into the cottage! It was a wonder that Raff did not waken. His dreams
were pleasant, however, for he smiled in his sleep.
Dame Brinker and her children had a fine supper, I can assure you. No
need of saving the delicacies now.
"We'll get father some nice fresh things, to-morrow," said the dame, as
she brought forth cold meat, wine, bread and jelly, and placed them on
the clean pine table. "Sit by, children, sit by."
* * * * *
That night, Annie fell asleep wondering whether it was a knife Hans had
lost, and thinking how funny it would be if he should find it, after
all.
Hans had scarce closed his eyes, before he found himself trudging
through a thicket; pots of gold were lying all around, and watches, and
skates, and glittering beads were swinging from every branch.
Strange to say, each tree, as he approached it, changed into a stump,
and on the stump sat the prettiest fairy imaginable, clad in a scarlet
jacket, and blue petticoat.
[Illustration: _"Good-night," they cried_]
XLII
THE MYSTERIOUS WATCH
Something else than the missing guilders was brought to light on the day
of the fairy godmother's visit. This was the story of the watch that for
ten long years had been so jealously guarded by Raff's faithful vrouw.
Through many an hour of sore temptation she had dreaded almost to look
upon it, lest she might be tempted to disobey her husband's request. It
had been hard to see her children hungry and to know that the watch, if
sold, would enable the roses to bloom in their cheeks again--"but nay,"
she would exclaim, "Meitje Brinker is not one to forget her man's last
bidding, come what may."
"Take good care of this, mine vrouw," he had said, as he handed it to
her--that was all. No explanation followed, for the words were scarcely
spoken, when one of his fellow workmen rushed into the cottage, crying,
"Come, man! the waters are rising! you're wanted on the dykes."
Raff had started at once, and that, as Dame Brinker has already told
you, was the last she saw of him in his right mind.
On the day when Hans was in Amsterdam looking for work, and Gretel,
after performing her household labors, was wandering about in search of
chips, twigs--anything that could be burned, Dame Brinker with
suppressed excitement had laid the watch in her husband's hand.
"It wasn't in reason," as she afterward said to Hans, "to wait any
longer, when a word from the father would settle all; no woman living
but would want to know how he came by that watch." Raff Brinker turned
the bright, polished thing over and over in his hand--then he examined
the bit of smoothly ironed black ribbon fastened to it; he seemed hardly
to recognize it. At last he said, "Ah, I remember this! Why, you've been
rubbing it, vrouw, till it shines like a new guilder."
"Aye," said Dame Brinker nodding her head complacently.
Raff looked at it again. "Poor boy!" he murmured, then fell into a brown
study.
This was too much for the dame. "Poor boy!" she echoed, somewhat tartly.
"What do you think I'm standing here for, Raff Brinker, and my spinning
a-waiting, if not to hear more than that?"
"I told ye all, long since," said Raff, positively, as he looked up in
surprise.
"Indeed, and you never did!" retorted the vrouw.
"Well, if not--since it's no affair of ours--we'll say no more about
it," said Raff, shaking his head sadly; "like enough while I've been
dead on the earth, all this time, the poor boy's died and been in
Heaven. He looked near enough to it, poor lad!"
"Raff Brinker! If you're going to treat me this way, and I nursing you
and bearing with you since I was twenty-two years old, it's a shame!
aye, and a disgrace," cried the vrouw growing quite red, and scant of
breath.
Raff's voice was feeble yet. "Treat you _what_ way, Meitje?"
"What way," said Dame Brinker, mimicking his voice and manner, "what
way? why just as every woman in the world is treated after she's stood
by a man through the worst, like a----"
"Meitje!"
Raff was leaning forward, with outstretched arms. His eyes were full of
tears.
In an instant Dame Brinker was at his feet, clasping his hands in hers.
"Oh! what have I done! Made my good man cry, and he not back with me
four days! Look up, Raff! nay, Raff, my own boy, I'm sorry I hurt thee.
It's hard not to be told about the watch after waiting ten years to
know--but I'll ask thee no more, Raff. Here, we'll put the thing away
that's made the first trouble between us, after God just giving thee
back to me."
"I was a fool to cry, Meitje," he said, kissing her, "and it's no more
than right ye should know the truth. But it seemed like it might be
telling the secrets of the dead to talk about the matter."
"Is the man--the lad--thou wert talking of dead, think thee?" asked the
vrouw, hiding the watch in her hand, but seating herself expectantly on
the end of his long foot-bench.
"It's hard telling," he answered.
"Was he so sick, Raff?"
"No, not sick, I may say; but troubled, vrouw, very troubled."
