among the thick bushes. She covered the grey stone with a shower of
rose-leaves, and the white petals of a fragrant flower that grew among
the grass of the garden--and looked proudly and hopefully upon her
labour of love. And now she flung herself upon her knees before it,
praying St. Anthony to accept her work, to fill the shrine which she
had made, and to free his children from the captivity of evil. At first
there was no answer; the minutes of her short hour of rest were ebbing
fast away, and the bell which called back the maidens to their tasks
was beginning to sound, when her eager eyes caught sight of a shadowy
form in the niche of the little shrine. It grew plainer, and a figure
like that of an old man, robed in grey, hovered for a moment against
the wall. Scarcely had his foot touched the rose-covered pedestal, when
a sound like thunder rent the air, and a mighty blast of wind swept
through the trees of the sleeping garden. Antonia fell with her face to
the earth, but in the roar of the storm she was aware of these words,
spoken by the same voice she had heard in her dream: “Thy prayer is
heard, the prison-gates are open, and thou art freed from thy burden;
but it shall fall upon her who laid it on thee--yea, for twice two
hundred years.” The thunder rolled louder, and she heard and knew no
more.
When she came to herself she was again in her own little room at home,
and might have thought this was but a second awakening from a dream,
only that a great noise of rejoicing broke upon her ear, and when she
went out into the village, she found that in every house whence a
maiden had once been stolen away, the lost one was now restored to the
love of her people. Her own parents, too, clasped her with joy to their
hearts, for she now found that she had been missing for a whole year,
and they also had given her up as lost. When her story was known, the
enthusiasm of the village knew no bounds; Antonia was looked up to by
every one as only next door to a saint herself, and a splendid shrine,
you may be sure, was raised by the people to St. Anthony.
There was one person in the village, however, who thought that nobody
had made enough of Antonia, after all, and so he devoted himself for
the rest of his days to making up the lack.
And now, amid all the happy faces in the village, faces of parents
consoled and lovers reunited, only a few sad ones were seen, those of
the maidens who had returned young, to find their loved ones old, or
forgetful, or dead. For these Antonia came too late; and thus it is
that no evil can be so blotted out but that it will leave some traces
in this world.
Of the castle on the hill, however, no traces were left save a few
ruins. It was years, to be sure, before any one ventured up there, and
then nothing was found but owls and bats and a heap of whitened bones.
But something like the old castle still reappears now and then, the
people say; only it always shows itself down in the valley, where it
first stood, and where the pit now is. It has been seen once or twice,
and the saying is, that if only the beholder could throw something that
belonged to him upon this castle--a cap, a kerchief, or what not--it
would be fixed to the spot and would become his property. Once a
maiden, who knew naught of the tale, went to draw water near the spot,
and came running home to tell her father she had seen a splendid house
standing above the old pit.
“And didst thou cast thy kerchief on it?” asked the father in haste.
“Nay,” replied the girl.
Then he gave her a stinging box on the ear, and ran out himself, but
the castle was gone.
As for the witch, St. Anthony’s curse was fulfilled upon her, and she
still haunts the hill, carrying the heavy casket and the huge bunch of
keys; nor has any one yet been found to ease her of her burden.
XIII
THE SILVER NAIL
[Illustration]
Many years ago there lived in the little town of Stolberg, which is the
centre of a mining district in the Hartz Mountains, a certain Joseph
Kerst, who was the overseer of one of the neighbouring mines. He had
begun work there as a boy, and had no thought or care but for the
treasures that were to be found in those dusky depths, so that he had
come, early in life, to enjoy a position of trust, and a certain degree
of wealth. This, however, was not enough to satisfy him; his great
ambition was to discover a fresh vein of silver, that should be his
alone, and make him the richest of men; and to this end he would wander
night and day about the mountains, and through the disused pits, pick
in hand, seeking for a spot that seemed to promise what he desired.
Now, with the wealth which was his already, he might easily have kept
a wife, and, indeed, many a girl in the town was on the look-out for
overseer Joseph, and would gladly have become the mistress of the
comfortable old house on the market-place. At last he did seem to
have made his choice, and a good choice too; for he often spent his
spare hours with the watchmaker’s daughter Anna, who was the sweetest,
gentlest girl in the world, and plainly did not want him for his money,
for it was easy to see she worshipped the ground he trod on. If the
truth were known, she often wept in secret over his craze for silver,
and his dangerous midnight excursions into the heart of the mountains;
but the poor, loving creature fancied that when once he had “given her
the ring,” which he promised soon to do, she could persuade him to turn
his mind to other things.
