In the Fire of the Forge (Historical Novel). Georg Ebers
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the open windows of the spacious apartment, where the Emperor Rudolph also remained during the ball. Here the moonbeams might have been reflected from glittering steel or the gold, silver, and gems adorning helmets, diadems, and gala robes; or they might surely have found an opportunity to sparkle on the ripples of the Pegnitz River, which divided the city into halves; but the heavenly wanderer, from the earliest times, has preferred leafy hidden nooks to scenes of noisy gaiety, a dim light to a brilliant glare. Luna likes best to gaze where there is a secret to be discovered, and mortals have always been glad to choose her as a confidante. Something exactly suited to her taste must surely be going on just now near the linden which, in all the splendour of fullest bloom, shaded the street in front of the Ortlieb mansion; for she had seen two fair girls grow up in the ancient dwelling with the carved escutcheon above the lofty oak door, and the ample garden—and the younger, from her earliest childhood, had been on especially intimate terms with her.
Now the topmost boughs of the linden, spite of their dense foliage, permitted a glimpse of the broad courtyard which separated the patrician residence from the street.
A chain, which with graceful curves united a short row of granite posts, shut out the pedestrians, the vehicles and horsemen, the swine and other animals driven through the city gate. In contrast with the street, which in bad weather resembled an almost impassable swamp, it was always kept scrupulously clean, and the city beadle might spare himself the trouble of looking there for the carcasses of sucking pigs, cats, hens, and rats, which it was his duty to carry away.
A young man with an unusually tall and powerful figure was standing in this yard, gazing up at a window in the second story. The shadow of the linden concealed his features and his dress, but the moon had already seen him more than once in this very spot and knew that he was a handsome fellow, whose bronzed countenance, with its prominent nose and broad brow, plainly indicated a strong will. She had also seen the scar stretching from the roots of his long brown locks across the whole forehead to the left cheek-bone, that lent the face a martial air. Yet he belonged to no military body, but was the son of a noble family of Nuremberg, which boasted, it is true, of “knightly blood” and the right of its sons to enter the lists of the tournament, but was engaged in peaceful pursuits; for it carried on a trade with Italy and the Netherlands, and every male scion of the Eysvogel race had the birthright of being elected a member of the Honourable Council and taking part in the government of Nuremberg.
The moon had long known that the young man in the courtyard was an Eysvogel, nor was this difficult to discover. Every child in Nuremberg was familiar with the large showy coat of arms lately placed above the lofty doorway of the Eysvogel mansion; and the nocturnal visitor wore a doublet on whose left breast was embroidered the same coat of arms, with three birds in the shield and one on the helmet.
He had already waited some time in vain, but now a young girl’s head appeared at the window, and a gay fresh voice called his Christian name, “Wolff!”
Waving his cap, he stepped nearer to the casement, greeted her warmly, and told her that he had come at this late hour to say good-night, though only from the front yard.
“Come in,” she entreated. “True, my father and Eva have gone to the dance at the Town Hall, but my aunt, the abbess, is sitting with my mother.”
“No, no,” replied Wolff, “I only stopped in passing. Besides, I am stealing even this brief time.”
“Business?” asked the young girl. “Do you know, I am beginning to be jealous of the monster which, like an old spider, constantly binds you closer and closer in its web. What sort of dealing is this?—to give the whole day to business, and only a few minutes of moonlight to your betrothed bride!
“I wish it were otherwise,” sighed Wolff. “You do not know how hard these times are, Els! Nor how many thoughts beset my brain, since my father has placed me in charge of all his new enterprises.”
“Always something new,” replied Els, with a shade of reproach in her tone. “What an omnivorous appetite this Eysvogel business possesses! Ullmann Nutzel said lately: ‘Wherever one wants to buy, the bird—[vogel]—has been ahead and snapped up everything in Venice and Milan. And the young one is even sharper at a bargain,’ he added.”
“Because I want to make a warm nest for you, dearest,” replied Wolff.
“As if we were shopkeepers anxious to secure customers!” said the girl, laughing. “I think the old Eysvogel house must have enough big stoves to warm its son and his wife. At the Tuckers the business supports seven, with their wives and children. What more do we want? I believe that we love each other sincerely, and though I understand life better than Eva, to whom poverty and happiness are synonymous, I don’t need, like the women of your family, gold plates for my breakfast porridge or a bed of Levantine damask for my lapdog. And the dowry my father will give me would supply the daughters of ten knights.”
“I know it, sweetheart,” interrupted Wolff dejectedly; “and how gladly I would be content with the smallest—”
“Then be so!” she exclaimed cheerily. “What you would call ‘the smallest,’ others term wealth. You want more than competence, and I—the saints know-would be perfectly content with ‘good.’ Many a man has been shipwrecked on the cliffs of ‘better’ and ‘best.’ ”
Fired with passionate ardour, he exclaimed, “I am coming in now.”
“And the business?” she asked mischievously. “Let it go as it will,” he answered eagerly, waving his hand. But the next instant he dropped it again, saying thoughtfully: “No, no; it won’t do, there is too much at stake.”
Els had already turned to send Katterle, the maid, to open the heavy house door, but ere doing so she put her beautiful head out again, and asked:
“Is the matter really so serious? Won’t the monster grant you even a good-night kiss?”
“No,” he answered firmly. “Your menservants have gone, and before the maid could open——There is the moon rising above the linden already. It won’t do. But I’ll see you to-morrow and, please God, with a lighter heart. We may have good news this very day.”
“Of the wares from Venice and Milan?” asked Els anxiously.
“Yes, sweetheart. Two waggon trains will meet at Verona. The first messenger came from Ingolstadt, the second from Munich, and the one from Landshut has been here since day before yesterday. Another should have arrived this morning, but the intense heat yesterday, or some cause—at any rate there is reason for anxiety. You don’t know what is at stake.”
“But peace was proclaimed yesterday,” said Els, “and if robber knights and bandits should venture——But, no! Surely the waggons have a strong escort.”
“The strongest,” answered Wolff. “The first wain could not arrive before to-morrow morning.”
“You see!” cried the girl gaily. “Just wait patiently. When you are once mine I’ll teach you not to look on the dark side. O Wolff, why is everything made so much harder for us than for others? Now this evening, it would have been so pleasant to go to the ball with you.”
“Yet, how often, dearest, I have urged you in vain——” he began, but she hastily interrupted “Yes, it was certainly no fault of yours, but one of us must remain with my mother, and Eva——”
“Yesterday she complained to me with tears in her eyes that she would be forced to go to this dance, which she detested.”
“That is the very reason she ought to go,” explained Els. “She is eighteen years old, and has never yet been induced to enter into any of the pleasures other girls enjoy. When she isn’t in the convent she is always at home, or with Aunt Kunigunde or one of the nuns in the woods and fields. If she wants to take the veil later, who can prevent it, but the abbess herself advises that she should have at least a glimpse of the world before leaving it. Few need it more, it seems to me, than our Eva.”
“Certainly,” Wolff assented. “Such a lovely creature! I know no girl more beautiful in all Nuremberg.”