Chapter X

When Hallheimer, the trader, came back from Italy, he heard something

on the mountain which astonished him; he was not to sell the smithy at

Waltheim, for Stephen Fausch was going back to his old place within a

short time.

The trader asked what had happened.

He got no answer. The smith only said, rudely: "It's none of your

business what I do." So Fausch gave the trader a new nut to crack,

though he had long puzzled over the smith's behavior and character. But

Simmen, the landlord, of whom he also asked the cause of Fausch's

departure, was equally evasive.

Meanwhile Stephen Fausch passed the days exactly as he had always done;

now and then he nailed up a box of his possessions and gradually got

his goods once more ready for moving. Cain and Katharine tiptoed around

him with a sort of timidity. There was something about Fausch that they

did not rightly understand, and that made them both involuntarily feel

small and humble. Yet his manner had not altered in any way; he was

sparing of his words as always, and the little that he said had a surly

sound. He was just the same on the morning when he called Cain into the

workshop, and told him that he, himself, was going back to Waltheim.

Cain had listened eagerly, had then remonstrated, and when his father

gave him a harsh answer, he had at last kept silence, to think things

over. And now, days afterward, he was still thinking about it all.

First he would feel joyful, and then doubtful. That he, Cain, was to

stay at the hospice made him joyful, and yet he felt doubtful, because

he could not understand his father's sudden decision to leave the

place. But one thing was clear to him: If he were freed from his

father's presence, the talk about the disgraceful name his father had

given him would sooner die out, even if only gradually. He, Cain, if he

were alone, would have the courage to stay there, and bear it, if a

couple of servants, men or maids, should ridicule him for a time,

until--they got tired of it. But his father? What was coming over the

strange man? Was it not almost certain that he was making a sacrifice

for him, for Cain, by going away? Did he repent of the injury he

had formerly clone him? And was he--it often seemed so in little

things--was his father somewhat fond of him, of Cain?

[Illustration: FOREST MEADOWS]

Oskar Frenzel

The young man was able to think all this over quietly. Thus far, he had

felt neither love nor dislike for Fausch. In all his life, his father

had done too little for him to awaken the boy's love, and yet too much

to permit of his hatred. But the more he now thought and speculated

about Fausch, the clearer it became to him, that in the smith's deeper

self, there was something which, until now, he had neither known nor

understood, something which gave the boy food for thought, and made him

feel a sort of awe, as if Stephen were suddenly very far above him.

Meanwhile the time passed by. The day came when Fausch's goods and

chattels were all packed. The same wagon stood again before the door

that had brought the goods up to the smithy months before. It was now

loaded, and Katharine, a feeble old woman, took her place on a chest as

before. But today she could not keep her eyes dry, for Cain was staying

behind, her boy on whom she had leaned for many years with a feeling of

comfort.

Cain had already been living at the tavern for some days, and was

sharing a room with a young working man, and had nothing in the world

to complain of. The number of guests had increased again, there was

plenty of work, and Cain and Vincenza hurried about as of old in the

room where the higher class of guests were entertained. Both did their

work even more quickly and easily than before, for an inner joy shone

in their faces and made their fingers fly. The guests watched them with

pleasure. If the landlord's wife looked in, her expression was serious

and austere as always, but she saw nothing in Cain to find fault with,

and if Simmen himself looked into the room on the right, he would nod

to himself and then go out again: the smith's boy was not so bad to

have about, he was a real help in the house!--

Stephen Fausch's horses and wagon started, and the teamsters ran

alongside. Then Cain came out of the tavern with his father, who had

been to say good-by. Simmen and a few others came out, to see them off.

"I will go with you as far as the path to the Schwarzsee," said Cain to

Fausch, then hurried after the wagon, swung himself up and sat down by

Katharine. No pair could be more unlike: he was like a slim, flexible

young tree, she like an old, old crumbling branch. Stephen Fausch

noticed nobody. In his dark, heavy clothes, with his blacksmith's cap

on his head, he walked behind the wagon with lowered head, and fell

into a long, regular step, that suited the rhythm of the rumbling

wheels. He scarcely seemed to concern himself even about Cain.

The weather was about to change. The clouds were chasing each other

across the heavens and slowly weaving themselves into a silver gray

shroud. But the sun behind them was still so strong, that a dazzling

light fell upon the landscape. The gray road lay clearly defined with

the lakes on both sides and the dark rocky peaks on the north, among

which it vanished. Along the pale colored road, in the dazzling light

went the heavy wagon, the smith marching stolidly behind it.

He now fell back a few steps.

As he did so Katharine laid her trembling hand on Cain's. "I must tell

you," she began mysteriously, and looking back at Fausch, as if he

might hear her.

"Yes?" asked Cain.

"You may believe me, that it is half killing him," said she, motioning

toward Fausch, "that he cannot have you with him any more."

"Yes--I--" said Cain, and could say no more. He looked back at his

father: the feeling grew upon him, that the smith was doing a great

thing for him.

"You may believe me," whispered Katharine. Then they both kept silence,

and involuntarily looked uneasily at the smith who was tramping along

behind them.

The lakes were now left behind, and the rocks were nearer. Far behind

from the hospice some one came running swiftly. It seemed to Cain that

he recognized Vincenza; but she turned off from the road into some

hilly meadow land and disappeared. So he was not sure whether he had

seen correctly. He and Katharine now began to talk of things that had

to do with their approaching separation. The old woman was overcome by

grief, and her tears flowed freely down the furrows on her wrinkled

cheeks. Cain tried his best to comfort her, and his sympathy and

affection moved him so, that he did not notice when they passed the

Schwarzsee and the road began to wind down toward the valley. When he

again took note of his surroundings, they had gone quite a distance

downward, and he called out quickly to the teamsters to stop and let

him get off. At the same time he looked about for Fausch, who was

nowhere to be seen.

"My father has not come with us," said he to Katharine. "You might wait

for him here," he added, and then said: "I must go now. I shall meet my

father on the road." Then he shook hands with the old woman.

"We shall never see each other any more," she lamented.

"Take care of yourself," said he. "You will be glad to be back in the

old place again down below!"

Then he jumped down. He hurried on up the hill and did not look back

again at the wagon, which stood in the road. A restlessness drove him

involuntarily onward. It seemed strange that his father did not come.

As he approached the entrance to the pass, he saw the smith standing by

the roadside. He was leaning against a rock, from which there was a

wide view over the high plateau. The glaring light, that the white sky

cast over the earth, had grown yet more dazzling. The whole valley

floor seemed to be brought quite close to the eyes. The dark lakes

glistened; the road lay between them, a blinding stripe of white. The

mountains stood like a dark wall beneath the glistening sky, showing

every gap and fissure in the rocks, which were like scars on their

weatherbeaten forms.

As Cain came forward, Fausch turned toward him. "Are they waiting down

there?" he asked.

Just then some one came out from between the rocks, by which he had

been standing. It was Vincenza. She behaved as if her coming was

perfectly natural, but her face was flushed. "I didn't have a chance to

bid you good-by, Smith," said she.

He took her hand in his, and as Cain came forward just then, he took

the boy's right hand too, and laid it beside Vincenza's. The two hands

had plenty of room in one of his. The smith laughed to see them there.

But it was such a strange, uncanny laugh, that it entirely changed the

expression of his face. It was neither merry nor scornful. Perhaps all

the kindliness that Stephen Fausch had to give lay in that one laugh.

His solitary eye looked larger and more quiet than usual. And as his

gaze rested thus on them both at once, they felt as if he were trying

to say: "So--you--you belong together, you two!" And then, with his

free hand he stroked their two hands a moment, and that was perhaps,

together with the laugh, the first outward sign of love that Stephen

Fausch had shown to anybody, since Maria's death. It was a poor,

thirsty, dried-up love, and far from tender; but as his hand touched

Cain's, something happened that no one saw; the smith's thick lips

trembled for a brief moment, in the midst of his black, woolly beard.

It seemed improbable and yet--perhaps Fausch had stifled a sigh. Then

he looked away from the two young people, and as he turned about, his

eye wandered once more slowly, and as if reluctant to lose the sight,

over the Alpine meadows, to the hospice, and over the dark and rugged

mountains and over the dazzling heavens above.

"Well, good-by!" said Fausch to Cain and the girl, letting their hands

go. And he walked heavily away, with head bowed down, showing in his

bearing the old churlishness. He did not look back again.

Cain and Vincenza looked after him for a long time. They could see him

plainly. If he sometimes disappeared around a bend of the road, he

would reappear far below, and they would soon see him again, walking

behind the wagon, dark and heavy and big.

Cain was very still. He had taken off his hat and held it in both

hands. He did not really know why he did so. He looked after his father

in amazement, and it was on his account that he had involuntarily taken

off his hat.