Meanwhile, however, he did not give up his search, and this is what
befell him at last:--It was a moonlight night; he had turned his steps
towards one of the disused tunnels of the _Auerberg_, and was going to
enter it, when he saw that the inside of the tunnel itself was flooded
with light, as though the moonbeams had found their way in there also.
Yet he presently perceived that this was no ray of the moon, for the
shaft of light streamed forth from within, even from the very heart of
the cavern, and as he gazed, a sound of far-off music struck upon his
ear. Now all miners know that there are spirits in the mountain, who
draw the precious metal down to the depths of the earth, or suffer it
to rise nearer to the surface, according to their pleasure; and Joseph
guessed at once that here might be the clue he was seeking. So, spurred
on by the thought that he was perhaps near the realisation of his
dearest hope, he stepped with a beating heart into the cavern and along
the shining pathway of light. Brighter and brighter it grew; louder
and sweeter, too, the music swelled forth, till his eyes were dazzled,
and his heart throbbed with so exquisite a pleasure that he could
hardly draw breath. And now misty forms, as of men and maidens dancing,
began to whirl before his eyes upon the golden floor; and then, as
these disappeared, he was aware of one radiant figure, clad in snowy,
shimmering garments, who stood alone against the dark rock and beckoned
to him. As he went nearer he saw that the form was that of a maiden.
Her long, dusky tresses fell round a pale, delicate face, in which the
large eyes shone out like lamps; her raiment was woven all of silver
threads, and in one hand she held a slender silver staff, shaped like a
long nail.
Presently she began to speak, and her voice was as sweet as the music
which had heralded her coming. “Have no fear, good mortal,” the gentle
voice said. “I have watched many a day for thy coming, for I knew thou
wert bold, and wouldst venture much, and I need such a one to release
me from my prison. Thou art seeking for precious ore. Know, then,
that the silver nail I hold can guide thee to the spot where lies the
richest vein in all these mountains. But there is a price to pay.” As
she spoke these words a smile dawned upon her face. But Joseph had no
ears save for the welcome news of the vein of ore; he forgot all his
alarm and doubt, and springing forward, cried: “Beautiful spirit, there
is no price I would not pay for such knowledge!”
“Art thou sure, Joseph? For this is the price--even that thou shalt wed
me, and promise that thou wilt not ever, in the time to come, cast it
in my teeth that I am a being of the under-world, and that thou hast
been my releaser. Only thus can I be freed; for I seek for love, yea,
as thou seekest for wealth; and if there be one in the town yonder who
hath already taken thy love, why then the price is not thine to pay,
and I warn thee to pause and consider ere thou promise it.”
Joseph felt a chill creep round his heart. He thought of Anna, but her
image seemed to grow pale beside the one before him. Yet--a spirit
dwelling in the old house on the market-place! How might this be?
The fairy maiden saw his hesitation, and her smile died away. “Nay, not
now,” she cried as he opened his lips to answer, “not yet must thou
reply, for thy fate and mine will be dark if thou dost promise what
thou canst not fulfil. To-morrow night, when the moon is full, come
again to the mountain, and let thy heart be honest and thy purpose
firm, to answer according to truth.” As she spoke the light vanished,
and Joseph stood once more alone at the cavern’s mouth. The moon
was setting, and its beams were scarcely bright enough to guide him
homeward again, but he stumbled on, unheeding, his mind in a whirl of
perplexity and doubt. When he reached his own door, and creeping in,
sat down by the warm stove, he could scarcely have told whether he
had not been sitting there all night, or whether his adventure had
been anything but a dream. Yet nay--he had surely set forth to the
Auerberg that evening, and in such haste that his half-finished supper
still stood there upon the table. Suppose it were true, and he within
an ace of being the richest man in the land? There was Anna--but did
he really love Anna? Had he promised her anything? He thought not; all
his intercourse with her seemed misty and far off now. Thus through
the night and day he struggled with one thought and another, his mind
in a whirl. His work was neglected, and even his underlings laughed,
unreproved, at his distraught and wandering looks. By evening he had
reached a condition in which he could not have sworn to the truth of
anything. Probably what he had seen the night before was all fancy;
but he must prove it to himself, for if it were true, what vague and
foolish lovers’ talk was there in the world worth giving up such a
chance for?
