MY FIRST NIGHT IN HUGH'S TOWER.
We ate with the ravenous appetite which a ten hours' ride through the
snows of the Black Forest would be likely to impart. Sperver attacked,
in turn, the kid, the pheasants, and the pike, murmuring, with his mouth
full, "Thank God for the woods, the heather, and the ponds." Then,
leaning over the back of his chair and seizing the first bottle that
came under his hand, he added, "And for the hillsides, green in spring
and purple in autumn. Your health, Gaston!"
"Yours, Gideon!"
The fire crackled, the forks jingled, the bottles gurgled, and the
glasses clinked, while outside the wind of the winter night, the blast
from the snow-bound mountains, sang its unearthly hymn,--the hymn that
it sings when storm-driven, fantastic cloud-shapes rush across the sky
and obscure from moment to moment the pale face of the moon.
We continued our grateful meal. Sperver filled the "wieder komm" with
old Brumberg wine, whose sparkling froth bordered its generous edges,
and, handing it to me, he cried, "Here's to the recovery of Hermann of
Nideck, my noble master! Drink to the last drop, Gaston, that your
prayer may be heard."
This was done; then, refilling the bowl, he drained it in his turn.
A sense of satisfaction took possession of us. We felt at peace with all
the world. I sprawled out in my chair with my head thrown back and my
arms hanging down, and began to study my apartment. It was a low, arched
chamber cut out of the live rock, shaped like an oval, and measuring in
the highest part not more than twelve feet. At the further end I
perceived a sort of alcove, and in it a bed resting on the floor, and
covered, as nearly as I could make out, with a bearskin robe. Still
further back was another and smaller niche, with a statue of the Virgin
cut out of the same piece of granite and crowned with a bunch of
withered grass.
"You are studying your chamber," said Sperver; "it is not as large nor
as luxurious as the rooms of the Castle. We are now in Hugh's Tower,
and it is as old as the mountain itself. It dates back to the time of
Charlemagne. In those days the people didn't understand the art of
building lofty, spacious dwellings; they cut right into the solid rock."
"That served the purpose as well; but it is an odd corner that you have
stuck me in, Gideon."
"Don't be deceived on that point, Gaston; it is the place of honor.
Whenever the Count's particular friends come to visit him, they are put
in here. Hugh's Tower is the most honorable accommodation of all."
"By the way, who was this Hugh?"
"Why, Hugh the Wolf!"
"What!" I exclaimed in astonishment.
"Certainly; the founder of the family of Nideck; a rough customer, they
say. He came and settled down here with a score of horsemen and archers.
They scaled the highest rock on the mountain,--you will see it
to-morrow,--and built this tower. 'We are the masters,' they declared,
'and woe be to those who try to pass without paying toll. We will fall
on them like wolves, tear the clothes from their backs, and the hides,
too, if they are obstinate. From here we can command the landscape, the
passes of the Rhethal, the Steinbach, and the Roche Plate, and the
entire line of the Black Forest. Let the merchants beware.' And the bold
fellows carried out their threats under the leadership of Hugh the Wolf.
Knapwurst told me all about it when we were sitting up the other
night."
"Knapwurst?"
"You know; the little dwarf who opened the gate to us; a droll chap,
Gaston, who is always to be found in the library bent over a book."
"So you have a scholar at Nideck."
"Yes, the rascal! Instead of staying in his lodge, where he belongs, he
spends the whole blessed day shaking the dust from old family
parchments. He moves about among the shelves like a cat, and he knows
our history better than we do ourselves. He would like nothing better
than to tell you his stories; he calls them chronicles. Ha, ha, ha!"
Hereupon, Sperver, exalted by the old wine, laughed for some moments,
without knowing exactly why.
"So that is why you call this the Tower of Hugh the Wolf?" I resumed.
"Didn't I just tell you so? What are you so surprised at?"
"Oh, nothing."
"Yes, you are. I see it in your face. What are you thinking of?"
"It isn't so much the name of the tower that surprises me, as that you,
an old ranger, who from a baby had never known any home but the
fir-trees and crests of the Wald Horn and the gorges of the Rhethal, who
would never sleep with a roof over your head in spite of all my father's
urging, and who amused yourself roaming the paths of the Black Forest
and revelling in the fresh air, the sunlight, and the freedom of a
hunter's life, should be found here, after sixteen years, in this
red-granite hole. Come, Sperver, light your pipe and tell me how it
happened."
The old ranger drew a short, black pipe from his leather jacket, filled
it leisurely, and snatching up a coal from the hearth, placed it on the
bowl of his pipe; then, with his head thrown back and his eyes wandering
over the ceiling, he replied thoughtfully:
"After I left your father's service twenty years ago, it was long before
I could bring my mind to work for any other master, for I loved the
General, and you, and your pretty mother, as I could never come to love
others, not even the Count and my mistress Odile. So I took to poaching
for a term of years, and found a living by any means I could, until one
night the Count came upon me in the moonlight.