"Had he done any wrong, think ye?" she asked lowering her voice.
Raff nodded.
"_Murder?_" whispered the wife, not daring to look up.
"He said it was like to that, indeed."
"Oh! Raff, you frighten me--tell me more--you speak so strange--and you
tremble. I must know all."
"If I tremble, mine vrouw, it must be from the fever. There is no guilt
on my soul, thank God!"
"Take a sip of this wine, Raff. There, now you are better. It was like
to a crime you were saying."
"Aye, Meitje, like to murder; _that_ he told me himself. But I'll never
believe it. A likely lad, fresh and honest looking as our own youngster,
but with something not so bold and straight about him."
"Aye, I know," said the dame, gently, fearing to interrupt the story.
"He came upon me quite sudden," continued Raff. "I had never seen his
face before, the palest, frightenedest face that ever was. He caught me
by the arm. 'You look like an honest man,' says he."
"Aye, he was right in that," interrupted the dame, emphatically.
Raff looked somewhat bewildered.
"Where was I, mine vrouw?"
"The lad took hold of your arm, Raff," she said, gazing at him
anxiously.
"Aye, so. The words come awkward to me, and everything is half like a
dream, ye see."
"S-stut! What wonder, poor man," sighed the dame, stroking his hand. "If
ye had not head enough for a dozen, the wit would never have come to ye
again. Well, the lad caught ye by the arm, and said ye looked honest
(well he might!). What then? Was it noon-time?"
"Nay; before daylight--long before early chimes."
"It was the same day you were hurt," said the dame. "I know it seemed
you went to your work in the middle of the night. You left off, where
he caught your arm, Raff."
"Yes," resumed her husband--"and I can see his face this minute--so
white and wild looking. 'Take me down the river a way,' says he. I was
working then, you'll remember, far down on the line, across from
Amsterdam. I told him I was no boatman. 'It's an affair of life and
death,' says he; 'take me on a few miles--yonder skiff is not locked,
but it may be a poor man's boat and I'd be loath to rob him!' (The words
might differ some, vrouw, for it's all like a dream.) Well, I took him
down; it might be six or eight miles, and then he said he could run the
rest of the way on shore. I was in haste to get the boat back. Before he
jumped out, he says, sobbing-like, 'I can trust you. I've done a
thing--God knows I never intended it--but the man is dead. I must fly
from Holland.'"
"What was it, did he say, Raff? Had he been shooting at a comrade, like
they do down at the University at Gottingen?"
"I can't recall that. Mayhap he told me; but it's all like a dream. I
said it wasn't for me, a good Hollander, to cheat the laws of my country
by helping him off that way; but he kept saying, 'God knows I am
innocent!' and looked at me in the starlight as fair, now, and
clear-eyed as our little Hans might--and I just pulled away faster."
"It must have been Jan Kamphuisen's boat," remarked Dame Brinker, dryly;
"none other would have left his oars out that careless."
"Aye--it was Jan's boat sure enough. The man will be coming in to see me
Sunday, likely, if he's heard; and young Hoogsvliet too. Where was I?"
[It was lucky the dame restrained herself. To have spoken at all of Jan
after the last night's cruel disappointment would have been to have let
out more sorrow and suspicion than Raff could bear.]
"Where were you? Why not very far, forsooth--the lad hadn't yet given ye
the watch--alack I misgive whether he came by it honestly!"
"Why, vrouw," exclaimed Raff in an injured tone, "he was dressed soft
and fine as the prince himself. The watch was his own, clear enough."
"How came he to give it up?" asked the dame, looking uneasily at the
fire, for it needed another block of peat.
"I told ye just now," he answered with a puzzled air.
"Tell me again," said Dame Brinker, wisely warding off another
digression.
"Well, just before jumping from the boat, he says, handing me the watch,
'I'm flying from my country as I never thought I could. I'll trust you
because you look honest. Will you take this to my father--not to-day but
in a week, and tell him his unhappy boy sent it; and tell him if ever
the time comes that he wants me to come back to him, I'll brave
everything and come. Tell him to send a letter to--to'--there, the rest
is all gone from me. I _can't_ remember where the letter was to go. Poor
lad! poor lad," resumed Raff, sorrowfully taking the watch from his
vrouw's lap, as he spoke--"and it's never been sent to his father to
this day."
"I'll take it, Raff, never fear--the moment Gretel gets back. She will
be in soon. What was the father's name did you say? Where were you to
find him?"
"Alack!" answered Raff, speaking very slowly, "it's all slipped me. I
can see the lad's face, and his great eyes, just as plain--and I
remember his opening the watch, and snatching something from it and
kissing it--but no more. All the rest whirls past me; there's a kind of
sound like rushing waters comes over me when I try to think."
