END OF DEES
It was on my seventeenth morning in Gratz that, having been fortified
with a letter by Herr Oberbürgermeister, I saw the Prince-bishop: the
morning of an audience: so that I had first to wait a long time among a
mob of all sorts of men, who passed in one by one at the call of a
Spanish abbé with sandals on his feet, a lad of such beauty that one's
eyes clung to his face, till my turn at last came, and I was ushered
into a chamber almost Pompadour in style, with statues, mirrors,
flowers, through a door of which one could see, and smell, the
palace-chapel. The Prince-bishop was pacing the floor, shut up within
himself. I think that I never saw a more imposing figure, for he was
big, and, having lately come from the chapel, had on a most gorgeous
large cope, the apparel of his amice sticking up stiffly about his jaws
under a dalmatic that might have bought a farm. Here was the Church in
the awe of her gaudery. He looked a young man of not more than
thirty-five, and stood like a king; but his lengthy chin was retreating,
and he had some kind of lisp which made his speech rather common and
silly.
He motioned me to a chair, and as I unfolded my tale quietly enough he
listened, pacing, pacing; but the moment I had finished he reddened,
and, suddenly placing his two palms far forth on the table, bringing his
face down to mine, the good man glared at me, giving forth the roar:
"_Impious scoundrel!_"
I, for my part, felt myself flush, and half rose to answer the insult,
for I fancied that he meant me: but he meant Baron Kolár!
During the remainder of our half-hour's interview it became clear to me
that there had been long-standing feud and war before this between the
prince-bishop and the baron, an old trial of strengths never yet
decided, but now to be decided; and when I deposited the affidavits with
the great churchman I deposited them certain that I had at last
discovered the key to the dungeon of Dees.
And so it proved: for, to cut short the story of intrigue, and
runnings to and fro, and hurried breaths, during the next three
days, on my twentieth day in Gratz a body of garrison-soldiers and
sicherheitswachmänner, numbering twenty-seven, set out from Gratz for
the mountains, I being in the rail-train with them, after having sent to
Swandale the telegram: "All goes well; you will see us within four
days."
These officers of the law were sent out in secret, under orders to
break into any part of Schweinstein Castle if need were, and to set free
the priest. I parted from them at Badsögl at four in the afternoon,
hurrying on upward on horseback, while the troop followed, travelling
afoot. Langler and I clasped hands under the corn-sheaf hung in the
guest-court porch, where he stood expecting me, looking, I thought,
remarkably well, with the good old smile stretching his lips. It was a
most happy meeting: I had returned in triumph to find him safe, with a
bundle of edelweiss as white as his soul in his hands and a fine brown
in his skin. "Well done, Arthur," said he to me, and I to him: "all
through you." "No, nego, nego," he answered. "Well, the point is," said
I, "that our pains are all but over, and Swandale once more in sight."
"Ah, Swandale," said he, "well, that, too, by God's mercy. Did you
telegraph to Emily?" "Yes," I answered. "I, too," said he. "Do you
think," I asked, "that anyone up here knows yet of the coming of the
troop?" "I fancy that Lossow knows," said he. "I wonder how?" said I. "I
don't know," said he, "but I fancy that it is anticipated; however, it
can be of no importance, since the troop are under vigorous orders."
"Let us hope not," said I; "well, but I am very hungry." Just then
Lossow's face appeared, trying not to smile, but chubbily smiling, so we
ordered a meal, and, passing inward, I was met at the foot of the stair
by the "kiss the hand, sir!" of the frau, of her children, and of all
the household. At that moment, at any rate, I may say that these people
wore their wonted faces, and seemed to have no weight on their minds.
While I was feeding upon the old gansbrust and beet, Langler and I made
up our minds that we had better be at the burg when Dees was set free,
so as to seize upon him, hear whatever he might have to tell, and then
speed down in the waggonette to Badsögl, whence we would wire Dees'
story to England, and so, having won our backs bare of the world's
business, make for home. All this was settled. My trunk was waiting
below at Badsögl; Langler's was ready packed.