"He did not despise Sperver, the old hawk, the true man of the woods;
and he said to me, 'Comrade, you have hunted long enough by yourself;
now come and hunt with me. You have a good beak and strong claws, and
you might as well hunt my game with my permission as without it.'"
Sperver was silent for some minutes; then he continued:
"I was getting old,--and the old falcons and hawks, having long swept
the plains, end by settling down in the cleft of a rock to die. So it
was with me. I loved the open air, and I love it yet; but now, instead
of lying on a high branch at night and being rocked to sleep by the
wind, I prefer to come back to my cover, quietly pick a woodcock, and
dry my plumage before the fire."
Sperver was silent for some moments; then he continued:
"I still hunt as before, and afterwards I drink a quiet glass of
Rudesheimer with my friends, or--" At this moment a shock made the door
tremble.
"It is a gust of wind," I said.
"No; it is something else. Don't you hear a claw scratching on the
panel? I think one of the dogs must have got loose. Open, Walden! open,
Lieverle!"
He got up, but he had not gone two steps when a formidable Danish hound
leaped into the room and raised his fore-paws on his master's shoulders,
licking his cheeks and beard with his long, red tongue, and whining with
joy. Sperver put his arm around the dog's neck, and turning to me:
"Gaston," he said, "what man could love me as this dog does? Look at
this head, these eyes, and teeth!"
He drew back the animal's lips and showed me a set of fangs that could
have torn a buffalo to pieces. Then pushing him off with difficulty, for
the dog redoubled his caresses, he cried, "Down with you, Lieverle; I
know you love me! Who would, if you did not?" He went and closed the
door.
I never had seen a dog of such formidable proportions before; he
measured nearly four feet in height, with a broad, low forehead and fine
coat, a bright eye, long paws, broad across the chest and shoulders and
tapering down to the haunches,--a mass of nerves and muscles
interwoven,--but he had no scent. If such animals possessed the scent
of the terrier, the game would soon be exterminated.
Sperver had returned to his seat and was passing his hand proudly over
Lieverle's head, while he enumerated the dog's fine points. Lieverle
seemed to understand him.
"Look, Gaston, that dog would strangle a wolf with a snap of his jaws.
He is what you might well call perfection in the matter of courage and
strength; not yet five, and in his prime. I need not tell you that he is
trained to hunt wild boar. Every time we meet them, I fear for Lieverle;
he attacks them too boldly; he flies at them like an arrow. Beware of
the brutes' tusks, Lieverle, you rascal! It makes me tremble. Down on
your back!" cried the huntsman; "down on your back!"
The dog obeyed, presenting to us his flesh-colored thighs.
"Do you see that long, white line, without any hair on it, which extends
from his thigh clear up to his chest? A boar did that. The noble chap
did not let go of the brute's ear, in spite of the wound, and we tracked
them by the blood. I came up with them first. Seeing my Lieverle, I
cried out, jumped to the ground, and lifting him in my arms, I wrapped
him in my mantle and brought him home. I was beside myself with grief.
Luckily, the vital parts were not injured, and I sewed up the wound.
God! how he howled and suffered; but at the end of the third day he
began to lick the place, and a dog who licks a wound is already saved.
Ha, Lieverle! you remember it! And now we love each other, don't we?"
I was much moved by the affection of the man for the dog, and the animal
for his master. Lieverle watched him and wagged his tail, while a tear
stood in Sperver's eye. Soon he began again:
"What strength! Do you see, Gaston, he has broken his cord to come to
me,--a cord of six strands? He found my tracks, and that was enough.
Here, Lieverle! Catch!"
He threw him the remains of the kid's leg. The dog went over and
stretched himself in front of the fire with the bone between his
fore-paws, and he slowly tore it into shreds. Sperver watched him from
the corner of his eye with evident satisfaction.
"Hey, Gaston," said the old steward, "if any one should order you to go
and take that bone away, what would you say?"
"That it was a matter which required delicate manipulation."
We laughed heartily, and Sperver, who was stretched out in his
red-leather armchair, with his left arm thrown over the back, one leg
resting on a stool, and the other on a log that was dripping with sap
and singing in the fierce flame, puffed blue rings of smoke to the
ceiling with an air of supreme contentment. As for me, I was lazily
watching the dog, when suddenly remembering our interrupted
conversation, I began:
"Listen, Sperver! You haven't told me everything. Was it not because of
the death of your worthy wife, my old nurse Gertrude, that you left the
mountains to come here?"
