DANGER.
It has been snowing all night. The Passeyrthal is mantled in a garment
of white; at first not thicker than the fleece of a young lamb, but now
ankle-deep; and there is more snow above, ready to fall.
A young girl, with drooping head and careworn mien, is issuing from _am
Sand_ with her milk-pail, and making her way to the cow-house, while
it is yet scarcely day-dawn. Suddenly she stumbled over a man, bending
down to the ground, and so intently engaged in measuring a foot-print
on the snow, as not to have been aware of her vicinity. Instantly her
voice is raised in shrill indignation.
"You pitiful priest! You mean, sneaking man! You may measure that
foot-print as long as you will, for it was not made by father! You
base, wicked Frenchman!--"
"My pretty girl--"
"Call me so again if you dare! Oh, you wretch! it isn't the first time
you've tried the power of your sweet words with me! Caitiff priest!
Some of these days your frock will be pulled off; aye, and your mask
first! Oh, you wicked, wicked man!"
Donay was actually petrified by her objurgations. He slunk away;
but still, with an eye to his original purpose, in the track of the
footsteps he had been measuring. Theresa, white with rage, was standing
like a statue, watching his retreating form, when she found a strong
arm thrown around her, and drawing her into the cow-house. Rudolf was
shaking with suppressed laughter.
"Theresa! let the old hound follow the false scent," said he. "What do
you think I did? I found this fellow lurking about, overnight; so I got
a pair of the Sandwirth's old laced boots, put them over my own, and
trudged right away with them to the edge of a steep bank, where the
snow has drifted to the depth of seven or eight feet! Then I crawled
along to the top of the hedge, without minding scratches, shovelling
the snow about, here and there, so as to leave no track by which I
could be traced, and returned in my own boots. Into that pitfall he'll
go! Ha, ha, ha!--And serve him right!"
"Quite right," said Theresa, between laughing and crying; "but, you
see, he has got the measure of father's foot."
"But that won't hinder his being led astray. And I shall deceive them
all, rogues as they are, over and over again, as you'll see, with this
precious pair of old boots. Two parties of spies have been buried under
avalanches already. And though they go peering and prowling about
every dwelling and outhouse in the valley, asking their sly questions,
'Where's _Sandvird_? when was he last seen?' they always get the same
stupid, indifferent-like answer, 'I don't know.'"
Rudolf drawled this out in such ludicrous caricature, that Theresa
could not help laughing heartily. "But it is too shocking to laugh
about," said she, checking herself with a deep sigh. "Poor father!"
"I am convinced he will escape them, Theresa. He is not a sanguine man;
but when we parted, he said with such steadiness, 'I trust in God,
in my faithful brothers, and in a certain nook in Passeyr,' that I
believed him."
"How did mother bear up?"
"Oh, bravely. We travelled quite silently, for more reasons than one.
Our voices might have been heard--they might have brought an avalanche
down upon us from the Oetzberg--and our hearts were heavy. When we
got to the châlet, however,--(it lies very high up, quite among the
glaciers!) we found it situated in a kind of little kessel,[D] so as
to be very unlikely to be discovered. A thicket of pines shelters it;
there is a little pool or pond near the door; a stable below, a loft
above, in which Johann and I slept--or rather, he whimpered himself to
sleep, but I lay awake, thinking matters over."
"No wonder!--Ah!--" (sighing.)
"Well, I thought it was no good to stay there till it got too light,
especially as it was snowing, which would prevent my retracing our
track if I delayed, and effaced mine along with it if I were quick.
The Sandwirth was serious, but quite calm and hearty. Your good mother
offered me some breakfast, but I would not diminish their little store."
"That reminds me, Rudolf! They will soon be in want of food!"
"Soon, but not just yet. I think we may leave them alone another week."
"Oh, only think if their stock should fall short! Cold, peril, and
famine _too_!"
"Well, then, at the end of this week, which will be in four days, I
will start off with a fresh supply if I _can_."
"If you _can_?"
"Yes, Theresa; remember everything does not depend on me; the weather
may be tempestuous, the search more vigorous and less easily baffled;
but what man _can_ do, I _will_ do, rely upon it."
Theresa rewarded him with a grateful look, and then began to milk the
cow. He stood by her the while.
"How everything has changed, Theresa!"
"Changed _indeed_--"
"_I_ am not changed."
"Nor I."
"The winter, with its snows and its ice-blasts, is not more different
from the summer, with its ripe fruits and sunshine, than the prospects
of the Tyrolese now are, from what they were a few months, even weeks,
ago!"
"No. Still I am glad we tried to free ourselves, though it did not
please God to give us success. We can feel self-respect. Even our
enemies must, I think, reluctantly respect us."