Vincenza now turned to him. She was breathing fast, as if she were only

now beginning to recover from her quick run. "Do you know why I ran

after you, Franz?" she asked. Her eyes were shining.

Cain shook his head.

"It came over me suddenly that your father might take you with him."

The fear that had driven her to follow him, still showed in her words

and in her eyes. Cain laid his hand thankfully on hers; they were still

watching the little group that was moving downward to the valley.

"He is a strange man, your--the smith," whispered Vincenza at last. "I

was always half afraid of him."

Cain suddenly seemed to awaken from deep thought. He turned, took the

girl's hand, and started to walk back toward the hospice with her. As

they walked, he gazed into the distance with wide open eyes. He was

still carrying his hat in his hand. Suddenly he stood still. "It seems

to me," said he, with a dreamy look, "that we have all misunderstood

him--my father."

Vincenza dared not reply, his manner was so unusual. He walked silently

along beside her, and that evening, and many times afterward, his

thoughts were more with Stephen, who was gone and never came back, than

with Vincenza, on whom his heart was set, and from whom he soon learned

that Simmen would not refuse her to him.

JAKOB SCHAFFNER

* * * * * *

THE IRON IDOL

TRANSLATED BY AMELIA VON ENDE

In one of our great industrial centres lived a childless couple, a

workingman and his wife, by the name of Höflinger. They had been

married ten years and had become resigned and accustomed to their

solitude. The husband turned the sentiment, which no offspring of his

could claim, toward the hopes and the aims of his class. He was known

as a well-read, serious and reliable man, whose political activity was

founded upon practical reality rather than theory and who was hostile

to the exploitation of principles popular with the ordinary run of

Socialist party leaders, but not always truly beneficial to the

proletariat. Hence he was held in higher esteem by the trades union

than by the party. He usually had a young man in his home who not only

enjoyed room and board at moderate price, but, if he had a good head,

was trained by Höflinger in class-consciousness and a practical

knowledge of the tactics of life. Thus Höflinger had no difficulty in

filling the vacancy whenever his boarder drifted away.

As he showed a fatherly solicitude toward these youths, so his wife

spent upon them her unused motherly gift and feeling. She had never

buried any of the ardent desires of her womanhood; she had never known

sickness. In spite of the shadow of her childlessness she went on

living her full, significant woman's life, and constantly defied the

gnawing thoughts of what might have been by a cheerful acceptance of

what life offered her. She was the daughter of a tailor, a dark blond

of trustworthy aspect, quietly inclined toward play and fancy, but

contented to express it before the men of her household only as a half

humorous, half melancholy mood. Her father had called her Marie, but

one of his customers, a lieutenant-general, had named her Spiele. She

on her part called her husband, whose real name was Ferdinand, "the

long one," not so much for his bodily length, as for the extent of his

activities, calculations, schemes and unionist controversies, which

sometimes made her lose her breath and her judgment.

At this time Höflinger was occupied with the organization of a

laborers' consumers' league. This work frequently called him away and

kept them apart, and though he always returned to her, still she

resented his having been separated from her for a time. In the factory,

too, Höflinger occupied a special and independent position: he served

the iron saw, a giant of double a man's height. This had impaired his

hearing; figuratively speaking, you had to use Gothic type in order to

make him understand. On the other hand, this deficiency favored his

tendency to accept the phenomena of life summarily and to survey things

from the organizer's standpoint.

To this couple came a young laborer, Victor Pratteler, who had but

recently stepped out of the narrow, securely guarded realm of hand

labor into the open and surging world of the iron proletariat. He

completely lacked that personal imagination and that subjective

instinct toward his material which make the very soul of the locksmith

and the blacksmith, so that their grasp becomes the servant of a sixth

sense, the sense of form. Pratteler's hand had not groped its way

toward this higher sense, so he employed it where the course of work

goes on abstractly without a will of its own and a predestined process

is watched by a soulless eye and served by a passionless grip. On the

other hand, there survived in Pratteler something of the whimsical mood

of that vanishing social type, the journeyman. He had highfaluting

ideas and pompous movements, and his speech was bloated with

superfluous pathos and personal conceit. His relation to life was a

many-linked chain of demands. Neighbors, both men and women, he looked

upon from the viewpoint of a young steer; the former were either

obstacles or they were bridges and steps leading to the pretty girls,

women and other treasures that he would have liked to own all for

himself. Thus by a single formula he interpreted the whole world. His

manner was violent, combative and absolutely inconsiderate without an

inkling of deeper relations. He was a native of Switzerland.

Like a motley calf driven by a storm he stumbled one evening into the

garden of the Höflingers. He arrived at the fence on a Wanderer wheel,

rather new in its coat of white paint, sharply applied the brake,

jumped down before it had worked, threw the wheel with a careless

movement against the paling and approached before Spiele's wondering

eyes with big important stride. It was a week-day, but he wore his good

blue suit. Rakishly perched on his black hair was a sporting-cap with

green and brown pattern. Under his Adam's apple, like a burning heart

that had been pushed up, was a blood-red necktie, the ends of which

flared out from under his turned-back white collar. He had strapped his

trousers, so they bulged outward, but Spiele immediately noticed that

he had crooked legs and wore tan sandals over gray hose. Out of the

collar rose a neck, long, thin and bare as a vulture's, and crowned by

a round black wrangler's head of medium size.

In an offhand manner and with slight embarrassment he touched

his cap and said that he was Victor Pratteler. When Spiele did not

immediately reply, he asked with some discomfort, whether he was at the

Höflingers', and frowned. With laughing eyes Spiele answered that he

was right and told him to sit down on the garden bench and wait until

Höflinger came home. Then she continued to sprinkle the young lettuce

plants which she was growing in narrow beds; when she had finished

them, she turned her attention to the peas. She did not look at the

young workingman again; she had already a colored photograph of him in

her head which she could bring to life whenever she wished. When she

turned the corner of the cottage with her sprinkler, she began to hum.

The gay lad gave her cause for amusement and put her in a merry mood.

She read in his frown that attitude of unreasoning resignation without

which a waiting heart cannot maintain its elasticity for any length of

time.

When the day's work was over, Höflinger arrived on his wheel and took

charge of the new guest. He showed him the shed which already housed

Spiele's bicycle and which by a clever manipulation would hold all

three. At supper it appeared that Pratteler, who was to begin work in

the factory the next morning, did not expect his trunk until tomorrow

or the day after. So Spiele had to fetch a pair of old trousers

and a coat and working-shirt of "the long one," which she did with

ever-laughing eyes. In order to avoid all misunderstandings, Pratteler

at once declared that he hated all emperors and kings, because they

were parasites who sucked dry the German people and were responsible

for its poverty and stupidity. They should be smoked out in order to

make way for the state of the future, which would establish conditions

more worthy of human society. If things had gone right, those

conditions might already exist, for after all labor is in the majority;

but the leaders and representatives put the workingmen's money into

their pockets and cared not for the shrunken stomachs when they were

sitting among the fat ones. Reichstag was nothing but a club of

heavy-weights. All were eager to have the ministers tickle them under

the arms; that meant some service to be rendered, and this again

brought marks of honor and perhaps a decoration. Everything was humbug.

Workingmen should help themselves and throw out all that reactionary

mob, army, clergy and aristocracy; otherwise there could be no change

for the better.

Spiele looked frequently at the long one to watch his expression while

the savage Swiss was emptying before him his social carry-all.

Höflinger said so little that the young man suspected him of being at

heart a bourgeois, of having fallen away from the labor cause after he

had earned his house and garden. Höflinger noticed that his wife was

secretly laughing, and, as he knew that she was sometimes opposed to

his well-planned tactics, he let her enjoy the diversion. The more

firmly a man is standing on his feet, the more indifferently will he

look at the antics of others. Besides, he knew exactly who had

furnished her the premises upon which she was now basing her amused

opposition to him.

Early in the morning the two workingmen rode together to the iron-works

spreading out at the opening of a ravine about an hour from Höflinger's

house. Pratteler wore "the long one's" trousers and coat. He had to

turn back the sleeves in order to use his hands and the trouser-legs

rested in many folds upon his open sandals. Under the blue shirt collar

he had again his red tie, so people might see at once what he stood

for. He pedaled with full force and frequently had to slacken his speed

in order to have Höflinger, who did not seem to be in a hurry, catch up

with him. Whenever he saw people on the road he tooted violently, while

Höflinger tinkled his little bell. When workingmen greeted Höflinger,

Pratteler responded with sombre mien, as if he were going to a

battle. When they made a joke, his brow contracted in a frown. What

was there to jest and laugh at, where they should rise in revolt

against reaction? Everywhere he saw too much peaceful comfort. He was

determined to infuse a new spirit into the life in this valley.

After the last turn in the road the factory buildings came in sight.