"Aye. That's plain to see, Raff; but I've had the same feeling after a
fever. You're tired now--I must get ye straight on the bed again. Where
_is_ the child, I wonder?"
Dame Brinker opened the door, and called, "Gretel! Gretel!"
"Stand aside, vrouw," said Raff, feebly, as he leaned forward, and
endeavored to look out upon the bare landscape; "I've half a mind to
stand beyond the door just once."
"Nay, nay," she laughed, "I'll tell the meester how ye tease, and fidget
and bother, to be let out in the air; and, if he says it, I'll bundle ye
warm to-morrow, and give ye a turn on your feet. But I'm freezing you
with this door open. I declare if there isn't Gretel with her apron
full, skating on the canal, like wild. Why, man," she continued almost
in a scream, as she slammed the door, "thou'rt walking to the bed
without my touching thee! Thou'lt fall!"
The dame's "thee" proved her mingled fear and delight, even more than
the rush which she made toward her husband. Soon he was comfortably
settled under the new cover, declaring as his vrouw tucked him in snug
and warm, that it was the last daylight that should see him abed.
"Aye! I can hope it myself," laughed Dame Brinker, "now you have been
frisking about at that rate." As Raff closed his eyes, the dame hastened
to revive her fire, or rather to dull it, for Dutch peat is like a
Dutchman, slow to kindle, but very good at a blaze when once started.
Then putting her neglected spinning-wheel away, she drew forth her
knitting from some invisible pocket and seated herself by the bedside.
"If you could remember that man's name, Raff," she began cautiously, "I
might take the watch to him, while you're sleeping; Gretel can't but be
in soon."
Raff tried to think; but in vain.
"Could it be Boomphoffen," suggested the dame. "I've heard how they've
had two sons turn out bad--Gerard and Lambert?"
"It might be," said Raff. "Look if there's letters on the watch; that'll
guide us some."
"Bless thee, man," cried the happy dame, eagerly lifting the watch, "why
thou'rt sharper than ever! Sure enough. Here's letters! L. J. B. That's
Lambert Boomphoffen you may depend; what the J is for I can't say; but
they used to be grand kind o' people, high feathered as fancy fowl. Just
the kind to give their children all double names, which isn't scripture
anyway."
"I don't know about that, vrouw. Seems to me there's long mixed names in
the Holy Book, hard enough to make out. But you've got the right guess
at a jump. It was your way always," said Raff, closing his eyes; "take
the watch to Boompkinks and try."
"Not Boompkinks; I know no such name; it's Boomphoffen."
"Aye, take it there."
"Take it there, man! why the whole brood of 'em's been gone to America
these four years. But go to sleep, Raff; you look pale and out of
strength. It'll all come to you, what's best to do, in the morning.
"So, Mistress Gretel! Here you are at last!"
* * * * *
Before Raff awoke that evening, the fairy godmother, as we know, had
been at the cottage, the guilders were once more safely locked in the
big chest, and Dame Brinker and the children were faring sumptuously on
meat and white bread and wine.
So the mother, in the joy of her heart, told them the story of the watch
as far as she deemed it prudent to divulge it. It was no more than fair,
she thought, that the poor things should know, after keeping the secret
so safe, ever since they had been old enough to know anything.
XLIII
A DISCOVERY
The next sun brought a busy day to the Brinkers.
In the first place the news of the thousand guilders had of course to be
told to the father. Such tidings as that surely could not harm him. Then
while Gretel was diligently obeying her mother's injunction to "clean
the place fresh as a new brewing," Hans and the dame sallied forth to
revel in the purchasing of peat and provisions.
Hans was careless and contented; the dame was filled with delightful
anxieties caused by the unreasonable demands of ten thousand guilders'
worth of new wants that had sprung up like mushrooms in a single night.
The happy woman talked so largely to Hans on their way to Amsterdam, and
brought back such little bundles after all, that he scratched his
bewildered head as he leaned against the chimneypiece, wondering
whether, "bigger the pouch, tighter the string" was in Jacob Cats, and
therefore true, or whether he had dreamed it when he lay in a fever.
"What thinking on, Big-eyes?" chirruped his mother, half reading his
thoughts as she bustled about, preparing the dinner. "What thinking on?
Why, Raff, would ye believe it, the child thought to carry half
Amsterdam back on his head. Bless us! he would have bought as much
coffee as would have filled this fire-pot; 'no--no--my lad,' says I, 'no
time for leaks when the ship is rich laden'--and then how he
stared--aye--just as he stares this minute. Hoot lad! fly around a
mite. Ye'll grow to the chimney-place with your staring and wondering.