Midnight and the full moon saw him standing again at the entrance of
the cavern, his mouth dry and his heart beating with anxiety. He waited
long. Despair, and a secret rage at his own credulous folly, were
beginning to seize hold on him, when his straining eyes caught sight
of a faint glimmer spreading through the dark. He hurried forward, and
with each step the light grew brighter and brighter, till it led him
at last to the rock where he had seen the maiden the night before. But
she was not there; the only thing that met his eyes was an iron door,
let into the rock on the spot where she had leant. He thrust against
it with all his might, and straightway there rang out a strain of the
sweetest music, such as he had heard before. And with the sound of the
music, these words were borne to his ear: “If thou truly and with a
loving heart seekest Eruna, call and she will answer.”
“Eruna!” repeated Joseph with trembling voice; “Eruna!”
At the second call the door flew open beneath his hand, and discovered
a rock-hewn chamber, radiant with light that streamed from its walls,
and at the farther end of it, just as he had seen her before, stood
the magic maiden he had learnt to call Eruna. A golden table stood
beside her, and upon it were a book, and a golden candlestick holding
a burning taper, and the candlestick was in the shape of a tall lily,
with buds and blossoms of gold. But in front of the table, on either
side, crouched two strange, terrible creatures with flaming eyes, and
their form was like that of a lion.
“Come to me without fear, Joseph,” cried Eruna as she saw him start
back; “these beasts are my faithful guardians, but they will not touch
one who comes without fear.” As she spoke she raised the silver nail in
her hand, and a feeling of triumph swept over the heart of the man. It
was true, then; this beautiful being and her promises were no dream,
and he had reached his goal! He sprang forward, all fear driven out by
his eager hopes, and the beasts crouched lower, as he passed them and
fell at the feet of the radiant Eruna. Ah, lions with the flaming eyes!
why was your sight darkened then, and why did no kindly instinct tell
you that daring is not born of love alone?
“Joseph,” said the gentle voice again, “art thou truly come to set
me free and take me for thy wife? And dost thou make the promise I
asked of thee? Then raise thy hand and pluck this golden flower from
its stem.” He obeyed, scarcely knowing what he did; and lo! as he
broke the lily from the stalk, again the sound of music rang forth and
echoed through the vaulted chamber. And at the plucking of the lily,
the taper was extinguished, and with it all the light in the room.
Darkness enveloped them, and he felt Eruna grasp his hand. He dropped
the golden blossom, and would have fled, dragging her with him, for
now the music had changed to a discord of horrid sounds, and he could
hear the wild beasts moving towards them. But Eruna stopped him for a
moment. “Wilt thou leave this behind thee,” said she--“the token of our
love?” And raising the golden blossom from where it had fallen at her
feet, she laid it in his hand. “Now, indeed, fly,” she hurriedly added,
“or the door will close!” And, in truth, they had scarcely reached
it, she guiding him with unerring steps, when the door clanged behind
them--even striking Joseph upon the heel as he fled--and the clamour
within rose to a hideous pitch. “I have angered my people, the spirits
of the mountain,” murmured Eruna; “then do not thou, O love, ever
forsake me!”
Joseph shivered; an iron hand seemed to clasp his heart, but he
replied, with the best grace he could muster: “I have sworn to love
thee, Eruna, if thou hast indeed a mind to come down into our life, and
bear our burdens; but, that we may be happy, and that I may give thee
all it befits thee to have, wilt not thou, too, keep thy word and show
me that which I was seeking when I first saw thee?”
He felt Eruna’s hand tremble in his. “So be it, foolish man,” she said.
“I was nearly forgetting the store thou dost set by the dross that
fills this mountain, and the sight of which wearies me. Come hither,
then, and where I strike in my silver nail, do thou smite with thy
pick, and leave it hanging there. To-morrow thou shalt find what thou
seekest.” As she spoke she paused at a certain point of the rocky
wall beside them, and raised her silver nail on high. Immediately a
pale light shone round about them, and lit up the side of the cavern.
Choosing a spot, she thrust in the point of the silver nail, and it
sank into the rock, leaving scarcely a trace behind. But into the track
it left Joseph eagerly drove his pick, and rolling up a large stone
further to mark the spot, he turned to leave the cavern with Eruna.