Pratteler saw a whole crowd of flues and chimneys in full activity.

Behind the iron-works were the woods, almost entirely firs, with only a

few beeches between. The water power of the brook which came tumbling

out of the forest was used partly for the lighting plant, partly for

the works themselves. When Höflinger and his new boarder and

fellow-workman rode into the factory courts, they joined a host of

other cyclists, and Pratteler's red necktie stood out significantly.

Somebody asked Höflinger whether he had caught Garibaldi, and all who

heard the remark began to laugh, while Pratteler frowned in silence.

When the siren gave the signal to begin work, Höflinger saw that the

newcomer made a good start; and the experience he had had with zealous

beginners gave him reason to anticipate that the Swiss youth would

become a good workman. So his relation to Pratteler assumed a pleasant

form. Like a priest Höflinger served the wheezing and squealing idol

which daily swung its high flaming face about itself. Pratteler only

picked its teeth and wiped its mouth. His task was not without danger;

of three machinists that did the work, one was sure sometime to be

carried from his place with maimed limbs or dead. The idol had neither

brain nor eyes, and he who served it had to be doubly on his guard.

Loaded carts came rolling along tracks and stopped automatically.

Pratteler manipulated the crane which seized the iron bars and laid

them at the feet of the idol. Then a claw would project itself and draw

the bar toward the revolving teeth. The bar cried out like a beast.

Behind the disk a whirlpool of fire was set free. The idol screamed and

screeched. At the end it whistled, and when it was done, it rang a

bell. Then the fragments that had dropped behind were automatically

removed and the claw reached out for its next work. Around the idol

iron stairs led up and ended in a circular gallery.

When Pratteler stepped up to the monster he scanned it with a quick and

hostile glance. For a moment he stopped short and felt disinclined to

grapple with it. Then he approached with determination, gritting his

teeth as if it were an enemy. After an hour he was familiar with all

its secrets. He learned that it was a rather simple idol. Yet its

gigantic proportions again and again impressed him, and he could not

understand how Höflinger treated it so familiarly and had never

mentioned it to him the day before. Nor had he said anything about the

masses of workingmen who were here working for the profit of others and

among belt-gearings and cables and rows of steel beasts of all sizes

and forms were day and night risking their lives. Those workingmen,

too, moved about in a self-contained and indifferent manner. They

crouched silently behind their machines, carried burdens, spat at

intervals, and did not seem to mind that the foremen watched them and

the engineers ordered them about. Pratteler hated all foremen, feared

the machines with a dangerous destructive fear, and thought the

engineers tyrants like Gessler, every man of them deserving to be the

aim of a new Tell. They played at being masters, scorned the

proletariat, and worked for the profit of the capitalists who paid

them.

At noon other masses appeared in the factory courts: the wives and

children of the laborers brought the lunch. They waited at the places

assigned them until the siren blew. Then the workingmen rapidly left

the shops and crowded toward their kin, unless they had brought their

food in the well-known blue dinner-pails that were waiting for them on

the stoves in the heating-rooms. Such herd-like movements annoyed

Pratteler's individual and democratic sense and offended his good old

journeyman traditions. Unwillingly he followed Höflinger into the third

factory court where Spiele stood beside her wheel. Höflinger had

invented a special arrangement for fastening the lunch-basket to the

wheel. Thus he could enjoy a freshly cooked meal while the others had

to be satisfied with the taste of warmed-up food, and he also had the

satisfaction of spending a minimum of time and strength upon what was a

necessity. Only in bad weather did the two ride home; but that made the

long one lose his noon-hour nap which he never failed to take after

lunch in one of the factory sheds.

Pratteler remained in the court, which he surveyed discontentedly, as

the women and children slowly retired. Spiele, the tailor's daughter,

suspected with her sensitive instinct that he was eager to express some

opinion; so she busied herself with her wheel. When she thought it took

him too long to say something, she turned around to bid him good-by.

Then he shrugged his shoulders and said he would not stay on this job.

He had expected to find zealous proletaires who hated capital and

fought for freedom, and he had found that everything was very well

arranged and trained to carry out the designs of capital. Everything

was after all a humbug. Whenever he was dissatisfied, he made a wry

mouth, which amused Spiele. But she consoled him. What he had seen that

morning was only work-hours on a week-day. After all one had to live,

and a small tree was better than none at all for purposes of shade. He

should inform himself about the organization; workingmen were wont to

awake at nights like bats. As far as she knew, plenty of mosquitoes

were swarming about at times. Then she nodded pleasantly, mounted her

wheel and rode off.

Victor looked after her in surprise. He noticed her low black shoe and

the slender instep showing from beneath the skirt as she worked the

pedal. She wore thin black stockings, which in some way suddenly

impressed the Swiss youth. Her bare blond head shone brightly as it

disappeared through the gate into the outer court. He remembered that

she had no children; that, too, struck him and made him think. Why had

she no children? So that was humbug, too, like everything else. All

life was humbug. The long one was also a humbug. He owed his wife

children, and he only nursed himself; even now he was lying asleep in

the shed. Victor despised him; he did not deserve such a woman; she was

far too good for this wretched toil. That she should come every day on

her wheel to bring the lunch and stand at the door in the crowd was

unendurable to him. Good heavens! There was nothing for it but to kill

all that were responsible for this state of things, beginning from

above with the thrones and the gilded armchairs, until the people

should come into their own. But the wife of Höflinger had impressed him

today. She seemed to make fun of this life; that made him think. He

concluded that this childless wife deserved more intimate study.

Everything else could go to hell. When the siren called him back to the

idol, he held his head more haughtily than ever before.

One day he remembered Spiele's hint to inquire about the organization.

Höflinger, who had considered it premature to speak of it or take him

there, glanced at him in surprise and silently turned back to the idol.

But in the next working pause he told Pratteler that he could go with

him to a meeting that night, if he cared. Victor went along. They

entered a large hall, the walls of which were hung with all sorts of

pictures, trophies and wreaths. It was the home of two singing

societies, a brass band and a dramatic club, each having reserved one

wall for its photographs and testimonials. Now workingmen were sitting

around the same tables. Under the shining loving cups, wreaths, bows

and flags their colorless gray or brown clothes reflected the want and

stress of their existence like a spiritless sea. Victor's eye took in

at once the contrast between the childish trash of the privileged class

that covered the walls and the seriously contained, yet deeply gnawing

consciousness of belonging to the disowned that slumbered in the men

who now sat in the bourgeois atmosphere of the hall.

Höflinger took his place at the table of the executive committee.

Pratteler was surprised to learn that the spirit of revolt had been

haunting the iron-works for some months past. A big strike was being

planned in order to rebel against decades of oppression and prepare the

foundations for a better future. Pratteler was confused. He could not

understand why he had not met this spirit in any of his noon hour

ramblings. He could not conceive that everybody should then take a nap,

return to his machine when the siren blew, draw himself in when the

idol wheezed or one of its servants passed. An elderly workingman got

up on a chair and reported how far preparations had gone and how large

the strike fund had grown; he also mentioned what organizations had

declared their solidarity and their readiness to give aid.

Victor was interested in everything that referred to the strike, but

could not approve the circuitous preparations and all the secret

machinations with which the attack upon the monster was planned,

instead of seizing it simply by the horns, as he thought they had the

power to do. When the old man stepped down and some others had spoken,

he could hardly restrain himself. He felt too closely hedged in in this

gingerly movement of the mass. He swallowed nervously and clutched and

tugged at his collar; he gulped down one glass of beer after another to

quiet himself. In his mind he saw a vision of violent revolt, the

masses furiously attacking the idol with axes and clubs, and hacking it

to pieces. The bourgeois state was just such an idol. Höflinger got up

on a chair and asked all those who had not yet joined the organization,

to sign their names. He reminded them of the powers that work up singly

from the depths and are back of every uprising of mankind: discipline,

devotion and perseverance. He informed the meeting that a food-centre

had been established at which a striker's wife could for a minimum

price get her supply of coal, bread and potatoes; out of this centre

was to grow the workingmen's consumers' league. Finally he warned the

men earnestly against damage to the company's property, smashing of

windows and breaking of machines. Help should come in a positive and

constructive manner, and the destructive tactics of passive resistance

and of sabotage should be discarded as being unworthy of a German

workingman. One should not forget that besides a strong body one had to

transmit to one's children class honor and trade character.

These words from the lips of the childless man stung Victor into

opposition. He gasped for air and struck the table with his fist. Then

he hissed like a rocket; he, too, could talk as well as the long one.

Before anybody had noticed him, he was standing on his chair,

challenging attention by an imperious movement of his fist, and

swallowed once more. "Attention, Garibaldi wants to speak!" called a

workingman that knew him. All looked astonished at the stranger. Many

laughed at his agitation. His necktie glowed lurid like a midsummer eve

bonfire against the pictures and trophies on the walls.