In the midst of our talk a boy of the place named Fritz brought us a
telegram: it was from Swandale, and in the words: "Yours received,
praises to God, beloved, shall await you Friday night at 9.17 at latest;
am quite well, but try, will you, for Thursday." Langler read, and
handed it to me. Now, every word from Swandale always powerfully moved
him, so I was surprised now that his first words were: "but what is the
matter with Fritz?" I answered that I hadn't noticed. "Well, he seems
much agitated," said Langler.
I ended my meal, and we sat by our window, smoking and still talking
about our plans. I was in the act of looking at my watch, and of saying
"within fifteen minutes now the troop should be at the castle-gate,"
when we were startled by the toll of a bell. It seemed to come from the
burg. Langler and I looked at each other, as the toll was anew borne to
us, shivering up through the forest on the soughs of the evening-breeze.
"Someone must be no more," murmured Langler in a low tone. I uttered no
word in answer: I was all hushed and bemused into the mood of the tolls;
all the mountain seemed hushed now on a sudden in submission to their
meaning and the tremolo of their bleating treble. I murmured to Langler:
"they seem to be tolling at the burg; someone must be dead."
The tolling of the bell went on. Presently I got up, and struck the
triangle (our bell), in answer to which old Lossow rushed wildly in, no
smiling now, in that old man's looks the very ghost and gauntness of
awe. "Why, what is the matter, Lossow?" said I, "who, then, is dead?"
"Oh, good gentleman!" he groaned, with an appealing underlook. "But who
is dead?" said I again, at which repetition of my question the old man
now seemed to fly into a flurry, and crying out, "I know nothing,
nothing of it!" washing his hands of it, tripped with his petty steps
from the room.
I looked at Langler, saying: "we shall learn nothing from him, so let us
start for the castle at once; by the time we get there the troop should
have come."
We took umbrellas, Langler taking his greatcoat, too, for since my
arrival the weather had turned out rough. At the bottom of the stair we
saw the Lossows all in a knot, all with the same blankness and eyes of
awe, and without stopping to speak to them passed out and down through
the forest, which every few moments was swamped with shivery tempests
and volumes of commotion mixed with spray. It was well past six, but
there was still some twilight, save in the thick of the timber. Some way
beyond the forest we saw a group of men staring at the troop before the
burg with faces that told more plainly than words that something
tremendous must have awed all these people to the heart. The bell was
still tolling, and again tolling, even now telling out to the mountain
as with the tongue of a woman its tidings of good-bye and bereavement,
the castle flagstaff flying a flag at half-mast. We two hastened up the
footpath to the gate, with the river at flood on our right, to find the
men of the troop with their field-caps pushed back, their brows flushed
from the tramp, for the most part soldiers of the third army-division,
proud fellows, dressed in blue-grey _bluses_, with cockades and
greatcoats. Their leader had just handed his warrant to Herr Tschudi,
who lifted his eyes from it to fix upon us two, as we drew nigh, a look
of venom. He, too, was white, like every denizen of the valley that
untoward night; he strove to keep under his agitation, but the warrant
shook in his hand, crackled in the wind; and close behind him the castle
bell tolled, and again tolled.
"Well, Herr Feldwebel," I heard him say, "there was certainly such a
prisoner in the castle as is named here, but I may tell you that he left
it over an hour ago."
"So much the better, Herr Burgvogt," answered the other; "still, I must
make a search."
"Willingly from the heart, since that is your pleasure," answered
Tschudi.
"Who, then, is dead?" asked Herr Feldwebel: "I hear your bell tolling."
"Oh, one of the men of the alp," was the answer.
"Forward!" said the sergeant-major to his men.