All night long such a storm raged among the mountains that their rocky
peaks seemed to reel beneath the echoing thunder-claps. Joseph never
knew how he got home that night, or whose hand it was that tended him
as he lay, smitten half senseless by the violence of the storm, upon
his cold hearth-stone.
In the morning curious neighbours, and workmen from the mines, came
pressing in to see if he were at home, and to inquire why he had been
absent so long, and then he knew, for the first time, that a whole week
had elapsed since his departure from home on a certain moonlight night.
But this was no longer, any more than the rest, a surprise to Joseph;
indeed, he rather welcomed the discovery, for how could he else have
accounted for the sudden appearance in his house of the beautiful,
pale woman with dusky tresses, who moved about with timid, uncertain
footsteps, as though the place and its ways were strange to her? He
was relieved to see her silvery raiment had disappeared. But she wore
a garb somewhat different from the dress of the women of the district,
and a happy thought struck him.
“Ha! ha!” he laughed, “I have stolen a march upon you all! Ye have
often told me I needed a wife, and here I have one, but she comes from
afar, from the other side of the mountains. I became acquainted with
her last year, when I went to see my kinsfolk yonder, and I have had it
in mind to wed her ever since; but I will have no gossips plaguing me
about such matters, so I even went to fetch her home by myself, without
any ado.”
The neighbours looked at one another, and those on the outskirts of
the crowd slipped off to tell the news, with much added detail, to
Anna, who was too sick to leave her bed. For the poor child had fretted
herself into a fever over the supposed death of Joseph during one of
his lonely rambles among the mountains.
“Why, then,” cried one of the miners in the crowd, “we have taken a
deal of trouble, master, for naught; we have been seeking thee at the
foot of every precipice in the country for days past.”
“Plague take ye for meddlesome fellows!” cried Joseph. “Cannot
such a man as I go away for a holiday but it must raise the whole
country-side? I’ll warrant you’ve been making it an excuse to do scant
work; but wait a while, I shall have work enough for ye all soon--ay,
and for many more!”
He would have driven them forth and hurried away to explore the fateful
spot where he had left his pick hanging, but that a cry of wonder arose
from a woman who had ventured close up to the spot where Eruna was
standing--the spot where Joseph had lain through the night. She had
picked up from the ground a tall branch of lilies, bud and blossom, all
fashioned in pure gold, so cunningly that no such goldsmith’s work
had ever been seen; and the weight of the branch was so great that she
could scarcely lift it. Exclamations and questions rose on every side,
and every one crowded round the holder of this wonderful treasure.
“That is my wife’s dowry,” explained Joseph, a little taken aback by
the discovery of this prize, which he had forgotten for the moment, but
proud enough of it withal. “There is naught like it, I’ll be bound, in
all the length and breadth of Germany!”
The people stared open-mouthed, and the men were disposed to envy
Joseph both bride and dowry, but many of the women, though they could
not disguise their wonder and admiration over the golden blossom, began
to cast suspicious glances at Eruna. Joseph was soon aware of them, and
they only increased the uncanny feeling of deception and mystery which
was to become but too familiar to him. For the moment, however, he
smothered it in anger; and declaring that he would have no more gaping
fools in his house, disturbing his honeymoon, he drove the neighbours
forth, only to send them carrying the news of his wondrous marriage far
and wide over the country.
[Illustration: And declaring that he would have no more gaping fools in
his house, disturbing his honeymoon, he drove the neighbours forth.]
As soon as they were gone, he too rushed out to the mountain, and
presently found the spot marked by his pick. A few hours’ work
convinced him that Eruna’s promise had not been false, and that here
was a vein of silver whose richness surpassed his wildest dreams. And
now for a time, indeed, Joseph reaped his reward. The country-side rang
with tales of his strange marriage, and of his still more wonderful
discovery of silver. Miners came from all sides, and found employment
at the new works, for a shaft was being sunk, and the vein seemed
inexhaustible. Joseph refused to give any particulars as to how he had
made his discovery; he only insisted on calling the shaft “The Silver
Nail,” a name which caused fresh wonderment among the townspeople. He
was fast becoming a rich man, and the tale of his good-luck, and of the
wondrous golden lily he owned, spread through the land, till it reached
the ears of the King himself, who expressed a wish to behold the
treasure that had fallen into the keeping of a working-man. So Joseph
had to travel to court and show his golden lily--for he had almost
forgotten that it belonged as much to Eruna as to himself, and had
only been entrusted to him as a guerdon of their love. At court he was
forced to baffle as best he could the inquiries that were made as to
how he had come by this marvellous piece of work. It was an heirloom,
he said; none knew how it had come into his family, and for years it
had been hidden in the earth, lest thieves should get at it. Some one
whispered to the bewildered man that he must offer it to His Majesty,
since all treasure-trove rightly belonged to him. This had certainly
not been part of Joseph’s plan, but the King and his courtiers overawed
him, and he stammered forth his willingness to lay the offering at His
Majesty’s feet.