"Workingmen, proletaires!" he began. "I am of another opinion. Why?

Because capitalists are vampires and scoundrels. Why should so many

precautions be taken? Up and on, as the old Swiss used to do--that is

what I say. If our fathers in Switzerland had waited until a consumers'

league had been established and the men of Zurich or Basel sent money,

all the cats would still be sitting on their tails and we should be

paying our debts with Austrian coin. By God! They rose with clubs and

ploughshares, and when the others sent a new army, they attacked it

again and again, until there was none left. We must smash all the iron

and other idols and serve their servant with the arrows of Tell. And

when new ones are erected, we must hack those too to bits. The whole

harvest must be ours. We don't want to spill our blood for the wives

and the children of others. We must plague capitalism until it gets

tired and surrenders. That is the meaning and purpose of capitalism: to

capitulate. Everything else is good for people who have no children and

no future to think of. They imagine one sort of class honor and another

sort of trade character, which at the end amounts to as little as one

had before. Class rule and trade fortune must come first; then

character will follow. When Switzerland got to that point, Swiss

character developed. But one must have courage, by Jove! Well, I have

had my say!"

He nodded at the assembly with an important and excited air, hesitated

a moment, and then got down from his chair. When he was no longer in

sight, there was a moment of silence. Then a murmur of amusement and

surprise arose and ended in good-natured laughter. But that, too, did

not last long. The old workingman who had opened the meeting got up

once more and all heads turned to him. So they passed over the rugged

cliffs of Victor's address to the order of the day and listened to the

final words of the old leader.

Yet they had taken the measure of the long-necked Swiss fighter just as

Spiele had done. By this debut he became a well-known figure and his

publicity began, without affecting or modifying his personality. The

surname Garibaldi was soon generally accepted, but with its irony

mingled something like an affectionate respect and beyond that

something of that motherly expectation which is not spoken of: he was

considered the promising child of the family. Victor on his part felt

uneasy at this kindly and somewhat sarcastic indulgence which the

submissive mass showed him from that day on. The laughter had struck

him like a thunderbolt. Yet he felt vaguely that by participating in

the movement he had linked his fate and established his kinship with

that mass. Instead of celebrating the occasion by a feast, it began

without further ceremony to correct and to train him, and this feature

of their mutual relation was one he disliked. It should have been

reversed: the mass should have been corrected and trained. It had no

backbone and no faith in its own fist. It wanted to do everything by

organization and pleading for help from Tom, Dick and Harry. It had no

real men at the head. The committee was a calculating and deliberating

bunch of old maids, and the organization was a girls' school led by

their apron strings. He thought with indignation of those conditions,

worked himself into a rage when he remembered that those immature

fellows had laughed at him, and turned his attention to the tailor's

daughter.

Höflinger did not allude with a single word to Victor's maiden speech.

He did not even seem to have felt the pointed hint about childless

people, or he bore him no grudge. That made Pratteler more angry with

him. That long fellow had no temperament; that is why the couple had no

children. Victor sulkily took up Spiele's sprinkler and deluged her

lettuce plants until they were almost drowned. He scratched the weeds

from the paths, raked them up and grumpily fed them to the rabbit. He

thought by himself that Höflinger could well afford to talk: he would

not be thrown out of his home when he went on strike, because he was a

house-owner. Then he spat furiously. After all the long one had worked

hard and saved in order to get where he was. And if he had drawn his

purse-strings tight, when the organization was in need, he would not

have been held in such esteem. So much he had to admit: that Höflinger

was devoted to the cause. But he had a good job; so what credit was

there in it?

Victor cleaned Spiele's wheel. He took it apart, washed everything in

kerosene, oiled all the parts and set it up again. There was a human

being for whom it was worth while to do something. He proposed that she

should have the handle-bar lowered; he himself almost touched the road

with his nose when he was on his wheel, and brushed the branches with

his back: that he considered the sporting way to ride. When she refused

and laughed, he laughed with her, and their merriment and friendliness

was doubled. But she ought to have an auto-horn, he said; that would

make the children heed her more than the thin little bell. When she

refused that, too, he suggested that she should discard the mud-brake

to make the wheel run more lightly. He had removed his; and when he

returned in rainy weather he bore on his back an armor of dirt thrown

up by the machine. When all the spinach was eaten, he dug over the bed

and wanted to help Spiele plant cabbage. But when he came home that

evening, she had done it herself. He sulked, she laughed, and finally

he joined in her laugh.

Spiele visibly brightened. She grew more lively and talkative. It

struck him, how often and how heartily she laughed of late. Höflinger,

too, noticed it and liked to hear it, without relaxing his stiff back

and sharing in the merriment. His head was full of a hundred schemes

and a thousand cares concerning the strike and the future of other

people's children; in that unequal triangle he was the remotest angle.

At least so it seemed in day-time and while Victor was present.

Pratteler would have liked to know how the couple looked at each other

and what they talked about when they were alone; he could not imagine

it. But he never noticed any disagreement or coolness. Spiele teased

her husband with all sorts of pointed allusions, as behooved a tailor's

daughter, to his difficult social responsibilities; but he never took

it ill. Even when she trespassed beyond the permissible, he preserved

his equanimity and only allowed an ironical smile to play about his

lips. Then she would grow angry, call him wooden, and ask Victor to

play cards with her. But the long diplomat held his own so cleverly

that she could not keep away from him for any length of time. At the

second or third game she would laugh, or in dealing throw eight cards

at him, and he would placidly take them up, even if he had been reading

a book. Victor never knew the moods of the pretty woman to produce even

a shadow of annoyance or to spoil an evening.

On fine Sundays they went out on their wheels into the country. The two

men had Spiele between them. In dodging Höflinger rode ahead and

Pratteler remained behind. Sometimes they had to keep long in that

order, because there were many pedestrians on the road. Then

Höflinger's old and well-worn machine, which did not run freely,

clattered ahead, and the little round bell strapped to the middle bar

tinkled incessantly. On account of his long legs Höflinger sat rather

high; it was quite a distance from his saddle to the button on his cap.

Spiele sat two heads lower. Her legs were not long; she reached up only

to her husband's shoulders. Victor was the last, bent double over his

wheel as though he had cramps. From the front bar extended two bent

cowhorns which he held at their very ends, so that he seemed to fly

across the road with arms outstretched. But now and then his animated

glance would take in Spiele's trim figure and sometimes he remained

behind in order to take a good start and to rush on like an express

train. He especially admired Spiele's small feet which so strongly and

cleverly worked the pedals and showed a commendable perseverance when

it was needed. Otherwise she preferred a leisurely comfort in her

movements. But when she rode along the street behind her long husband

and before her gay little admirer, her head was humming with all sorts

of notions and she made up her mind to torment Höflinger a bit in order

to get him closer to her.

She began by suggesting that he should add a horn to his wheel, since

the little cat-bell was insufficient for the road. She referred to

Victor, commending the loud blast which made all children run to

safety. She also called his attention to the safety of those behind him

and showed her concern about her own; so he gave in and bought a little

horn. Then she complained that his back shut out the view from her

because he was perched so high and advised him to lower his handle-bar.

He suggested riding behind, but that she would not permit: Victor would

speed too much and with him she rode more safely. So Höflinger agreed

to lower his handle-bar. But now she complained that she could not bear

to see his bent back and peevishly asked him to raise it again. With

such a longlegs one could do nothing; if he had a well-proportioned

figure like Victor, it would be easier to get along with him. Pratteler

had substituted sole-leather for the worn-out rubber on Höflinger's

pedals, because it would last longer. Now it happened that he slipped

on the hard and smooth surface. Then Spiele asked him to wear soft

sandals like Victor, but he preferred his stiff boots. However, he

procured hooks which kept the foot in place and allowed him to enjoy

the advantage of the leather surface. Now she was worried lest the

hooks should prove a dangerous obstacle in jumping off the wheel. She

consulted Victor; but he only said, it depended.

One Sunday, however, on their way home, they met a drunken farm-hand,

also on a wheel. Höflinger saw from a distance that the man took up the

whole width of the road and could not control his machine. He gave a

warning blast of his horn. Spiele tinkled merrily. Victor also tooted a

warning. All three kept to the right. For a moment it seemed as if an

accident could be avoided. But suddenly, as though he had been struck a

blow from the back, the brute swerved to the other side of the road. He

could not help himself and had to ride straight into Höflinger's wheel:

it was his fate. Höflinger wanted to jump quickly, but could not get

out of the hooks as rapidly as he would, and lost control of his wheel

before the other reached him. Spiele was frightened and rode between

him and the rustic; her heart urged her to get near her husband. It was

the worst move she could make; she prevented him from dodging in time.

