Villa Eden Part 215

The notary now came from the adjoining room. Eric and Weidmann returned, and signed a receipt for the whole amount.

Eric now learned for the first time that Roland had insisted on Adams being brought. Knopf said in an aside to Eric, that he might be proud of the boy: there was great strength of character in him. He had repeatedly said that he must show he felt no hatred towards the innocent cause of this great calamity, and that, instead of persecuting the negro, he was bound to show him kindness.

Weidmann urged Adams's immediate departure from the Villa, fearing the effect that a chance meeting with him might have upon Frau Ceres, a.s.sociated as his appearance would be with recollections of her home.

He advised the man's going with him to Mattenheim: but Roland bogged that Adams might be allowed to remain till he himself went back to Mattenheim; and the Major joyfully agreed to take him home with him.

Eric was incensed that Knopf should have brought Adams at all; but Knopf told how he had met the negro on the way to the Villa, and, with an air of triumph, went on to tell what a model of knavery the fellow was. He had devised a plan for going to Sonnenkamp, openly expressing repentance for his deed, and offering to appear as a false witness, on condition of being handsomely paid for it. He was beside himself, therefore, when he learned that Sonnenkamp had fled, and his false testimony was of no value.

An important consultation took place in Sonnenkamp's room, upon the subject of a new enterprise which Weidmann had in contemplation. He was about to purchase a large estate three leagues from Mattenheim, in the direction of the mountains, and asked Roland and Eric if they would not invest a considerable sum in the land. He wanted to make the attempt to settle a new village there, in combination with an old design of his, of attracting artisans by establis.h.i.+ng them on small pieces of land of their own.

Eric questioned whether they would have a right to use this money in a foreign land for the benefit of foreigners; and, besides, at present they were only stewards of the property.

Weidmann praised his caution, but convinced him that this was a safe investment, and one that would be of benefit to many. He promised not to act alone, but to take the advice of the Banker in the matter.

Security should be given that the amount of capital invested, should be set free again in a certain number of years.

That evening, Weidmann departed for Mattenheim with a great chest of gold.

Eric was to bring the papers to the city, and then deliver them into the Banker's keeping.

CHAPTER III.

A SON OF HAM.

On no one of the persons interested in Villa Eden, had the startling events that had taken place produced a greater impression than on the Major. He could find no rest at home, and, since hearing Sonnenkamp's statement, he had lost the best possession he had,--his sound, healthful sleep. He wandered about restlessly all day, often talking with Laadi, throwing the dog sometimes a mushroom fried in fat, and then punis.h.i.+ng her severely when she tried to eat it. At night, his inward excitement was so great, that he kept talking in a low voice to himself, and occasionally even roused Fraulein Milch in the hope that she would dispel the disturbing thoughts. Sonnenkamp's flight, and now the news that Bella had gone with him, increased the distemper of his mind.

He summoned all his strength when Knopf brought in the negro, received him most cordially, and insisted upon his staying in his house first.

Adams consented; and the Major took him at once to the castle, where the work was still going on.

Fraulein Milch confessed to Herr Knopf that she was oppressed by a fear she could not control, and begged him to stay with them; but he regretted that his duties to Prince Valerian made his stay impossible.

So far from allaying Fraulein Milch's anxieties, he rather increased them by the satisfaction with which he dwelt upon the consummate knavery of this Adams.

"I take delight," he repeated, "in observing what a savage the fellow is. A savage nature is not soft, not good-natured, but sly as a tiger-cat. After all, how can you expect a slave to be a model of virtue, and an example of all that is good?"

The good-natured, soft-hearted Knopf took a real pleasure in knowing consummate rascals like Sonnenkamp and Adams. When he had discovered evil in a man, he carried it to extremes at once, like all idealists: the man must instantly be a consummate villain. The royal descent that Adams boasted of, was, according to him, nothing but a lie: he was usurping the character of some man of princely blood who had been drowned. "For," added Knopf, with great satisfaction, "he could not have taken the stamped sailing papers from him before he was launched on the sea of eternity."

He declared to Fraulein Milch that he had caught Adams in the lie; for the man had made a mistake in the dates: and Knopf was not a teacher of history, with all the dates at his tongue's end, for nothing.

On the Major's return with Adams, his disease fairly broke out, and he was obliged to take to his bed.

The Doctor came, and administered soothing remedies, which relieved the Major; but he had no soothing remedies for Fraulein Milch. She was to receive these from a man who had no knowledge of medicine. When the Professorin could not be with Fraulein Milch to relieve her loneliness, and keep up her courage, she sent Professor Einsiedel; and to him the poor woman confided all her uneasiness with regard to Adams. The man would engage in no occupation; he could drink and smoke all day; but that was all. He had worked only while he was a slave, and driven to it; and as lackey he had had nothing to do but to sit in fantastic livery upon the box of the royal coach. So there he remained in the house with Fraulein Milch, doing nothing but inspire her with an unconquerable terror. The greater her fear became, the more pains she took to preserve a friendly manner towards him.