Now, Raff, here's your chair at the head of the table, where it should
be, for there's A MAN to the house now--I'd say it to the king's face.
Aye, that's the way--lean on Hans; there's a strong staff for you!
growing like a weed too, and it seems only yesterday since he was
toddling. Sit by, my man, sit by."
"Can you call to mind, vrouw," said Raff, settling himself cautiously in
the big chair, "the wonderful music-box that cheered your working in the
big house at Heidelberg?"
"Aye, that I can," answered the dame, "three turns of a brass key, and
the witchy thing would send the music fairly running up and down one's
back--I remember it well--but, Raff," (growing solemn in an instant)
"you would never throw our guilders away for a thing like that?"
"No, no, not I, vrouw--for the good Lord has already given me a
music-box without pay."
All three cast quick, frightened glances at one another and at
Raff--were his wits on the wing again?
"Aye, and a music-box that fifty pouch-full would not buy from me,"
insisted Raff; "and it's set going by the turn of a mop handle, and it
slips and glides around the room, everywhere in a flash, carrying the
music about till you'd swear the birds were back again."
"Holy St. Bavon!" screeched the dame, "what's in the man?"
"Comfort and joy, vrouw, that's what's in him! Ask Gretel, ask my little
music-box Gretel, if your man has lacked comfort and joy this day."
"Not he, mother," laughed Gretel. "He's been _my_ music-box, too. We
sang together half the time you were gone."
"Aye, so," said the dame, greatly relieved. "Now, Hans, you'll never get
through with a piece like that; but never mind, chick, thou'st had a
long fasting; here, Gretel, take another slice of the sausage; it'll put
blood in your cheeks."
"Oh! Oh! mother," laughed Gretel, eagerly holding forth her platter,
"blood don't grow in girls' cheeks--you mean roses--isn't it roses,
Hans?"
While Hans was hastily swallowing a mammoth mouthful in order to give a
suitable reply to this poetic appeal, Dame Brinker settled the matter
with a quick:
"Well, roses or blood it's all one to me, so the red finds its way on
your sunny face. It's enough for mother to get pale and weary-looking,
without----"
"Hoot, vrouw," spoke up Raff hastily, "thou'rt fresher and rosier this
minute than both our chicks put together."
This remark though not bearing very strong testimony to the clearness of
Raff's newly awakened intellect, nevertheless afforded the dame intense
satisfaction; the meal accordingly passed off in the most delightful
manner.
After dinner, the affair of the watch was talked over and the mysterious
initials duly discussed.
Hans had just pushed back his stool, intending to start at once for
Mynheer van Holp's, and his mother had risen to put the watch away in
its old hiding place, when they heard the sound of wheels upon the
frozen ground.
Some one knocked at the door, opening it at the same time.
"Come in," stammered Dame Brinker hastily trying to hide the watch in
her bosom. "Oh! is it you, mynheer! Good day; the father is nearly well,
as you see. It's a poor place to greet you in, mynheer, and the dinner
not cleared away."
Dr. Boekman scarcely noticed the dame's apology. He was evidently in
haste.
"Ahem!" he exclaimed, "not needed here, I perceive. The patient is
mending fast."
"Well he may, mynheer," cried the dame, "for only last night we found a
thousand guilders that's been lost to us these ten years."
Dr. Boekman opened his eyes.
"Yes, mynheer," said Raff. "I bid the vrouw tell you, though it's to be
held a secret among us, for I see you can keep your lips closed as well
as any man."
The doctor scowled. He never liked personal remarks.
"Now, mynheer," continued Raff, "you can take your rightful pay. God
knows you have earned it, if bringing such a poor tool back to the
world, and his family, can be called a service. Tell the vrouw what's to
pay, mynheer; she will hand out the sum right willingly."
"Tut! tut!" said the doctor kindly, "say nothing about money. I can find
plenty of such pay any time, but gratitude comes seldom. That boy's
'thank you,'" he added, nodding sidewise toward Hans, "was pay enough
for me."
"Like enough ye have a boy of your own," said Dame Brinker, quite
delighted to see the great man becoming so sociable.
Dr. Boekman's good-nature vanished at once. He gave a growl (at least,
it seemed so to Gretel) but made no actual reply.
"Do not think the vrouw meddlesome, mynheer," said Raff; "she has been
sore touched of late about a lad whose folks have gone away, none know
where; and I had a message for them from the young gentleman."
"The name was Boomphoffen," said the dame eagerly. "Do you know aught of
the family, mynheer?"