"Not they! Mark you, Theresa: I believe that when people lose
self-respect, they also lose by degrees even the perception of what is
respectable. Sometimes, o' nights, such big, swelling thoughts fill
my head,--I think, 'Surely, what we have done, this Anno Domini Nine,
will _live_? people will talk of it hereafter, when we have long been
dead and buried?' And then I think, 'Ah, no! See how the emperor,--"our
Franzel," as we used fondly to call him, who was most of all beholden
to us, and who put us up to what we did,--'see how he has fallen
off from us, like a snow-drift from the hill-side, that the river
in the ravine below sweeps away for ever! See how it's the fashion
already--how it was the fashion, even while we were winning glorious
victories--for the Austrian counts and barons to look down on us,
with a contemptuous pity, as a set of honest-hearted loggerheads!'--I
say, you sir!" shouted Rudolf, interrupting himself, as he caught the
twinkle of an eye gazing in upon them through a chink between the logs;
and rushing out, he collared the spy, and gave him a good shake.
"Why, how now?" cried the intruder, who proved to be Franz. "What's
this for?--what have I been a doing?"
"Spying and prying," said Rudolf, bluntly.
"Spying and prying?" quoth he. "Why, what have I come this long way
all across the snow for, but to ask after the Sandwirth, and to offer
Theresa a root of the gems-wurz, which, if he eats before sunrise, will
make him bullet-proof? There now!"
And Franz drew himself up like a man aggrieved.
"Thanks," said Theresa, carrying her milk-pail towards the dairy; "but
how am I to get it to him?"
"Oh, _you_ know where he is!" said Franz, insinuatingly.
"No, I don't," said Theresa, who therein, as far as her personal
acquaintance with the locality was concerned, spoke the truth.
"Will you like me to look for him, then?" said Franz, slily.
"No, I should not," answered Theresa, very quickly; adding, "I don't
want you to meddle at all in our affairs."
"Well, certainly, one has not much encouragement to do so, except for
good-will," said Franz, following her into the house, and putting his
cold hands on the stove to warm them; "they're likely to do what I am
doing now--burn their fingers."
Rudolf's mother, who had come to be a companion to Theresa in her
parents' absence, now poured out the porridge, and summoned the family
to breakfast. Theresa said to Franz, "You'll join us, I suppose?" to
which reluctant half-invitation, he replied by drawing a stool to the
table, and taking his share with the rest.
He pricked up his ears to catch any allusion to the Sandwirth, but none
was made. A cloud had settled heavily on them all; but they had already
learnt the needful lesson of silence.
Franz, after lounging about in his usual way, left _am Sand_,
announcing his intention of going to Meran. Before he had proceeded
far, however, some one said "Hist!" and he looked round and saw Donay.
"Well?" said the priest, coming up to him, and walking with him.
"Well," said Franz, "I've been there, and breakfasted there, but to no
good. Theresa wouldn't drop a word that one could lay hold of."
"Ah, there are other things besides words that sharp people can
lay hold of," said Father Donay. "For example, I have laid hold of
something that certifies to me the Sandwirth has been to his house and
from it, within these twelve hours."
"Aye? And yet, father, we've watched that house as a cat watches a
mouse!"
"Pooh, pooh!"
"What's your proof?"
"His footprints, my son. One day, at Innsbruck, when your famous Hofer
was lodging in the imperial palace, he kept me waiting some time. I
left without seeing him; but, before I did so, happening to observe a
pair of his clumsy boots lying on the parqueté floor, which they graced
as well as _he_ graced the palace, I soiled my hands so far as to take
their length and breadth."
"That was far-sighted of you, father!" said Franz, with a kind of
sympathetic admiration.
"Well, I did not know at the time all that might come of it--I merely
amused myself by showing the clumsy proportions to one or two in the
camp; but there must have been something pre-ordained--I was but an
instrument," said this pious priest. "On coming to _am Sand_ this
morning, to look about a little, what should I see but numerous
footprints in the new-fallen snow, different from those of any who
are supposed to be sleeping in the house, namely, women and children.
I dropped on my knees, and--_measured them_! they were Hofer's!
I afterwards tracked them across the pastures, full half a mile,
till--plump!--into the snow I sank till it was above my head!"
Franz burst out laughing, and suddenly stopped short, as he saw Father
Donay turn red with wrath.
"You are rude to laugh," said the priest, with displeasure. "I nearly
lost my life, I can tell you! When I floundered out, I found so many
foot-tracks that I got confused, and could make none of them out to be
Hofer's; yet, whoever it was who had walked up to that spot, must have
turned back or gone on, unless, indeed, they could have been smothered
in the snow."
"Which he may have been, in the darkness of night," cried Franz.
"Well, I think not; he might have floundered about as I did," said
Father Donay. "Life is equally dear to us all, I suppose.--So, now I
leave it to you to find where he is, whether there or anywhere else;
and, when you do, you know your reward."
"Well, I can't say I like this job," cried Franz, after a pause. "Do
you know, father, in a miracle-play, I once played Judas--"
"Well, you've only got to play Judas again," said the priest, with a
sinister smile.
"What, and _hang_ myself?" cried Franz, hoarsely. "Why, father, what is
it you are asking me?"
"You fool!" cried Father Donay, in a rage, "the cases are not parallel:
your allusion is blasphemous. Let me hear no more of it, I pray."