“In sooth,” the King replied, “this is too rich a treasure for me to
purchase it, or to think of taking it as a gift either, from this good
fellow; yet I were proud to possess it, and it is, indeed, only fit for
a king’s treasury. Now I have found a way. Leave me thy flower, Joseph
Kerst, and take instead the barony of Stolberg, for thou hast enriched
thy native town, and hast paid due homage to thy King, and art worthy
to be reckoned amid the nobles of the land.”
So Joseph went forth a great man, and thought to return home and bring
joy to his bride, Eruna, for whom he cherished a kind of awe-struck
admiration, as the being who had brought him all his luck. But take
her honestly to his heart, as a simple woman, and love her as he might
have loved his faithful Anna, whom he had known from childhood, that
he felt he could never do. He was dismayed, however, on his return
home, to find a different reception from that which he expected. The
townspeople, indeed, received him with acclamations, as their new
baron, but Eruna’s eyes wore a sadder, more wistful look than usual.
“Thou hast parted with our lily, our marriage token!” she moaned. “Woe
be to us, Joseph! what are lands and names beside the guarding of our
love? Oh, blind of heart! hadst thou no care for the token that bound
us together, or even for the treasures which my love alone can bring
for thee from the depths of the earth? Take heed to thy tongue, then,
for if love guard it not, it may easily speak the fatal word.”
Joseph would have replied angrily, but the close of her speech reminded
him of the promise he had solemnly made on that night, which now seemed
so far away, and he choked back his wrath. But from that day things
went crookedly. He spent his money right and left, so that it was gone
almost as soon as it came from the mines. That was of no consequence,
indeed, since there seemed to be no end to “The Silver Nail” vein; but
the riches soon ceased to bring him all the pleasure he had expected.
He was ill at ease in his lordly castle, and heavy at heart when he
went down into the town and saw how his old acquaintances shunned him,
partly from awkwardness at feeling him now so much higher placed than
themselves, and partly on account of the suspicions and rumours that
were whispered about concerning his mysterious wife, who could never
learn the ways of the other women, or talk like one having interests
akin to theirs. Only Anna, who had so just a cause of offence against
him, yet treated him as she had done of old; and when the poor child
arose from the long illness which fell upon her at the sudden news
of his marriage, her gentle, forgiving spirit gave him shelter as a
friend, who now could never be a lover. In talk with her he learnt more
and more to see how great a gift he had bartered away for his heaps of
hard coin, and his lordly, unhome-like home. Yet Anna was often sick,
and could not speak cheerfully even to him, and her father and the
neighbours looked coldly upon his comings and goings.... And up yonder,
at the castle, the pale face framed in dusky tresses gazed forth with
despairing eyes as he turned his steps to the watchmaker’s house.
At last there came a day when Joseph too looked sadly down from the
hill, watching a funeral train that wound its way along the valley; a
train he might not join, for the people whispered, loud enough for him
to hear, that Anna’s death lay at his door, and that he could do no
less than let her go to her grave in peace. So he watched her go with
remorse in his heart, and as he watched there was that in his face
that no one could mistake. Eruna read it, and the fount of misery that
had been gathering in her breast broke forth, for the first time, in
uncontrollable wailings.
“Her, her thou hast loved, Joseph!” she cried, “and hast been false
both to her and me! Ah, woe is me that I could not read one mortal’s
heart aright!”
Now the pent-up wrath and pain in Joseph’s heart were more than
he could bear. No remembrance of his covetous longings or of his
false-hearted dealings withheld him, and he turned upon her, crying--
“And if it were so, what is that to thee? For what did I barter my
happiness but to release thee and give thee mortal life, thou soulless
clod of earth!”
Even as he spoke Eruna glided close, and threw her arms about him,
trying to stay his speech. But it was too late, the words were out, and
as her cold white hand touched his lips, he felt a deadly chill at his
heart, and fell senseless to the ground.