Gideon looked grave, and a tear dimmed his eye; he straightened up, and
knocking the ashes from his pipe upon his thumb nail, he replied:
"Yes, my wife is dead, and that is what drove me from the woods. I could
not see the valley of the Roche Creuse without sorrow, and so I have
come hither. I hunt but little in the underbrush, and if the pack happen
to go in that direction, I leave them to themselves and turn back again,
trying to think of other things."
Sperver had become melancholy. His head had fallen on his breast, and he
remained silent. I regretted having recalled these sad images to his
mind. Then, reflecting once more on the Black Plague crouching in the
snow, I shivered. How singular that a single word had thrown us into a
train of dismal recollections! A whole world of retrospection had been
invoked by the merest accident.
I know not how long our silence had lasted, when a deep, terrible
growl, like the sound of distant thunder, made us tremble. We looked
at the dog. He still held his half-eaten bone between his fore-paws,
but with raised head, ears pricked up, and shining eyes, he was
listening,--listening in the dead silence, and a tremor of rage ran
along his back.
Sperver and I looked at each other anxiously; not a sound, not a murmur,
for the wind outside had fallen, and we could have heard the least
noise; nothing, save the deep, continued growl, which seemed to come
from deep down in the dog's chest. Suddenly the animal sprang up and
leaped against the wall, with a short, harsh, ominous bark that made the
arches resound as if thunder were rolling away along the empty passages.
Lieverle, with his head low down, seemed to see through the granite, and
his teeth, bared to their roots, glistened like snow. He still growled,
pausing now and then for a moment to sniff along the bottom of the wall;
then he sprang up again angrily, and seemed trying to tear away the
stone with his fore-paws.
We were watching him, unable to understand the cause of his excitement,
when a second howl, more fearful than the first, brought us to our
feet.
"Lieverle," cried Sperver, springing towards him, "for heaven's sake,
what ails you? Are you going mad?"
He seized a log, and began to sound the wall, which, however, gave forth
only a dull, dense sound. There was apparently no hollow in it, but
still the dog maintained the same posture.
"Decidedly, Lieverle," said the huntsman, "you have had a nightmare.
Come, lie down, and don't set our nerves on edge any more."
At the same moment we heard a sound outside. The door opened, and the
big, fat face of honest Tobias Offenloch, with his round lantern in one
hand and his stick in the other, and his three-cornered hat on one side
of his head, appeared smiling and genial in the doorway.
"Greeting, worthy company!" he exclaimed; "what the devil are you doing
here?"
"It was this foolish Lieverle who made all the racket," said Sperver;
"he sprang against the wall and wouldn't be quieted. Can you tell us the
reason of it?"
"He probably heard the stumping of my wooden leg as I came up the tower
stairs," replied the good-natured fellow with a laugh. Then setting his
lantern on the table: "That will teach you, Master Gideon, to tie up
your dogs. You have a weakness for dogs,--an absurd weakness. They will
end by putting us all out of doors. Only a moment ago, as I was coming
along the gallery, I met your Blitz; he snapped at my leg,--see, there
are the marks of his teeth. A new leg, too, confound the cur!"
"Tie up my dogs? What an idea!" replied Sperver. "Dogs that are tied up
are good for nothing; it makes them savage. Moreover, Lieverle was
fastened, and he has what was left of the cord around his neck still."
"It is not on my account that I am speaking, for whenever I see them
coming, I always raise my stick and put my wooden leg first. It is only
for discipline. The dogs ought to be in the kennels, the cats on the
gutters, and the people in the Castle, according to my way of thinking."
Tobie sat down as he finished his sentence, and with his elbows resting
on the table and his eyes beaming with satisfaction, he said in a
confidential tone:
"You should know, gentlemen, that I am a bachelor this evening."
"How is that?"
"Marie Anne is sitting up with Gertrude in the Count's antechamber."
"Then you are in no hurry."
"Not the least bit."
"How unlucky you should have come so late," observed Sperver; "all the
bottles are empty."
The discomfited expression of the good fellow made me feel positively
sorry. He would gladly have profited by his widowhood. In spite of my
efforts to repress it, however, my mouth parted in a wide yawn.
"We will put it over till another day," he said, getting up; "what is
postponed is not lost."
He took up his lantern.
"Good night, gentlemen."
"Wait a minute," said Gideon; "I see the doctor is sleepy; we will go
down together."
"Gladly, Sperver! We will have a word with Trumpf as we pass. He is
down-stairs with the others, and Knapwurst is telling them stories."
"Well, good night, Gaston."
"Good night, Sperver. Don't forget to call me if the Count grows worse."
"Never fear. Lieverle, come here."
They went out, and as they were crossing the platform, I could hear the
old Nideck clock striking eleven.
I was completely exhausted with the day's experiences. Soon I threw
myself on the bed, and straightway fell into a deep slumber, where all
night long I was wandering beside a radiant creature with a halo of
golden hair about her face, amid flower-strewn paths, and the song of
birds, and above our heads the fairest of summer skies.