The impact was terrible. With bent head and shoulders drawn in, the

farm-hand had shot at Höflinger's wheel as if lost in deep thought. The

collision threw him over his own bar and the fore-wheel of Höflinger

against the curb, where he lay like a sack. Höflinger bent aside

toward Spiele's wheel. The woman, the man, their wheels and that of the

farm-hand, the bar of which had caught in Höflinger's spokes, tumbled

clattering and crashing into the ditch. Höflinger had stretched out his

hand and balanced himself, breaking the force of the impact. Spiele was

buried under her wheel, but her husband's weight did not fall on her.

There was a moment of suspense, until Pratteler appeared to render

assistance. With chalky pallor he bent over the victims of the mishap

and began to work like a fireman. First he grabbed the machine of the

farm-hand, disentangled it and flung it furiously out upon the road

with a clatter which its owner fortunately did not hear. Then he freed

Höflinger from his own wheel, which was still between his knees, and

helped him to his feet. Finally he reached Spiele; she was a bit pale,

but unhurt. When he saw her on her feet once more, he began to upbraid

Höflinger. He seemed beside himself and positively dangerous. He showed

his teeth, looked Höflinger up and down and rattled away about crazy

hooks, danger to life, and stupidity. Höflinger looked at him in

amazement and was getting ready to keep him at arm's length. Victor had

been so much praised by the tailor's daughter that his conceit had

grown; he was firmly convinced that he was the latest guest, not only

in her house, but also in her heart. Undisciplined as his mentality

was, he forgot all standards and limitations of the world and wanted

only to blame Höflinger for the great fright they had experienced. At

heart this beastliness was only a means of relaxing the surplus tension

of his nature; but it showed nevertheless what savage beasts were

haunting the queer faithful soul of the Swiss. At last a stray glance

of his eyes caught the strange expression which Spiele's face had

assumed at his attack, and he suddenly lapsed into silence, as if he

had been hit on the mouth.

Spiele asked Höflinger with subdued voice whether he had been hurt and

inquired about the wheels, and he bent over them. Spiele's wheel was

undamaged. His own well-worn machine had more than stood the test; he

had only to adjust the bar and they could go on; the bump which the

frame had received was only a new mark of honor. Spiele thanked Victor

for his assistance. Now she appeared again in such a halo of prudence

and womanly kindness, that he would have liked to tear his heart in two

and place one-half in her hands and throw the other at Höflinger's

feet. At the sympathetic glance of her brown eyes tears came into

his own. He turned about sharply and saw the farm-hand struggle up

crab-fashion from the grass. He gave the wheel another kick and got on

his Wanderer. The couple also mounted their wheels. For a time they

rode straggling across the whole width of the road facing the setting

sun. Then village strollers came with the evening coolness, and they

resumed their customary order.

The incident did not act on Pratteler's passion either as brake or as

sedative. In his queer head it tended to justify his claims and hopes

and to give him the right to support them. Something had appeared which

had to be recognized and to run its course. Victor expected Höflinger

to take cognizance of it; when nothing of the kind was forthcoming, he

picked up that half of his heart which he had thrown at Höflinger's

feet and with the other half placed it in the hands of Spiele. Now she

owned his whole heart and openly too--by Jove! The long one knew it,

and she knew it, and both knew that he knew it. That was a delightful

chain of ready facts; and he saw the pretty tailor's daughter dreamily

laughing and expectantly groping toward them with the free hand which

did not bear his heart. One day she was bound to reach him; no power

could help her. Then it would be for Höflinger to see how he would

resign himself to his loss.

From that day Victor no longer restrained himself. Spiele, too, it

seemed to him, was going more and more out of herself in her husband's

presence. She seemed to enjoy their leavetaking. She began to sing all

sorts of taunting little tunes that she remembered from her girlhood,

innocent jolly songs with which the daughters of the middle class while

away their time and keep awake their minds in their long wait for a

husband. Sometimes she was simply ravishing. Once she danced before the

men. They had read in the papers about Salome. She sat still a while

and smiled, and Victor knew that she was scheming something. Finally

she said: "We can dance too," and rose from her seat. She picked up her

skirt with two fingers of each hand and began to take some steps. She

swayed right and left. She bent back and forth. She laughed with her

fresh lips. When she slightly contracted her lids and sent her glance

like a song along the walls which seemed transformed, or when she fixed

her gaze upon the light of the hanging lamp which made her eyes open

like yellow daisies in a star-like halo, Victor said to himself that no

man could tell whither she was looking. But he was sure that all this

was done for him and in the name of the silent love they bore each

other. Nor did it strike him as strange that she never left her corner

seat on those evenings when her husband attended the frequent meetings

of the committee and left her alone with Victor. She then quietly

busied herself with her sewing or mended stockings and seemed

absorbed and absent-minded. Victor felt depressed and suspected that

his presence disturbed and perhaps irritated her, but they would have

to get used to it. When he could stand the strain no longer, he would

drag forth his wheel, light the big lantern and ride out into the

night. But his imagination would conjure up before his inner vision a

glowing picture of what she was doing and how she spent the evening

until night came. Sometimes he experienced a disappointment; for when

he returned she was sitting at the table with Höflinger, perhaps

laughing. That left a sting in his heart and would not let him sleep.

Of the strike he learned nothing more. He presumed that the big scheme

was running its course, and his sharpened eye noticed in the noon hour

the spirit that walked about among the steel monsters. But though he

had joined the organization and had made the personal acquaintance of

some unionists and social democrats the secret was so well kept by the

executive committee that no knowledge which was not voluntarily

communicated, reached the main body. Least known to him was the day and

hour of the strike. The longer ignorance lasted, the higher rose

expectation and the larger proportions did the act of deliverance

assume which was dawning on the horizon of the near future. On the

other hand, this uncertainty of the inevitable contributed toward

increasing and deepening the feeling of solidarity. The herd

strengthened the individual's heartbeat, and the individual

unconsciously sought the pulse of the mass in order to raise its own

rhythm. Even the most rebellious spirits suddenly experienced the

change from individual to joint experience, and into the intercourse of

the several members entered a note of respect and sympathy in face of

the common foe and the common risk. To those spirits belonged

Pratteler. He still obstinately distrusted the leaders, and in his

heart did not discard the motto: Everything is humbug. They made

themselves so big with their "if" and "but," and they made you wait for

them in order to appear necessary and powerful. But the individual man

interested Victor keenly. Those days did far more toward developing his

social soul than he himself suspected. His nose accustomed itself to

the smell of the herd; to use a hunter's term, he had almost acquired

the scent. He followed, though perhaps unwillingly, the physical

atmosphere of this general body, in which he recognized his new master

and lord. As its latest member he was still more by instinct than by

reason plunged in primitive ideas of the possibilities of personal

action and freedom of decision. His highly-colored speech had drawn a

small crowd of super-revolutionists about him, childish, genuine

groundlings, who wanted to be keener than the blade of which they were

only the handle. Some ignorant old fellows also belonged to the clique

and contributed no little to raise Victor's self-esteem. Once in a

while the more experienced soldiers in the army indulgently looked over

their shoulders, and Victor heard perhaps a kindly laugh; but that did

not disturb him. The leaders had no time to bother about the tail;

after all it is there only for the purpose of wagging.

In those days Spiele was again fighting her husband. She complained

that he was not proposing to give her a discount at the future

consumers' store and asked Victor whether he, too, would let her come

off so badly in the big scheme. Then there was some talk about their

leaving the cottage with the garden and moving into the workingmen's

colony. He was ignorant of any reasons for the plan, but agreed with

Spiele that their home was far more attractive and that anybody should

be glad not to have to live in the colony. The matter was very simple.

Being manager of the food centre, Höflinger wanted to live in the same

building in which it was to be opened. Since he had no family to look

out for, he at least wished to devote himself thoroughly to the cause.

But Spiele had not yet abandoned hope of that family, nor could

Höflinger persuade her to his viewpoint. So the question was for a long

time undecided, while the relation of the couple assumed a critical

intensity, which they both felt as a sort of sweet bitterness, with the

sweet or the bitter element alternately prevailing. Sometimes Spiele

wept; then again she indulged in all sorts of tricks that she had

learned from her father and his apprentices. She lost money and found

it in Victor's pocket, which gave her an opportunity to appeal to his

conscience. She could read fortunes in the cards and make spirits rap

at her table. She promised Victor a good wife, and added cheerily: "One

like me." She also promised him four healthy and handsome children, and

at the prophesy lapsed at once into a melancholy mood.

Victor would have liked, with his glowing gaze, to hide her in a

burning bush, so that nobody else could approach her. One evening he

forgot himself in Höflinger's presence. Spiele had teased him about his

red necktie, which began to look black with wear; she asked whether he

would always stay a Garibaldi and offered to sew a new one for him, if

he would let her remove the old. He agreed; nobody noticed the glow and

the tension in his eyes. When she had unfastened the little red rag and

was running away with it laughing, he quickly grabbed her hand and

caught it between his crooked horse-teeth. Spiele cried out and tore

herself away. Victor laughed with embarrassment and excitement.