They stooped through the wicket, which closed after them, and Langler
and I were left alone. We waited at first under a wood of yews near the
outwork, but as there was lightning we drew away again into the open
before the portal, dressing our umbrellas against the wind, which anon
brewed drizzle. The twilight died out more and more bleakly; the bell
continued to toll. We stood silent, waiting. As for me, a fear was in
me. I felt that some doom may have overtaken Dees, though, in that case,
it seemed hardly to be believed that they would dare to toll the bell in
the very presence of the officers of the law; still, I feared; I think
that Langler did, too, but he said nothing of it; if we spoke, it was to
remark on the strangeness of the lightning, which up there on the
heights somehow strikes in different tints, now purplish, now greenish,
or rosy. We must have waited forty minutes when seven of the troop came
out, bearing pine-torches in their three-fingered gloves, and biting
sandwiches. I ran and asked one of them for the news.
"He is not in there," was his answer, "we have searched every nook, and
are now going to look round."
"Did you see Baron Kolár inside?"
"No, the baron is not in the castle," he said.
They ran up into the barbacan, ran down again in ten minutes, then ran
down the path to the south castle-side, and vanished from our sight.
We abode between fear and hope. No sound was to be heard within or
without the burg but the sounds of the winds. It was almost dark before
we saw the torches of the troop of seven returning, these having
discovered no trace of Dees. They went back into the castle. Some
minutes later the whole troop of twenty-seven came out with lanterns and
torches. I approached the sergeant-major, to whom I was known, and had
some talk with him: all he could say was that the captive named in his
commission was nowhere in or near the castle, so that nothing remained
to him now but to march back down the mountain.
We saw their torch-lights pass away down the castle-mound, and up to the
forest, and lost to sight, and still we loitered by the portal, not
knowing what to think or what next to do.
"Perhaps we had better go back to the guest-court," I said at last;
"something may be learned there."
Before Langler could answer the wicket opened, Herr Tschudi stepped out,
and, peering at us, cried jauntily: "kiss the hand, sirs! What, still
waiting to see the good Pater Dees come out?"
Neither of us answered him.
"You are only losing your time," he went on: "Pater Max, is it? the
blessed Max? But no saintly Max will come out here again, by Gott, no.
Look you"--his voice sank secretly--"I'll bite into the sour apple, and
give you a hint, just to satisfy you two men. You have been eager to see
the lovely saint--eager, eager: well, he is not a thousand metres off,
up yonder by the right river-bank, waiting now for you; you go, you will
find him, you were eager to see him"--and at once the man dashed inward
from us, chuckling, and slamming the wicket after him.
"But what a fury!" said Langler.
"Let me go up the river as he says, and _see_," said I, "and you wait
here till I come back."
"But if you can go I will, too," he answered in a strained voice.
We went by a path which, after skirting the castle-back, followed the
line of the cliffs a few feet from their edge. Occasionally, in a flash,
the river appeared at flood thirty to forty feet below; but mostly it
was so murky that we kept on missing the path; our minds, too, were
crowded full of gloom, for all that night seemed to us haunted with
ghosts and meanings of awe and fear. Some little distance from the burg
the river and cliffs had a sudden bend from east to north, thenceforth
the cliffs being clad to their foot in fir-forest, and we had gone past
this bend, and were going on northward, I holding Langler's arm, when,
at a lighting up of the scene of river and forest, we both stood still
in a fright. At one place at the base of the opposite cliffs was a patch
of sward some inches above the water, a very lonely little spot, and
just there, in the cut of the lightning, our eyes seemed to catch sight
of a crucifix. It was about twenty feet below us, perhaps fifty yards
beyond us.
What stopped my breath was the fact that that was an uncommon place for
one of the wooden crucifixes common in Styria, and that I had never
chanced to notice a crucifix just there before, though I knew the cliffs
well; but we were still standing uncertain as to what we had actually
beheld, when somewhere someone was heard to say: "yes, it is my son Max
that you see nailed to that wood."
The tone was like a woman's, and not remote, though our eyes could make
out no form in the dark; I seemed to find myself with the world of the
departed, and while I shrank there from the presence that was with us, I
remember hearing in the silence a roaring of waters against the arches
of the bridge and the banks of slime below; for the tide was turned, the
flood had convened, had teemed, had lasted, and was over now, and the
brimming river was streaming back down, as when hosts stream back
homeward from some supremeness and ritual, when all's over now and done,
and the mourners stream about the streets.