The Legend of Ulenspiegel Volume Ii Part 65

The wind blew soft, the sun shone warm; Lamme in his fever was securely tied on his bed, so that in his witless spasms of leaping he might not jump over the side of the s.h.i.+p; and deeming himself still in his galley, he said:

"This fire is bright to-day. Soon it will rain ortolans. Wife, spread snares in our orchard. Thou art lovely thus, with thy sleeves rolled up to the elbow. Thy arm is white, I would fain bite it, bite with my lips that are teeth of live velvet. Whose is this lovely flesh, whose those lovely b.r.e.a.s.t.s showing beneath thy white jacket of fine linen? Mine, my sweet treasure. Who will make the frica.s.see of c.o.c.k's comb and chickens' rumps? Not too much nutmeg, it brings on fever. White sauce, thyme, and laurel: where are the yolks of eggs?"

Then making a sign for Ulenspiegel to bring his ear close to his mouth, he said to him in a low voice:

"Presently it will rain venison; I shall keep thee four ortolans more than the others. Thou art the captain; betray me not."

Then hearing the sea beat softly on the s.h.i.+p's side:

"The soup is boiling, my son; the soup is boiling, but how slow is this fire to heat up!"

As soon as he recovered his wits, he said, speaking of the monk:

"Where is he? doth he grow in grease?"

Seeing him then, he put out his tongue at him and said:

"The great work is being accomplished; I am content."

One day he asked to have the great scales set up on the deck, and to be set in it, he on one pan, the monk on the other: scarcely was the monk in place than Lamme soared like an arrow in the air, and rejoicing, he said, looking at him:

"He weighs it down! he weighs it down! I am a weightless spirit beside him: I will fly in the air like a bird. I have my idea: take him away that I may come down; now put on the weights. Put him back. What does he weigh? Three hundred and fourteen pounds. And I? Two hundred and twenty."

VII

The night of the day after this, when the dawn was rising gray, Ulenspiegel was awakened by Lamme crying:

"Ulenspiegel! Ulenspiegel! help, rescue, keep her from going away. Cut the cords! cut the cords!"

Ulenspiegel came up on the deck and said:

"Why dost thou call out? I see naught."

"'Tis she," replied Lamme, "she, my wife, there, in that skiff rounding that flyboat; aye, that flyboat whence there came the sound of singing and the viol strings."

Nele had come up on deck.

"Cut the cords, my dear," said Lamme. "Seest thou not that my wound is cured, her soft hand hath healed it; she, aye, she. Dost thou see her standing up in the skiff? Dost thou hear? she is singing still. Come, my beloved, come; flee not from thy poor Lamme, who was so lonely in the world without thee."

Nele took his hand, touched his face.

"He hath the fever still," she said.

"Cut the cords," said Lamme; "give me a skiff! I am alive, I am happy, I am healed!"

Ulenspiegel cut the cords: Lamme, leaping from his bed in breeches of white linen, without a doublet, set to work himself to lower away the skiff.

"See him," said Nele to Ulenspiegel: "his hands tremble with impatience as they work."

The skiff ready, Ulenspiegel, Nele, and Lamme went down into it with an oarsman, and set off towards the flyboat anch.o.r.ed far off in the harbour.

"See the goodly flyboat," said Lamme, helping the oarsman.

On the fresh morning sky, coloured like crystal gilded by the rays of the young sun, the flyboat showed up her hull and her elegant masts.

While Lamme rowed:

"Tell us now how didst find her again," asked Ulenspiegel.

Lamme replied, speaking in jerks:

"I was sleeping, already much better. All at once a dull noise. A piece of wood struck the s.h.i.+p. A skiff. A sailor hurries up at the noise: 'Who goes there?' A soft voice, her voice, my son, her voice, her sweet voice: 'Friends.' Then a deeper voice: 'Long live the Beggar: the commander of the flyboat Johannah to speak with Lamme Goedzak.' The sailor drops the ladder. The moon was s.h.i.+ning. I see a man's shape coming up on to the deck: strong hips, round knees, wide pelvis; I say to myself: 'a pretended man': I feel as it might be a rose opening and touching my cheek: her mouth, my son, and I hear her saying to me, she--dost thou follow?--herself, covering me with kisses and with tears: 'twas liquid perfumed fire falling on my body: 'I know I am sinning; but I love thee, my husband! I have sworn before G.o.d: I am breaking my oath, my man, my poor man! I have come often without daring to come nigh thee; the sailor at last allowed me: I dressed thy wound, thou knewest me not; but I have healed thee; be not wroth, my man! I have followed thee, but I am afraid; he is upon this s.h.i.+p, let me go; if he saw me he would curse me and I should burn in the everlasting fire!' She kissed me again, weeping and happy, and went away in spite of me, despite my tears: thou hadst bound me hand and foot, my son, but now...."

And saying this he bent mightily to his oars: 'twas like the taut string of a bow that launches the arrow forthright.

As they approached the flyboat, Lamme said:

"There she is, upon the deck, playing the viol, my darling wife with her hair of golden brown, with the brown eyes, the cheeks still fresh and young, the bare round arms, the white hands. Leap onward, skiff, over the sea!"

The captain of the flyboat, seeing the skiff coming up and Lamme rowing like a demon, had a ladder dropped from the deck. When Lamme was by it, he leapt from the skiff on to the ladder at the risk of tumbling into the sea, thrusting the skiff three fathoms behind him and more; and climbing like a cat up to the deck, ran to his wife, who swooning with joy, kissed and embraced him, saying:

"Lamme! come not to take me: I have sworn to G.o.d, but I love thee. Ah! dear husband!"

Nele cried out:

"It is Calleken Huybrechts, the pretty Calleken."

"'Tis I," said she, "but alas! the hour of noon has gone by for my beauty."

And she seemed wretched.

"What hast thou done?" said Lamme: "what became of thee? Why didst thou leave me? Why wilt thou leave me now?"

"Listen," said she, "and be not wroth; I will tell thee: knowing that all monks are men of G.o.d I confided in one of them: his name was Broer Cornelis Adriaensen."

Hearing which Lamme:

"What!" said he, "that wicked hypocrite who had a sewer mouth, full of filth and dirt, and spoke of naught but spilling the blood of the Reformed; what! that praiser of the Inquisition and the edicts! Ah, it was a blackguardly good-for-naught rascal!"

Calleken said:

"Do not insult the man of G.o.d."

"The man of G.o.d!" said Lamme, "I know him; 'twas a man of filth and foulness. Wretched fate! my beautiful Calleken fallen into the hands of this lascivious monk! Come not near me, I will kill thee: and I that loved her so much! my poor deceived heart that was all her own! What dost thou come hither for? Why didst thou tend me? thou shouldst have left me to die. Begone, thou; I would see thee no more, begone, or I fling thee in the sea. My knife!..."