Waldfried Part 5

"They are no longer mine. I sold them yesterday, and they are to be led to France."

"A pleasant meal to you, France!" said Martella, laughing boisterously.

I could not help noticing her hearty laughter, for I felt quite shocked by it. What can this child be, thought I? What will become of our tranquil household?

We arrived at the house. The room seemed lighted up more brilliantly than usual. We ascended the steps, Martella preceding me. My wife was waiting for us on the threshold, and taking both of Martella's hands in hers, said, "Now, child, thou art at last at home."

"I am at home everywhere. And so is my dog. Isn't it so, Pincher?" said Martella in a bold tone.

We entered the room. There were three lights on the table. My wife's eloquent glance told me to have patience, and when I saw her lay her hand on her heart I felt that she was confident that she could direct everything for the best.

I now, for the first time, had a good look at Martella. In carriage and feature she seemed as wild and defiant as a gypsy. Her face was full of an expression of boldness. But she was indeed beautiful and fascinating when she spoke, and even more so when she laughed.

"Why do you have three lamps on the table?" said she.

"That is the custom," answered my wife, "when a bride comes to the house."

"How lovely!" exclaimed Martella. "The one light stands for us who are as one. The other two lights represent the parents." And she laughed most heartily. Her next question was, "Why do you have two clocks in your room?"

"You ask a great many questions," I could not avoid answering. But my wife said, "That is right. Always ask questions, and you will soon learn all that you need know."

Martella may have imagined that she had been too precipitate, for she soon said:

"To-morrow is yet another day. I am so tired. I would like to go to sleep now. But I must have my dog with me, or else I cannot rest."

Indeed, her gentle good-night and her curtsey seemed strangely at variance with her usually bold and defiant manner.

When she had left us, my wife said to me, "Do not take this affair to heart. It is indeed no trifle. But remember that Ernst might have made a much more serious mistake. He loves the wild creature, and our duty is to help him as best we can. Let Rothfuss and me take charge of the girl. For the present, you had better treat her with an air of reserve.

We two will attend to all. You may be glad that we have so faithful a servant as Rothfuss. They are friends already, and he says, 'By the time the potatoes are brought home, she will lay aside her red stockings.' I was wis.h.i.+ng for that on our way here. But she refused so positively, that I desisted from my endeavors to persuade her."

After a little while, she continued:

"A voice in the forest helped me to bring all things about as they should be. I heard the cuckoo's cry, and was reminded by that, that he would leave his young in a strange nest, and that other birds would patiently and affectionately nurture the strange birdling. We are something like these cuckoo parents. What they do without thought, we do consciously."

When at early dawn on the following day, I looked out of my window, I saw Martella and her dog at the fountain in front of the house. Seen by day, and in her light attire, she seemed wondrously beautiful and fascinating.

She washed her face and plaited her thick brown hair. Her every movement seemed free and n.o.ble, and almost graceful enough to please an artist's eye.

She sang in a low voice, and would from time to time exclaim, "Cuckoo!"

Rothfuss, who saw that she was was.h.i.+ng herself, called out to her that she must not do that again. "The cows drink there, and if you wash yourself in that basin, they will never go there again."

"I have already noticed," she replied, "that the cattle have the first place in this house."

When she saw me, she called out in a clear, ringing voice:

"Good-morning, master. Ernst was certainly right when he told me that it is lovely here. One can see so far in every direction. I shall yet climb every one of those hills. How good the water is! Do you, too, hear the cuckoo? He is already awake, and has bid me good-morning. Old Jaegerlies[2] has often told me that I was the cuckoo's child. And do you know that the cow got a calf during the night? A spotted cow-calf?

We have already given the cow something warm to drink. The calf drank milk when it was hardly two minutes old. Rothfuss said it would be a pity to kill the calf. I am going to drive out into the fields with Rothfuss to get some clover. Yes, a cow has a good time of it in your house. But look! the cuckoo is flying over your house! That is an omen!"

She went to the stable, and I followed her a short time afterwards. She looked on dreamily while the cow was licking the new-born calf, and said at last,

"That is what you folks call kissing."

Rothfuss asked her:

"Are you fond of cows?"

"I don't know; I never had one."

He showed her our best cow and said,

"Three years ago, when she was a calf, she got the first prize at the agricultural exhibition. She puts food to the best use. Everything that she eats turns either to meat or to milk."

Rothfuss told Martella to put on a little jacket. They soon drove out to the fields, and when she held up the scythe, she exclaimed, "Cuckoo!" It seemed to me as if I were dreaming, and yet I remembered quite distinctly that my wife had spoken to me on the previous night of the cuckoo's young ones.

What a strange coincidence it seemed!

Martella returned from the fields in good spirits, and during the morning lunch was quite cheerful. She was constantly talking of the daughter-in-law, and the cow-calf that had come into the family during the night before.

I then said to her, "I will give you the cow-calf. It is yours."

She made no answer, but looked at me with an air of surprise.

Rothfuss told me that when in the stable, she had said to the calf: "You belong to me. But of course, you know nothing of it. You really belong to your mother. But your mother belongs to the master, the master belongs to Ernst, and Ernst belongs to me; and that is how it is."

When evening came, Rothfuss expressed his opinion in the following words:

"If her inside is like her outside, she need not be made any better than she already is."

Our oldest maid-servant, Balbina, seemed quite kindly disposed to the new arrival, and Martella said that Balbina had told her something with the air of imparting a secret of which she was the only possessor. And what was it? "Why, nothing more than that it is sinful to lie and steal."

I have given the story of this first day in its smallest details. It is only for the first green leaves of spring that we have an attentive eye. They go on, silently increasing, until they become so numerous that they excite no comment.

CHAPTER IX.

Martella did not become attached to any one in the house except Rothfuss, whom she was constantly plying with questions about Ernst's childhood. When in pleasant evenings during the week, and on Sunday afternoons in clear weather, the youths and maidens would march through the village, with their merry songs, she would sit with Rothfuss on the bench by the stable, or, unattended by any companion save her dog, would be up in the woods that lay back of our house.

When she had any special request, she would communicate it through Rothfuss.

Among other things, she wanted to go out into the forest with the wood-cutters. From her thirteenth year she had wielded the axe, and could use it as cleverly as the men. We did not grant this wish of hers.

Her craving for knowledge was insatiable, and I marvelled at the patience and equanimity with which my wife told her everything she wanted to know.

Things to which we had become accustomed were to her occasions of the liveliest surprise. This did not seem to change, for she never could get used to what with us had, through daily habit, become a matter of course. To her all seemed a marvel.