Höflinger looked up startled. The tailor's daughter seemed angry and

scolded Victor; but her scolding was music to his ears. When he finally

noticed the husband's cold and disapproving glare, he showed his teeth

again and remarked aggressively: "People ought to be able to take a

joke!" Then he struck the table with his fist and went out quickly.

After that incident Höflinger walked up and down in silence and

listened to Spiele, who set about removing a double veil from his eyes.

She told him what a distant and strange husband he was, his head filled

with the business of other people and his heart never heeding the need

and the loneliness of his wife. Absorbed by other interests, he seemed

to leave it to her whether she should continue to hope for the

fulfillment of her longing, or like him, however young in years,

passively give up all hope. She told him what wrong he was directly

committing against himself and her, by renouncing what after all, as he

well knew, the law of nature would not force her to forego for a long

time to come. She left him no room for doubt, that she was going by all

means within her power to avoid being cheated out of happiness by his

attitude. A large, extensive organization was no compensation for the

absence of a single innocent little being, which was perhaps denied

them on account of his interest in the other. Not to lose a single

trump, she pointed to the fiery young boarder as an example of a real

lover. She took Höflinger by the nose and made him follow all the

successive steps in the development of her heart's cause. She did not

even fail to show him that a good willing boy was suffering for a

wife's faithfulness toward her absent husband, who unsuspectingly and

self-complacently was busy with alien things. She poured such a storm

of good arguments and sound object-lessons upon the absorbed mind of

her partner, that she really succeeded in arresting his attention.

Höflinger finally stopped and looked at her in astonishment. He had

never noticed that his wife had grown from a little girl into a mature

woman. It was the first time that he heard her talk like that, and her

speech rang so true that one could not help agreeing with her in

general. This was what that man of reality enjoyed most in all her

argumentation. His eyes grew clearer and clearer before her. What her

dances and her tricks had not accomplished, was achieved by this

violent thunderstorm. When he had got over his first amazement, he

began to rejoice in every fibre of his being; and his face showed a

youthful and animated glow which pleased her so much that she allowed

the storm to pass by and to be followed by a partial rainbow. Finally

her magnetism so overpowered him, that in spite of the jealousy which

gnawed and stung, as she had desired it should, he began to laugh. His.

eyes were so kindly and so enterprising, that she joined in his

laughter, and morning and night were turned into another wedding-day.

Victor had been watching behind a tree to see whether Höflinger would

abuse his wife for the incident of the necktie. He witnessed a scene

which filled him with burning misery from head to foot. He saw Spiele

wrestling with her husband, laughing and brushing her hair from her

forehead and apparently running away from him. He firmly believed that

she really feared him and suffered his amorous mood only because

she could not help herself. At the end he heard Höflinger whistle a

tune, while he was locking the door of the cottage and bolting the

sitting-room, and saw him, candle in hand, follow his wife to her

bedroom. Victor decided that this evening cried for revenge in his own

and in Spiele's name.

One day a thunderbolt came down before his eyes. Höflinger took leave

for three days and Victor was to remain alone with the idol and the

wife. The long one had to take this trip in the interest of the

workingmen's consumers' league which was now about to be realized.

Pratteler spent half of each night on his wheel. He ate nothing and

drank much. In those days he sought the midday rest with the other

laborers and lay down where Höflinger was wont to take his nap. Having

to pay so much more attention to the machine used up his nervous

energy, already much tried, and wore him out. He wanted to sleep, but

the wild and foolish notion that he might take the place of Höflinger

at night, too, banished the rest he craved. Then he jumped up and went

about in the courts and between the steel monsters, wherever the spirit

of revolt was brooding and whispering into his ears wild and

extravagant words. He breathed more freely when the siren called the

herd to work. His task of serving the idol filled him with a dull

indifferent hatred; he despised the monster. Sometimes he gave vent to

all the bitterness and the scorn his breast was harboring by spitting

into the revolving shining face. But that had not the slightest effect.

The idol continued to screech and wheeze, and its claw greedily grabbed

the next iron bar. Then Victor turned away weary and sad at heart, and

mounted the iron staircase to attend to the oiling.

At noon Spiele came as usual through the dark gate, jumped off her

wheel in her light-footed way and approached his place with a nod.

Recently she was inclined to be late and no longer waited in the crowd.

The first day, eager to cut short the ceremony of taking the lunch-pail

from her, he managed to bump his head against hers. She looked straight

at him, surprised at his haste. He trembled like a wall hit by a shot,

and did not know whether to fall backward, or forward into her arms.

Both blushed. He exclaimed with embarrassment: "Hopla!" and set the

pail down. She scolded him for neglecting his lunch, while his

trembling fingers rolled a cigarette and he lapsed into a moody

silence. The next day he let her do everything herself. He ate a

little, while she explained to him that it was unhealthy for him to be

so much on his wheel. Besides, he should raise his handle-bar, for it

could not be good for a stomach to float like a cloud over the ground.

It also shocked the nervous system too violently, when the arms alone

bore the weight of the body, as was natural when the wheel leaped and

bumped over the uneven roadbed. Submissively and somewhat cautiously he

replied that she might be right. That evening he obediently drew up the

handle-bar by the width of a hand, and lowered the saddle. It was hard

for him; but since she was solicitous about his health, there was some

consolation in it. He thought she would not care, if she did not love

him a little.

When he returned late from a tavern, his passion got the better of him.

He went to the door of the sitting-room which led to the bedroom, and

firmly pressed down the latch--not softly, but as if he had a right

to enter. But the door was bolted. He rapped. Nothing moved; the

door remained locked. With aching limbs he went up the stairs to his

garret-room; he felt as if smoke were rising from his lungs and his

very vitals were on fire. A tempest of thoughts was brewing in his

head. In the morning he drank his coffee, pale and tortured. Spiele was

invisible. It was not her habit to be present; she always retired once

more after serving the men's breakfast and before Victor appeared. But

that morning he considered it a special measure upon which she had

decided--or a proof of guilt. He had all the day to decide which of the

two it was. At noon he asked Spiele incidentally, whether Höflinger

were sure to return that night and observed her from the corner of his

eyes. She said "yes" in a rather absent-minded manner, which he at once

interpreted as secret sharing of his impatience. Heaving a deep breath

he opened all doors to the remotest back gate of his soul to give free

entrance to any idea that would promise help. After work he was busy

with the idol a few minutes longer, as though he had to put something

in order. In reality he loosened some screws and unfastened a coupling.

Then he threw himself once more upon his wheel. He did not return for

supper. He sat in the inn down in the valley and only started for the

house when he was sure that Höflinger had returned and the couple had

retired.

[Illustration: MOORLAND]

The next morning at breakfast Höflinger scanned him with a searching

glance. "Did everything go well with the saw?" he asked with concern.

"Why should it not!" replied Victor sulkily and rose; the last mouthful

stuck in his throat. When he rode to the works beside him, Höflinger

noticed the change in his wheel and nodded approvingly: "You are right

to obey my wife's suggestion, Pratteler," said he, and added: "You

should also give up your extravagant speeding and pedaling for hours at

a stretch." Victor was silent. Later other workingmen joined them and

greeted Höflinger eagerly. But he was no more communicative than at

other times.

They entered the machine-shop. Before the gable-wall in the background

towered the idol. Its immense disk shone treacherously in the morning

light. Victor's heart was beating. The siren howled. The belting-gear

cracked and rolled up. The first shot rang out behind the halls.

Höflinger pressed down the lever and let the idol run. It rang the bell

and whistled; but there was a crunching noise. Höflinger listened and

hastily threw back the lever; the disk made a sweeping movement.

Silently he went up to the iron gallery. After a moment which seemed an

hour to Victor, he came down again. His face was grave; his eyes sought

Victor. "Did you do anything to the machine, Pratteler?" asked he with

troubled mien. "Is something wrong?" replied Victor much too loud and

angry at the ring of his voice. "It ran well until work was over last

night. After that I was not near it." Höflinger cleared his throat.

"Then it is sabotage," said he dejectedly. "But it is senseless and

murderous sabotage. If I had not heard that something was wrong, we two

should not be going about much longer." He went to the tool box and

again ascended the gallery.