The doctor's reply was brief and gruff.
"Yes. A troublesome set. They went long since to America."
"It might be, Raff," persisted Dame Brinker, timidly, "that the meester
knows somebody in that country, though I'm told they are mostly savages
over there. If he could get the watch to the Boomphoffens with the poor
lad's message, it would be a most blessed thing."
"Tut! vrouw, why pester the good meester and dying men and women wanting
him everywhere. How do ye know ye have the true name?"
"I'm sure of it," she replied. "They had a son Lambert, and there's an L
for Lambert and a B for Boomphoffen, on the back; though to be sure
there's an odd J too, but the meester can look for himself."
So saying, she drew forth the watch.
"L. J. B.!" cried Dr. Boekman springing toward her.
Why attempt to describe the scene that followed! I need only say that
the lad's message was delivered to his father at last--delivered while
the great surgeon was sobbing like a little child.
"Laurens! my Laurens?" he cried, gazing with yearning eyes at the watch
as he held it tenderly in his palm. "Ah, if I had but known sooner!
Laurens a homeless wanderer--Great Heaven! he may be suffering, dying at
this moment! Think, man, where is he? Where did my boy say the letter
must be sent?"
Raff shook his head sadly.
"Think!" implored the doctor. Surely the memory so lately awakened
through his aid could not refuse to serve him in a moment like this.
"It is all gone, mynheer," sighed Raff.
Hans, forgetting distinctions of rank and station, forgetting everything
but that his good friend was in trouble, threw his arms round the
doctor's neck.
"I can find your son, mynheer. If alive, he is _somewhere_. The earth is
not so very large. I will devote every day of my life to the search.
Mother can spare me, now. You are rich, mynheer; send me where you
will."
Gretel began to cry. It was right for Hans to go but how could they ever
live without him?
Dr. Boekman made no reply, neither did he push Hans away. His eyes were
fixed anxiously upon Raff Brinker. Suddenly he lifted the watch, and
with trembling eagerness attempted to open it. Its stiffened spring
yielded at last; the case flew open, disclosing a watch-paper in the
back bearing a group of blue forget-me-nots. Raff, seeing a shade of
intense disappointment pass over the doctor's face, hastened to say:
"There was something else in it, mynheer, but the young gentleman tore
it out before he handed it to me. I saw him kiss it as he put it away."
"It was his mother's picture," moaned the doctor; "she died when he was
ten years old. Thank God! the boy had not forgotten. Both dead? It is
impossible!" he cried, starting up. "My boy is alive. You shall hear his
story. Laurens acted as my assistant. By mistake he portioned out the
wrong medicine for one of my patients--a deadly poison--but it was never
administered, for I discovered the error in time. The man died that day.
I was detained with other bad cases until the next evening. When I
reached home, my boy was gone. Poor Laurens!" sobbed the doctor,
breaking down completely, "never to hear from me through all these
years. His message disregarded. Oh, what must he have suffered!"
Dame Brinker ventured to speak. Anything was better than to see the
meester cry.
"It is a mercy to know the young gentleman was innocent. Ah! how he
fretted! Telling you, Raff, that his crime was like unto murder. It was
sending the wrong physic he meant. Crime indeed! why our own Gretel
might have done that! Like enough the poor young gentleman heard that
the man was dead--that's why he ran, mynheer. He said, you know, Raff,
that he never could come back to Holland again, unless"--she
hesitated--"ah, your honor, ten years is a dreary time to be waiting to
hear from----"
"Hist, vrouw!" said Raff sharply.
"Waiting to hear," groaned the doctor, "and I, like a fool, sitting
stubbornly at home, thinking he had abandoned me. I never dreamed,
Brinker, that the boy had discovered the mistake. I believed it was
youthful folly--ingratitude--love of adventure, that sent him away. My
poor, poor Laurens!"
"But you know all, now, mynheer," whispered Hans. "You know he was
innocent of wrong, that he loved you and his dead mother. We will find
him. You shall see him again, dear meester."
"God bless you!" said Dr. Boekman, seizing the boy's hand, "it may be as
you say. I shall try--I shall try--and, Brinker, if ever the faintest
gleam of recollection concerning him should come to you, you will send
me word at once?"
"Indeed we will!" cried all but Hans, whose silent promise would have
satisfied the doctor even had the others not spoken.
"Your boy's eyes," he said, turning to Dame Brinker, "are strangely like
my son's. The first time I met him it seemed that Laurens himself was
looking at me."
"Aye, mynheer," replied the mother proudly. "I have marked that you were
much drawn to the child."