Only to Professor Einsiedel did she complain of the presence of the negro.

"I must take care," she said, "not to let this one black man give me a prejudice against the whole race."

"What do you mean by that?"

Fraulein Milch blushed as she replied,--

"If we do not know a foreign nation, or a foreign race, and our preconceived notions of it are unfavorable, we are very apt to consider the solitary individual who may come under our observation as a representative of the whole, and to charge upon the whole his peculiar characteristics and faults. This Adams, now, is a man who will neither learn nor labor. As a slave, he was used to being taken care of, and as a lackey the same: it would be very unjust to let him prejudice me against the whole race, and to conclude that all negroes have these peculiarities."

"Very good, very reasonable," was the Professor's verdict. "But I should like to know how you come to be so carefully on your guard against prejudices. I know very little about women, to be sure; but I had supposed this quality was not common among them."

Fraulein Milch bit her lip. This acknowledgment of the claim of every individual to be judged by his own merits had had a peculiar origin in herself; but she could not tell it. She felt the Professor's keen glance fixed upon her face, and fancied he must have discovered her secret. She waited, expecting to hear it from his lips, but he was silent: after a pause, she continued,--

"Do you not think with me that the blacks will never be free until they free themselves, until a Moses appears from among their own number, and leads them out of bondage? And do you not think, also, that this generation which has been in bondage must perish in the wilderness, and that the new generation, that has grown up in freedom, will be the one to enter the promised land of freedom?"

"You seem very familiar with the Old Testament," said the Professor.

Fraulein Milch colored up to the border of her white cap.

"But you have the right idea," continued Professor Einsiedel. "I hope you understand me. The black race has developed nothing original: as far as we can yet see, it contributes nothing to the intellectual possessions of the human family. Certainly no outsider can free them; but our new age, the only redeemer which we acknowledge, culture, will reach and deliver them. Are you acquainted with the recent investigations into the j.a.phetic races?"

"Alas! no."

"Certainly; I forgot myself. But you must know that the sons of Ham, this, of course, you have learned from the Bible, are without a history: they bring nothing of their own conquest, acquisition, creation, into the great Pantheon. It is the Semitic, j.a.phetic races that must free the descendants of Ham."

The Professor was about to lay before Fraulein Milch the result of the latest investigations; to tell her what extraordinary discoveries had been made among the Egyptian papyri; how it was proved that the author or the compiler of the Bible had not understood Egyptian; in fact, that the contents of the Bible had existed before in Egyptian writings, and the deliverance of the slaves was the only one great act of the mythical Moses in the whole ancient world. In his delight at finding so good a listener, he was about to deliver himself at great length, when Claus came in, having been sent by the Doctor to take Adams home with him. Fraulein Milch whispered in his ear that he would have difficulty in making Adams work, at which he cried with a smile,--

"Yes, yes: slaves and rich men are alike in that. The slave does nothing because his master feeds him, and the rich man does nothing because his money feeds him."

Fraulein Milch impressed upon Claus that he must treat the black man kindly, and remember that he did not represent the black race. The field-guard laughed heartily, and carried Adams off to his house.

The dogs barked fiercely, and the women screamed in terror, when the negro appeared. The screams soon ceased; but, whenever Adams went out of the house, the dogs set up a fresh chorus of barks.

CHAPTER IV.

BELLA'S LEGACY.

When the Doctor came with the Professorin, he was highly rejoiced that Adams had left the house, and still more that the Major was able to sit up in bed, and smoke his long pipe. After enjoining upon him great quiet, he went with the two women into the sitting-room, and there informed them that he had reason to be proud; for Bella had written to him from Antwerp, and to no one else. He read the letter to them which was as follows,--

"You alone are no puppet; you never made a pretence of friends.h.i.+p for me, and therefore you shall have a keepsake. I give you my parrot. The parrot is the masterpiece of creation: he says nothing but what he is taught. Adieu!

"BELLA."

The ladies exchanged glances of surprise; and Fraulein Milch rejoiced the Doctor by saying, for once in her life, an unkind word; for she could not help expressing pleasure that Frau Bella had come to such an end. The Doctor, on the other hand, said, in a tone of complaint,--

"I feel a want now that she is gone. I miss in her a sort of barometer of thought and an interesting object of study. Strange! now that this woman is gone we see, for the first time, how widely her influence was extended,--more widely perhaps than was her due. But still the story pleases me, as a proof that there still exist persons of courage and strong will."

"You like eccentricity," suggested the Professorin.