Reinhold had not smiled, but as the fair vision disappeared in the
shadow of the entrance he passed the hand which she had held so long
over his eyes.
"And you thought you knew how to love!" said he to himself. "What are
our purest, holiest aspirations when compared with the heavenly purity
and goodness of such a mind as this poor blind girl's, who is as
unconscious of her beauty and her charm as are the lilies of the field?
How could so lovely a flower have blossomed here?"
He looked around. The bell which had summoned the workpeople to their
breakfast as Cilli came out of the house rang again. The men returned
to their work. Looking round the corner of the house, he had a peep
through the wide-open doors of the workshops, which seemed to occupy
the whole of the ground-floor. Crosses and tombstones were being
chiselled and carved by busy hands.
A chill came over Reinhold, to see this sad, gloomy sight just now,
when the world lay so bright before him, lighted up by the fancies of
the blind girl who lived over these melancholy workshops, and in whose
dreams the tapping and knocking of these dreadful hammers and chisels
must mingle!
He asked for his uncle. No one had seen him that morning; he might be
in the engine-room or in some of the back yards. Where was Herr Anders'
studio? Here in this very building, the first door round the corner;
the second was the young lady's studio.
Reinhold walked round the house and knocked at the first door, near
which was a high window half shaded from within. No one answered, and
he was going on when the door opened a little way. But it was not the
friendly countenance of the sculptor, with its bright eyes and cheery
smile, that met him, but a strange, dark face, from which a pair of
black, sparkling eyes glared at him.
"Beg pardon! I expected to see Herr Anders."
"Herr Anders is not here; he is in his own house, the third door
upstairs."
He of the dark complexion said this in a forbidding tone and in German,
which, though fluent enough, betrayed the foreigner in every syllable.
"Then I will go and look for him there."
"Herr Anders is going to the Exhibition; he is dressing."
Reinhold now observed that the young man himself was in the act of
dressing and still in his shirt-sleeves, whose extreme whiteness made
the darkness of his complexion even more remarkable. The interruption
of his toilette quite explained the unfriendly tone of his answers, and
the want of hospitality that made him hold the door only just enough
open for him to speak to the stranger.
"Perhaps you know whether Fräulein Schmidt is in her studio?"
The pertinacity of the question seemed to irritate the young man. The
black brows frowned heavily, the delicate upper lip with its slight
moustache curled sufficiently to show the white teeth for a moment.
"_Non lo so_," he blurted out.
He shut the door, muttering between his teeth something else in Italian
which did not sound like a blessing.
Reinhold felt convinced that Ferdinanda was in her studio, and that the
ungracious youth knew it; but at the same time it would not make her
very unhappy if he paid his visit later, or did not pay it at all. At
all events he must look for his uncle first.
He returned to the yard, passing a place where huge blocks of marble
were being cut through by the aid of large suspended saws, each of
which was regulated by a man. It must have been fatiguing work,
requiring great strength, and indeed was only undertaken when the
machinery could not turn out enough work, as was now the case; there
was no doubt that the machine certainly could do much more. So said the
workman, taking the opportunity to get a little breathing-time. The
steam saws were in that building; they had just seen the master go
there. But Uncle Ernst was not near the steam saws, he had just been
there; perhaps he was in the lathe-room close by.
Reinhold had some difficulty in taking in the words which a workman
shouted in his ear, so loud was the screeching, overpowering noise of
the immense saws as the steam power drove them backwards and forwards
with inconceivable rapidity through great blocks of marble as high as a
man; eight, ten, and twelve saws working at once through the same block
and cutting it into as many inch-thick slabs. And between each two
blocks was a man upon a small platform incessantly busied in throwing
water, mixed with sand from a pail, upon the sparks caused by the saws;
and the one who had got down to answer Reinhold sprang hurriedly back
to his place to extinguish the sparks which now came from his block in
trails almost a yard in length.
