as headsman on my property and heritage, or do any here say nay?’
“Then one of the council replied: ‘None say nay. You are headsman within the precincts of the city and in the Count’s domain, Master Benz; act then according to your sealed rights and privileges, and with God’s help, as we are ready to give you ours.’