The Burgomaster's Wife (Historical Novel). Georg Ebers
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ha!” muttered the baron, gazing attentively at the landlord’s disagreeable face, whose little eyes glittered very craftily, then turning to Nicolas, said:
“Go and watch the blackbirds in the window yonder a little while, my son, I have something to say to the host.”
The youth instantly obeyed and as, instead of looking at the birds, he gazed after the two enthusiastic supporters of Holland’s liberty, who were riding along the road leading to Delft, remembered the simile of fetters that drag men down, and saw rising before his mental vision the glitter of the gold chain King Philip had sent his father, Nicolas involuntarily glanced towards him as he stood whispering eagerly with the landlord. Now he even laid his hand on his shoulder. Was it right for him to hold intercourse with a man whom he must despise at heart? Or was he—he shuddered, for the word “traitor,” which one of the school-boys had shouted in his ears during the quarrel before the church, returned to his memory.
When the rain grew less violent, the travellers left the inn. The baron allowed the hideous landlord to kiss his hand at parting, but Nicolas would not suffer him to touch his.
Few words were exchanged between father and son during the remainder of their ride to the Hague, but the musician and the fencing-master were less silent on the way to Delft.
Wilhelm had modestly, as beseemed the younger man, suggested that his companion had expressed his hostile feelings towards the nobleman too openly.
“True, perfectly true,” replied Allertssohn, whom his friends called “Allerts.” “Very true! Temper oh! temper! You don’t suspect, Herr Wilhelm—But we’ll let it pass.”
“No, speak, Meister.”
“You’ll think no better of me, if I do.”
“Then let us talk of something else.”
“No, Wilhelm. I needn’t be ashamed, no one will take me for a coward.”
The musician laughed, exclaiming: “You a coward! How many Spaniards has your Brescian sword killed?”
“Wounded, wounded, sir, far oftener than killed,” replied the other. “If the devil challenges me I shall ask: Foils, sir, or Spanish swords? But there’s one person I do fear, and that’s my best and at the same time my worst friend, a Netherlander, like yourself, the man who rides here beside you. Yes, when rage seizes upon me, when my beard begins to tremble, my small share of sense flies away as fast as your doves when you let them go. You don’t know me, Wilhelm.”
“Don’t I? How often must one see you in command and visit you in the fencing-room?”
“Pooh, pooh—there I’m as quiet as the water in yonder ditch—but when anything goes against the grain, when—how shall I explain it to you, without similes?”
“Go on.”
“For instance, when I am obliged to see a sycophant treated as if he were Sir Upright—”
“So that vexes you greatly?”
“Vexes? No! Then I grow as savage as a tiger, and I ought not to be so, I ought not. Roland, my foreman, probably likes—”
“Meister, Meister, your beard is beginning to tremble already!”
“What did the Glippers think, when their aristocratic cloaks—”
“The landlord took yours and mine from the fire entirely on his own responsibility.”
“I don’t care! The crook-legged ape did it to honor the Spanish sycophant. It enraged me, it was intolerable.”
“You didn’t keep your wrath to yourself, and I was surprised to see how patiently the baron bore your insults.”
“That’s just it, that’s it!” cried the fencing-master, while his beard began to twitch violently. “That’s what drove me out of the tavern, that’s why I took to my heels. That—that—Roland, my fore man.”
“I don’t understand you.”
“Don’t you, don’t you? How should you; but I’ll explain. When you’re as old as I am, young man, you’ll experience it too. There are few perfectly sound trees in the forest, few horses without a blemish, few swords without a stain, and scarcely a man who has passed his fortieth year that has not a worm in his breast. Some gnaw slightly, others torture with sharp fangs, and mine—mine.—Do you want to cast a glance in here?”
The fencing-master struck his broad chest as he uttered these words and, without waiting for his companion’s reply, continued:
“You know me and my life, Herr Wilhelm. What do I do, what do I practise? Only chivalrous work.
“My life is based upon the sword. Do you know a better blade or surer hand than mine? Do my soldiers obey me? Have I spared my blood in fighting before the red walls and towers yonder? No, by my fore man Roland, no, no, a thousand times no.”
“Who denies it, Meister Allerts? But tell me, what do you mean by your cry: Roland, my fore man?”
“Another time, Wilhelm; you mustn’t interrupt me now. Hear my story about where the worm hides in me. So once more: What I do, the calling I follow, is knightly work, yet when a Wibisma, who learned how to use his sword from my father, treats me ill and stirs up my bile, if I should presume to challenge him, as would be my just right, what would he do? Laugh and ask: ‘What will the passado cost, Fencing-master Allerts? Have you polished rapiers?’ Perhaps he wouldn’t even answer at all, and we saw just now how he acts. His glance slipped past me like an eel, and he had wax in his ears. Whether I reproach, or a cur yelps at him, is all the same to his lordship. If only a Renneberg or Brederode had been in my place just now, how quickly Wibisma’s sword would have flown from its sheath, for he understands how to fight and is no coward. But I—I? Nobody would willingly allow himself to be struck in the face, yet so surely as my father was a brave man, even the worst insult could be more easily borne, than the feeling of being held in too slight esteem to be able to offer an affront. You see, Wilhelm, when the Glipper looked past me—”
“Your beard lost its calmness.”
“It’s all very well for you to jest, you don’t know—”
“Yes, yes, Herr Allerts; I understand you perfectly.”
“And do you also understand, why I took myself and my sword out of doors so quickly?”
“Perfectly; but please stop a moment with me now. The doves are fluttering so violently; they want air.” The fencing-master stopped his steed, and while Wilhelm was removing the dripping cloth from the little cage that rested between him and his horse’s neck, said:
“How can a man trouble himself about such gentle little creatures? If you want to diminish, in behalf of feathered folk, the time given to music, tame falcons, that’s a knightly craft, and I can teach you.”
“Let my doves alone,” replied Wilhelm. “They are not so harmless as people suppose, and have done good service in many a war, which is certainly chivalrous pastime. Remember Haarlem. There, it’s beginning to pour again. If my cloak were only not so short; I would like to cover the doves with it.”
“You certainly look like Goliath in David’s garments.”
“It’s my scholar’s cloak; I put my other on young Wibisma’s shoulders yesterday.”
“The Spanish green-finch?”
“I told you about the boys’ brawl.”
“Yes, yes. And the monkey kept your cloak?”
“You came for me and wouldn’t wait. They probably sent it back soon after our departure.”
“And their lordships expect thanks because the young nobleman accepted it!”
“No, no; the baron expressed his gratitude.”
“But that