In the next room which Reinhold entered a less awful noise was going
on. Though here, too, was heard the rattle of the driving bands as they
stretched like interminable snakes from a wheel in one corner of the
ceiling to another at the other end, and so descended to a second at a
medium height, and once more went up and down in bewildering quivering
lines; and here again wheels rattled and clattered, and the iron
strained and screeched and creaked as it cut through the marble, boring
holes, cutting with chisels, filing, shaving, scraping, and in every
possible way converting it into skilful and sometimes even artistic
forms. Entablatures with sharp plinths, slender fluted columns, elegant
pedestals for candelabra or vases, even vases themselves which, rapidly
revolving, were polished by busy hands with pumice stone.
Herr Schmidt had been here a few minutes ago--was perhaps now upstairs
in the workshops where the fine work was done before it came here to be
polished.
Those workshops lay on the opposite side of the yard, so that Reinhold
now first obtained a true idea of the dimensions of the establishment
as well as of the enormous extent of the business. He had already been
into three workshops, and had glanced into as many more in passing.
What an amount of capital must be sunk in these massive buildings, and
in the ground alone which was taken up by them and the yard, and in
these complicated ingenious machines, and in the already completed
goods, and again in these masses of rough marble which lay about
all over the yard, and between which ran the paved road for the
strongly-built waggons, upon which the powerful horses dragged these
enormous weights backwards and forwards.
And all this was done by the man of whom Aunt Rikchen had rightly said
that he ought to understand the feelings of a person who has learnt
nothing in his youth! This man who as a boy and youth had with his
father gone up and down the Havel and the Spree in the great boat which
was the only property of the family, till after the old man's death he
had started a business in bricks and sandstone in the lonely spot above
the town, in the modest little house where Reinhold had visited him ten
years ago.
What industry, what energy and what intelligence had been brought to
bear, to attain such a result, to create a world out of nothing! Was it
to be wondered at if he who had created it carried his head higher than
other men; or if this head, which had so much and so many to think of,
to consider and to care for, were often shadowed by heavy clouds?
Loud voices, which sounded close to Reinhold, startled him out of these
meditations, a high one and a deep one, in which he thought he
recognised his uncle's. A dispute must be going on. The high voice got
gradually louder, till a thundering "Silence!" stopped the flow. It
could only be Uncle Ernst thus thundering.
He stood still, uncertain whether to go nearer or to avoid the
disputants. They however came round the great blocks of marble which he
had just been looking at, his uncle and a red-haired man, whose ugly
face was distorted and inflamed with anger. On his uncle's forehead,
too, from which the broad-brimmed hat was pushed back, lay a red angry
cloud, but his large powerful eyes had a calm and steady look, and his
voice, too, was calm and steady as now seeing his nephew, he said:
"Good-morning, Reinhold, though it is not a good morning for me."
"Do you require my presence any longer, Herr Schmidt?" asked the man.
"Certainly. You will dismiss the people in my presence."
"That I shall not do, Herr Schmidt."
"In my presence, and in that of all the others. Sound the bell!"
And Uncle Ernst pointed to a small platform over which hung a great
bell.
"That is not my office," said the overseer hotly.
"True," answered Uncle Ernst, "for from this moment you no longer hold
any office."
"I claim a quarter's notice."
"That we shall soon see."
Uncle Ernst went up to the bell; Reinhold stepped before him.
"Let me," said he.
He did not wait for his uncle's answer, and pulled the rope that hung
down; immediately the mighty clang of the great clapper sounded through
the yard, overpowering and drowning the screeching and shrieking of the
saws, the tapping and knocking of hammers and chisels, and startling
the workmen at their work. Presently they emerged from all sides with
anxious faces.
While they assembled and stood in groups as they came from the
workshops to the number of about two hundred, so Reinhold thought.
Uncle Ernst stood leaning against a block of marble with folded arms,
staring straight in front of him; a few steps from him stood the
overseer, now very pale, and in whose alarmed and anxious looks it was
easy to see that fear alone kept him in his place.
Reinhold had come up to the side of the block upon which his uncle was
leaning so as to be near him in any case. Whatever was the matter it
was certainly nothing pleasant, and as his glance fell upon the people,
he noticed several desperate and even wild faces.