Victor did not dare to follow him until he called. They both repaired

the damage done. Victor's hands were cold as ice in all the heat that

rose from the half-glowing iron blocks. At this moment he felt a

violent hatred of Höflinger and came near throwing him from the

gallery. Höflinger said only that the perpetrator would be expelled

from the organization as soon as discovered. That word sounded like a

judgment to Victor's ears. It gripped and shocked him in a depth of

consciousness he had not yet realized. He began to tremble. He stood

unknowingly under the jurisdiction of the power called social morality,

and his highflown democratic notions were already so strongly modified,

that he came near confessing his guilt to Höflinger. Yet the impulse

only intensified his hatred of the man who by his laconic and deeply

ordered life deprived him of one freedom after another, until it became

an unendurable torture. He had lost his heart to Spiele's charm over

which the enemy had unlimited mastery. Now his self-will, too, was

being shattered and pushed under the feet of the marching multitude.

Something had to happen to give the world breathing-space. A master

shot should explode that whole damnable scheme in which his life was

about to be sunk and buried.

A week after that incident in the short nine o'clock pause Höflinger

remarked casually, that Spiele would no longer bring them their lunch,

and they would have to ride home. He gave no reason for this decision,

and, when Victor glanced at him, did not look as if he were inclined to

be questioned. Victor said it was all right, and stared dismally before

him. Suddenly he took his cup and angrily spilled the coffee on the

floor. He was convinced that Höflinger had learned of the incidents of

the first noon and the second night of his absence, and that the change

was due to them. So he was again to be punished. Höflinger had raised

his brows in surprise: "Why do you spill that coffee?" "Because I don't

like it--d--it!" Victor got up breathing fast and stepped aside.

Beside him glistened the cold disk of the saw; he looked wrathfully at

the claw which had stopped about to grab a bar. What a tyrant the long

one was! He found out everything; he got out everything from that

helpless woman. He surely found it annoying to ride home every noon,

but he wanted Victor to feel his power. He wanted to punish and torture

him for his devotion to Spiele. And such a fellow was in the executive

committee and was esteemed by the mass!

Suddenly Victor started, trembled and his eyes shudderingly turned away

from the monster's claw. Whoever came within its grasp was lost, even

if his name was Höflinger and he was in the committee. Then he would

cease to tyrannize over his handsome wife and to lead about by the

nose, the ill-advised proletariat. A big humbug would end, and the air

would be so much purer than before. Pratteler sighed, gritted his teeth

and rapidly measured the idol with a look of distrust and hatred. After

that, this beast should be disposed of--what a relief that would be!

Two scoundrels silenced. A giddiness came over him. For an instant he

had to hold on to the lever, but the next moment found him once more

standing firm and tense in all his muscles on his well-trained

cyclist's legs. The siren called. The bells rang sharply through the

shops. Five minutes later another shot was heard behind the machine

halls. Engineers went watching back and forth. The individual

workingman disappeared behind the steel monsters; nothing was seen but

the movement of shining metal limbs. There was a roar, and there a

crash. Now an iron cry echoed through space. An uncanny shrill ringing

of bells followed. The walls seemed to throw back a cruel hard

laughter. The gearing cracked and rolled. The belts were swaying. Cold

bluish lightning flashed all over the machines. The idol wheezed and

squealed.

Sabotage had recently become more frequent. Several men had been

caught, expelled from the organization and forced to leave the

iron-works. If they refused, they were given up to the authorities.

Höflinger was the most bitter foe of those malefactors. One day he

again discovered that screws had been loosened and that some parts of

the idol were even missing. In this way the black sheep among the

workingmen were trying to take revenge. In the lower strata of the

force there was a tendency toward disorganization. A group of secret

anarchists and born marauders hoped to bring about general disorder

during the strike and to have an occasion either to derive some

personal profit or to destroy the whole plant. Though Victor did not

belong to them and by his inborn middle-class honesty was separated

from those wild rebels, still there was a bridge leading from the

shores of youthful discontent and ignorance to the camp of those

law-breakers, and there was always intercourse through the medium of

deserters and newsmongers. Victor realized the danger of sabotage, but

he could not grow indignant about it, because he really wished injury

to the capitalists.

Höflinger was of course not ignorant of his ideas. Victor had a bad

conscience, though this time he was innocent. He suspected that

Höflinger distrusted him and anticipated that he would make use of this

opportunity to frame a case against him. He spent a half day full of

hatred and torture in helping him to repair the damage, while the

engineers walked about excitedly. That clay there was not a moment when

Victor did not wish the death of Höflinger and in his mind was menace

to his life. Pain gnawed at his very vitals. He felt as if his lungs

were compressed in iron hoops. From time to time his teeth chattered.

Sometimes he had forcibly to collect his senses and was surprised that

he was still there and alive. The whole shop moved about him like a

wild and treacherous dream-world. Nothing was real in it but his

boundless love and his unendurable hate. His bad conscience suggested

ever new combinations and was eagerly active to realize the most

improbable notions and fancies. If he had still believed in hell, he

would have imagined in those moments of self-absorption that he was in

the midst of it. So the time had come when the seed of despair which he

had so sadly and seriously tended in his soul, was quickened.

On a Saturday evening, when he paid his board, Höflinger told him that

they had decided not to keep boarders any longer. The announcement was

made in a kindly and friendly manner: but Victor listened with secret

malice. He grew pale and gave Höflinger a hostile stare. Höflinger

added that he regretted, that he had liked him, but that everybody had

to arrange his life according to his own needs. These were more good

words than Victor had ever heard from him, and his suspicion that the

recent sabotage and a secret decision of the committee which the long

one had carried through, were back of it, rapidly became a conviction.

In his mind he sneered: "We'll see who leaves the house first." He

nodded convulsively and left the room with stiff knees. He thought by

himself: "He wants me to feel his power" and "He denounced me so as to

get me away from his wife. He is a wretched scoundrel one must get rid

of!" These three conclusions henceforth determined his thoughts and the

direction of his speculations. Before his eyes the claw of the idol

continually appeared, rising from the ground and grabbing its prey.

Between the wife and the idol stood nothing but the doomed victim.

Everything else had vanished like smaller beasts at the tiger's coming.

The world had become strangely simplified.

Victor sat seriously brooding on the first step of the stairs to the

gallery and stared before him with eyes, sunken and circled with

dark rings. A workingman passed and remarked laughing: "Get your

hair cut, Garibaldi." He looked after him wondering what he meant.

Höflinger stepped near. The siren shrieked. The electrical bells

yelled through the shops. Softly the gearing began to move. The

steel beasts came to life again. The first thrill went through the

halls. Hundreds of shining metal limbs were lifted high, slender,

irresistible, triumphant. Elbows and fists appeared and disappeared. A

low, mocking crackle, tinkle and knocking followed the first movements.

A dull roar slowly swallowed it all. The belts were whizzing and

swaying. Once more the machines were masters.

Höflinger looked surprised at Victor who was still sitting on the iron

step, his fists on his knees. "Well, Pratteler, are you going to look

on today?" he asked with a halfhearted smile. Victor started. With a

bewildered look he braced up, threw back his shoulders and went to

work. The strike committee had sent guards and watchmen to prevent

sabotage and everything seemed to be quiet. Höflinger had just received

their report and was pleased. "We have quietly put a stop to the tricks

of those good-for-nothings," said he to Victor. "The machines run as

smoothly as ever." The blood mounted to Victor's face. He had only

heard the word "good-for-nothing" and mechanically interpreted its

meaning; he was sadly experienced in that sort of thing. He felt

sneered at and betrayed all around, and his temper rising, conjured

the spirit of revenge. Again before his inner vision he saw the

claw rise from the ground; he waited with bent head until it really

appeared. Then with three hurried steps he approached Höflinger.

Looking aside as if by accident, he pushed against the claw and

the revolving disk, and waited, blind with excitement, to see what

would happen. Six--eight--twelve heartbeats: finally, hearing no

outcry, he looked around. One hand on the railing of the stairs,

Höflinger stood, his eyes turned toward him and scanning him with a

troubled look, as the other day on the street. "Something seems to be

wrong behind there after all," cried Victor his voice pitched too high

and shaking with fear. "They are standing about a machine and

consulting." That was true. Höflinger looked in that direction. He

resumed his reticent mien and bit his lip. Then he went up the iron

stairs to the gallery and staid a long time.

With senseless regularity, without soul or breath, the iron sphinxes

turned their hardened limbs. They stretched up their shining fists and

chased the connecting-shafts until they whined and moaned. Cold and

haughty glowed the metal. The belts were flying without purpose or

restraint. Periodically an explosion was heard. The idol stood in the

steady fire of the torrent of sparks that shot from between its teeth.

The iron screamed. Pale and unreal the day looked in through the high

windows. Where a sunbeam struck, it was felt as a burning torture.

Through the middle aisle three older workingmen came down with measured

steps. Behind every machine heads bobbed up to look after them. Then

the engineers approached and the heads vanished. Victor tended the idol

and waited for Höflinger.