Franz walked on, silent and astounded, doubting which of them were the
wickeder man. "The Sandwirth," resumed he, at length, with a choke in
his voice, "has never done me a wrong--on the contrary, nothing but
good. It is only Theresa--"
"Ah, if you can put up with that girl's scorn, you can put up with
anything," said Father Donay contemptuously.
"I _can't_ put up with it, and won't!" cried Franz; "but it's making
her pay pretty dearly, too, if her father gets shot."
"Don't be such a dolt as to suppose it," said Father Donay pacifyingly;
"the worst he and she will get is a good fright. He will be tried by
court-martial; probably acquitted, or reprimanded, or sentenced to a
short imprisonment, from which, at Austria's intercession, he will be
released."
"If I were sure of that--" said Franz, hesitating.
"Why, don't you know I speak with authority? You know my credentials
pretty well," said Father Donay. "I have all but told you who empowers
me--"
"And you have promised me absolution, if any unforeseen evil comes of
it--" said Franz, still uneasily.
"How should I do otherwise, my son? I will promise it twenty times, if
that will make it any stronger."
"No, no--of course it will not. Well, then, I'll think about it,
father: and--"
"And, if somebody else should do it while you are only thinking about
it, he'll get the reward instead of you."
"That won't suit me at all!" cried Franz. "Why, if I make up my mind
to do an ill turn, I may as well do it as not; the sin--that is,
the--whatever it is, will be the same--"
"The intention, but not the reward," said Father Donay. "Heaven notes
our intentions; man only notes works."
"I wish I were fairly out of _this_ work," exclaimed Franz. "If
Theresa, now, were to come across me at this moment, she might overcome
me with a straw!"
"Truly, I believe you!" said Father Donay, with ineffable scorn; "and
men of straw, or men knocked down by straws, are not the men _we pay_."
"Ah!" cried Franz, grinding his teeth, "if you were not a priest, I
should think some evil spirit was within you."
"And I, without any if," coolly replied Donay, "think an evil spirit
_is_ within you--the spirit of irresolution. Come! no more of this
child's play. Are you going to throw away a cup of good milk because
there's a cow-hair in it?"
"Not I," cried Franz recklessly. "Nothing venture, nothing have. Give
me a fortnight, and I'll hunt him up. When I was keeping the herds up
the mountains this summer, I made myself pretty well acquainted with
all the nooks and corners of 'em; and I guess the man we are after to
be in a certain châlet in a certain spot that I chanced upon one day,
when I was seeking for cream o' the moon."
"Cream o' the moon, indeed!" repeated Father Donay, ironically.
"Well--if you find him, and enable us to find him, that will be better
than moonshine."
"But, father! if I find him, and point out to you the place where he
is, you may find him yourselves. I wash my hands of taking him."
"Wash your hands by all means. We'll take him."
"Very well--that's to be all, then?"
"All, and enough."
"Just so. Good bye then, father--here we are at St. Martin--"
"_Benedicite_, my son."
The place of Hofer's concealment, a picturesque little
cow-house--nothing better--was about twelve miles from his home, among
the glaciers of the Oetzthal, near the Timbler Joch, and in a position
that, for many months of every year, the snow made quite inaccessible.
The winter of the Year Nine, however, was comparatively mild; and the
châlet might be reached with considerable fatigue, difficulty, and
danger.
At the door of this cow-house, then, stood the man who--we will not
say had strutted his little hour on life's stage, for Hofer had never
endeavoured to ape a grandeur that he had not; he was a plain, simple,
upright man from first to last. He had attained a great, though brief
power, and had not abused it: he had fallen from it, but not into
despair.
In the profound loneliness and inaction of his present life, after so
stirring a campaign, there might have been a chance of his mind preying
on itself, had it not been for the constant sense of danger. His heart
did not indeed prey on itself, but feed on itself it did. He mused much
on his late career, and on the anxious question, had he been wasteful
of human life or not? At this moment, he was reading, for the twentieth
time, a letter which had found its way to him even in this secluded
spot--it was from the emperor himself--the beloved Franzel! strenuously
urging him to leave his desolate retreat and take refuge in Vienna,
and pledging his imperial word for his safety. Yes, this plain, homely
man had thus been sued by his sovereign, and had refused. He would not
forsake his family or his country.
His faithful wife had accompanied him, as in love and duty bound,
feeling her home to be under whatever roof sheltered the head of her
husband. She had her distaff and knitting; and as they sat among the
trusses of hay chattering of this and that, many a simple wile did
the good woman successfully use to lure her Anderl's thoughts from
anxious themes. Now, it was to explain some family genealogy, some
intermarriage she professed nearly to have forgotten--then, when he
had wondered how she could be so forgetful, she would branch off
into correlative domestic histories, harmless jests, recollections
of wedding-feasts, baptisms, and burials; then, broach some knotty
point, or ask him to recall some old legend or fairy-tale, or local
superstition.
Hofer had brought Johann with him partly out of fondness, and to amuse
Anna, partly lest he should be seized as hostage; and partly because he
knew the little fellow to be without reticence, and as likely to betray
him from heedlessness as an enemy might be from mischief.
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