And now Uncle Ernst stood erect; the great eyes flashed over the
assembled crowd, the arms fell from his broad breast, and from that
broad breast came the mighty voice like thunder:
"Men, you know the rules of this establishment; they are all put before
you, before each of you that enters my service; they are hung up in
every workshop; no one can say that anything is not clear or is
difficult to understand, and they shall be kept, as by me the employer,
so by you the employed. If there is one amongst you who can come
forward here and say that I have diverged one hair's breadth from what
I promised you, or that I have in the smallest degree not fulfilled my
duty and obligation, let him come forward and say so."
He paused, crossed his arms again, and looked down, as though he would
not intimidate any one by his glance, but left them free to express an
opinion. Reinhold saw that here and there a few heads collected
together, and several quick secret glances were exchanged from one
group which he had noticed before. A man stepped forward, but the
others held him by the arm, and he went back. Uncle Ernst looked up
again.
"No one has come forward; I must assume that you have nothing to say
against me, that you have no grounds of complaint. I, however--I have
grounds of complaint against some of you, and that you may all hear
what it is, and who it is, and may behave accordingly in the future,
and that any man who is secretly following in the same way may know how
to behave if he is otherwise an honest man, is why I call you together
now. Jacob Schwarz, Johann Brand, Anton Baier, stand forward!"
A considerable agitation arose amongst the people; all eyes were
directed towards the group which Reinhold had already noticed. The same
man came forward again decidedly, and looked behind him, whereupon two
others followed hesitatingly.
"What is it?" said the first.
"You will soon know," said Uncle Ernst. "You know all of you that our
rules forbid you to belong to any union; that I might have sent away
these three on the spot when I found out what they were about a week
ago, and that I allowed mercy to take the place of justice in not
sending them away, but giving them time for consideration. Yesterday
evening the time of grace expired; they did not give Herr Roller the
required assurance yesterday evening that they had left the union. Herr
Roller ought not to have allowed them to return to their work; he did
do so and is consequently henceforth no longer your overseer, and is
dismissed absolutely from my service."
There was a movement amongst the crowd; consternation was depicted on
most faces, malicious satisfaction on many; the overseer attempted a
scornful smile, but got no further than a sickly grin.
"You," continued Uncle Ernst, for the first time turning to the
culprits, "take your things and leave the yard at once! And you others,
let this serve as a warning to you and a reminder of what, indeed, you
must all have known long ago, that I am not to be trifled with, and
that when I say a thing I mean it--and now go back to your work!"
A good many of the men turned at once and began to disperse; but
others--a few from almost every group--remained, and as the ranks
thinned drew closer together, as if to afford each other protection.
Those too who had moved away at first now stopped again, turned back,
and also drew together, so that in a few minutes the throng was divided
into two parts; the last mentioned, who for the present were more
amenable and conciliatory, were by far the larger number; but the
others--of whom there might be about thirty, were evidently the bolder
and more determined. Reinhold moved to his uncle's side.
"What are you waiting for?" asked Uncle Ernst, "what do you want?"
From the group of malcontents who had now clustered thickly together, a
man stepped forward, not one of the three; a young man who would have
been handsome if his youthful countenance had not been marred and
distorted already by evil passions. His pale, bold eyes had a watery
look, as if he were already too much addicted to the bottle. He waved
his hand as if he were standing on a platform to speak, and with great
fluency began:
"We wish to know, Herr Schmidt, why we should not be socialists and
communists too, if we choose; who is to forbid us to enter the ranks of
the army of workers who are marching against the hardhearted middle
classes to win back the rights which are so shamefully withheld from
us? We wish to know----"
"Silence!" thundered Uncle Ernst; "silence, wretched boy! and blush for
shame if you have any shame left in you!" Uncle Ernst advanced a few
steps, and the lad retreated before him like a jackal before the lion,
and slunk back into the knot of men which had drawn still closer
together. "What are you standing there for, laying your heads together
and muttering and threatening? Do you think that I fear you any more
than I fear this wretched boy, whom I took from the streets, and
clothed, and fed, and sent to school, and who wants to know now why I
withhold his rights from him! His rights? Your rights? To keep honestly
to what you have promised, what you have pledged yourselves to by your
own signatures, that is your right--neither more nor less! Who forced
you to sign your names?"