When he came down the stairs, Pratteler counted his steps and listened

to their sound. He thought he noticed that Höflinger was afraid. That

filled him with radiant joy and with faith in his good conscience. The

victim knew that it was doomed. Everything seemed to clear of itself.

In the distance floated and beckoned the future of Spiele: that was the

prize. His imagination painted glowing pictures of her life and of her

heaven. His love became distorted like a cloud image and the adored

form of his sweetheart went under in the wild conflagration. He hoped

to see an angel rise from the flames; but at best it was a charred

corpse that awaited him.

Like a monster horse the idol neighed. Its swinging disk rang

and roared. Sparks flew about. That meant that the block was sawed

through and the claw would soon appear--empty. Höflinger was just

stepping to the floor. Pratteler hurried to him and grabbed his arm.

"Come--look--quick--" cried he, hoarse with excitement, and tried to

drag him along. Höflinger beat down his hand and stepped back. He

looked at him more attentively. Victor threw himself upon him; carried

away by his passion he began to pummel and shake and drag him about

without any sense. Höflinger's fist came down on his head, but still

without full intent. In Pratteler's soul all the long-suppressed rage

and wretchedness flared up. Like a cat he leaped at the long one's

neck, knocked him with his knees and twisted his feet about his legs to

bring him down to the floor. He struck at his eyes and under his chin

and tried to grab his throat. Höflinger was at a disadvantage, because

he did not act in temper and his defense was limited to a few straight

but honest blows. The claw withdrew empty and appeared once more. The

disk rang the bell and roared. The carts approached with their load and

returned with it. Victor no longer thought of his prize; he had

only in mind Höflinger's destruction. All means for that purpose

seemed justified to him. He did not even care, that he, too, would be

ruined--if only Höflinger were lying dead and in pieces behind the idol

and the world were delivered from him and would be free to work out its

own fate. When he saw that he was most likely to drag Höflinger with

him to the claw, he directed all his efforts to accomplishing that

purpose. Now Höflinger grasped the bitter seriousness of the situation,

and his blows became heavier and more direct. But whenever he threw

Victor with a single blow against the railing, the young man jumped

upon him or against his legs, so desperately quick and brutal and

clever in his movements, that Höflinger saw the moment come when he

would have to fell him with a last well-aimed blow against the temples.

He believed that the Swiss had become insane.

Nevertheless he had seemed to notice before that the song of the idol

was growing weaker, and now he became fully conscious of it. Even

Victor in his God-forsaken mood became aware of it. He struggled a

while against this knowledge and continued to fight, but he was

startled by it and his attacks seemed to be aimed distractedly. The

disk whistled and started to ring the bells. As if struck in his heart,

Victor's hands dropped from Höflinger, and he turned around at the

idol. He looked about and about and was sobered. Behind the halls

another explosion was heard. The gearings dragged and cracked. Then the

machinery stopped. Victor collected his thoughts. It was far from

closing-hour, only the middle of the afternoon. His eyes sought

Höflinger as if to question him, but strayed aside bewildered and

turned to the sunbeams and their glaring torture. The siren cried. It

howled. It blew a triumphant blast. It played tricks like the sirens of

a merry-go-round or shoot-the-chutes. Finally it stopped on one note

which it repeated with full force, half a minute at the time, again and

again and always at the same pitch. The disk shone and shook

treacherously. Behind all the machines the forms of workingmen rose.

Victor was amazed at the number of men that these halls had held. Again

he looked at the long one, who contemplated him half pitifully, half

angrily. He braved that look for a second; then he east his eyes down

before the long feet of Höflinger and awaited his judgment. His heart

was beating in brief, timid beats. He could have been directly led to

his death without uttering a word or a plea.

Höflinger cleared his throat. "What is the matter with you, Pratteler?

Is that the way a union member treats a comrade?" His voice trembled

with suppressed emotion. Victor listened. His false repose was not

equal to this note. At mention of the organization a multitude of

possibilities overwhelmed him. He thought that Höflinger knew

everything, and when he saw him retain his composure he dropped his

last claim and looked up to this specimen of human greatness that had

grown out of greater depths and had been formed by higher laws than he

suspected.

Victor sighed deeply and raised his dim eyes to Höflinger. "Forgive me,

I was crazy," said he shaking his head. "I understand nothing of all

this. If you can prevent it, don't have me expelled from the

organization. Do you hear? If you want, I will immediately take my

leave."

Höflinger looked at him astonished. "Do you care at all for the union?"

he asked. "I don't understand you. Why should you be expelled? Besides,

even if I wanted it, I should not have the power to do it."

Victor's head dropped; suddenly he gave himself up. "It was I who

damaged the machine the first time. But not after that. Now you will

have to tell on me, Höflinger. Did you not know it? Why am I to leave

your house?"

Höflinger opened his eyes wide, as if he could not take in enough

knowledge of this peculiar fellow. "Because my wife is about to become

a mother and wants to be alone with--it, and with me," he replied with

tension. "Why did you ask?"

"Oh, I thought it was from revenge--or something." Victor passed his

trembling hands over his brow and his hair. "It is all humbug," he

added with bitterness.

Slowly Höflinger began to comprehend. "The individual is a humbug,

Pratteler," he added with precision and knowingly nodded at him.

"And yet you want to be a father," remarked Victor. "Your child will be

nothing better."

Höflinger grabbed his coat; he saw that all were getting ready and

collecting in groups. "A man like me becomes not a father, but a

brother, when his wife gives birth to children," he remarked as if to

change the subject. "But why did you want to attack me? Did I offend

you without knowing?"

Victor reddened violently and shook his head. "I can't tell you," he

replied and grabbed his coat.

A workingman came running up the aisle. "Strike!" he called from far

and swung his hat. "Strike, Höflinger!" The long one nodded; it did not

seem to surprise him. For him particularly it meant that he would open

the food centre and realize his ideal. Victor forgot his coat when he

heard the word "strike." Cold and hot shivers ran over him. Now he

stood there as a little modest workingman in the great event which the

others had prepared. When his eyes took in the situation, he recognized

the excellence of the organization and the value of the waiting period

which had preceded this date. His coat in hand, he quietly walked

behind the two workingmen and his head was humming with thoughts that

were neither foolish nor jealous.

On both sides and all about the iron beasts were lying, lurking

immovable, their merciless limbs lazily stretched. In their beautiful

brutal bodies a sustained glow seemed to flicker. As at all times the

vicious graceful forms lay there and shone with a lustful light. But no

living brain conceived a creative thought, no eye was animated by a

soul. Cold, heartless, brainless beasts filled the halls where they

reigned. The little long-necked man with the bushy head and the yellow

wheelman's sandals brought to contrast with them much solid worth, and

surpassed them in real beauty. For those sovereigns could all be hacked

to pieces, and nothing was lost; they could be replaced. But if Victor

Pratteler by some sad accident lost his life, the world would have been

poorer in just so much love, good will, sincere remorse, faith,

humility and honesty. Before he left the hall, he threw another glance

at the idol, and wondered at himself. For the idol was no longer a

symbol to him; he could contemplate it quietly and objectively. A

feeling of shyness came over him at the memory of the last half hour;

but the distress which he had experienced was so great and his

deliverance so simple and comprehensible to his soul, that the power of

the idol had melted before it. The siren continued to howl. The

strikers had fastened the valve with a rope, locked the furnace room

and thrown the keys in through the window, so they could not be

reproached with having them. After an hour the fire department silenced

its voice. In the meantime a stream of workingmen was surging toward

the meeting-hall.

With the same quiet and impersonally gentle manner in which he had

taken leave of the idol, Victor approached Spiele, when he returned

with Höflinger. He noticed now with his unveiled eyes that the tailor's

daughter was by no means as pretty as he had always believed. There

were wrinkles about her nose from her habit of drawing it up so often.

She also had some crowsfeet about the eyes. It could not be denied that

these eyes were of a beautiful brown in the twilight, but when you

looked at them in full light, there was plenty of green in them. Her

hands were rather hardened by work and quite callous on the inside from

wielding broom and garden tools. So Victor was consoled for her loss,

and withdrew his head from the noose. In the evening the long one made

a joke. "Think of it, Spiele, Pratteler did not want to leave us. I

believe he had some scruples about leaving you alone with me."

Spiele turned over a baby garment which she was sewing. "Well, it is

not always a pleasure to be alone with you!" she replied with a laugh.

"But I am going to try it once more."

A week later Victor obeyed the order of the organization which bade

all unmarried workingmen leave, in order to unburden the strikers' fund

and to let the heads of families fight out their cause. Afterward they

might return. He left the house of Höflinger, in which he had after all

fulfilled a vital mission, grateful and with the best wishes for the

happiness of those he left. With a conscious will and readiness for

action, and with well-trimmed hair, he went out into a world which his

eyes saw everywhere in the throes of reorganization.