"Hunger!" cried a rough voice.
"You lie, Carl Peters!" cried Uncle Ernst; "and if you did suffer
hunger it was because you are a sot and carry the money which belongs
to your wife and children to the gin palace."
"We are all socialists, every man of us!" called another voice from the
crowd.
"Then you are all liars and cheats, every man of you!" cried Uncle
Ernst. "You lied when you signed your names to what you knew you would
not and could not keep! You have cheated me every day and every hour
that you worked for me, when you knew that I would not tolerate in my
house or my yards any one who is pledged to your insane principles; but
that I would drive them out of my house or my yard as I do now all of
you that stand there!"
A sullen murmur sounded through the crowd, and some single loud
threatening shouts were heard. Uncle Ernst sprang with one bound
straight in front of the knot of men.
"Be off with you!" he thundered; "be off with you at once!"
The foremost fell back upon those who stood behind them. Evidently no
one had courage to proceed to action. They gave way gradually; the knot
began to separate.
"Be at the office in half an hour to be paid off!"
The men were gone and the overseer with them. Uncle Ernst turned to
Reinhold.
"There is a specimen for you of your fine Prussian discipline, which
impressed you so greatly during the war; there is an instance of the
last new German truth and honesty as it is learned in Bismarck's
school."
"But uncle, excuse me, what has Bismarck to do with all this?"
"What has he to do with it?" Uncle Ernst stood still. "What has he to
do with it? Who was it who gave the rule that might came before right?
Or, if he did not say it, who gave such effect to it in his actions
that the accursed maxim has become the leading principle with men
nowadays, on which they regulate their conduct--both active and
passive? Who has taught our good simple folk how a man may live in
perpetual conflict with those whom it has chosen as its
representatives, and grasp at his objects over the heads of these
representatives?--how an army of followers may be created, and a docile
party say 'Amen' to everything, or say anything else that is needed to
attain these objects? Did you not hear what was said about the army of
workers? That is no longer the mad dream of some crack-brained
enthusiast. It is a reality, which is increasing threateningly as an
avalanche, and which will sooner or later precipitate itself in wild
destruction upon us all. Who can blame them? Might is stronger than
right! And so the revolution is declared _en permanence_, and
war between every man and his neighbour. For the present he has
conquered--he thinks he has conquered--and glories in his victory and
in the imperial crown which he has won for his master, and which he has
taken from the shelf, where another laid it who would not take it from
the hands of the people!--from the hands of the people of those days--a
good, true, faithful people, whose most sacred dream was this crown!
Ask them if they still believe! Ask them what they think of the crown
by the grace of God! Ask them what they dream of now!"
Uncle Ernst pointed to the dismissed workmen, who were crossing the
court, in larger and smaller parties, towards the lower building, from
the door of which Cilli's father had issued before, and were
gesticulating wildly and talking together.
"Will they be paid off without any disturbance?" asked Reinhold.
"The police-station is too near," answered Uncle Ernst, with a bitter
smile. "They are still afraid of the police; you need be under no
anxiety. And, before I forget it, thank you, my boy."
"What for, uncle?"
"There was no necessity for it, but I saw that you were ready to stand
up for me at need."
"Had you doubted it?"
"No, in spite of your enthusiasm for Bismarck. And now go to
Ferdinanda. You are going to the Exhibition?"
"I heard something of it; but, to tell you the truth, I have lost all
inclination for it."
"Oh, nonsense!" said Uncle Ernst. "Ferdinanda would be inconsolable,
and--I do not like to have my business arrangements interfering with
the family affairs."
Uncle Ernst pressed Reinhold's hand heartily, and walked into the
house, passing through the workmen, who drew back timidly on either
side. Reinhold left the place with a hesitating step. He would have
liked to remain with his uncle, at any rate; and he was more than
doubtful that Ferdinanda would be inconsolable if he did not come.