1.
THE GIRLS AT THE WELL.
[Illustration: The Red Tailor.]
On Saturday afternoon the house of the Red Tailor was alive with
singing. Doors were opened and closed with a bang, windows thrown up,
chairs and tables moved here and there, and the broom rattled among the
lifeless bones; but over all was heard a rich, full, female voice,
travelling up and down stairs, into rooms and out of passages. Song
followed hard upon song, grave and gay meeting with equal favor. At
last the singer was forthcoming,--a girl of stout proportions but the
utmost symmetry of form. A jacket of knitted gray yarn set off the
swelling outlines to the best advantage: one corner of the apron was
tucked up and left the other hanging jauntily. With the milking-pail in
her hand, she went to the stable. The words of the songs were now more
distinctly audible. One of them ran thus:--
"I climb'd up the cherry-tree;
For cherries I don't care.
I thought I might my true love see:
My true love wasn't there.
"It isn't long since the rain came down,
And all the trees are wet;
I had a true love all my own:
I wish I had him yet.
"But he has gone abroad, abroad,
To see what luck would do;
And I have found another love:
He's a good fellow, too."
With a water-bucket under her arm, she made her appearance again,
locked the door of the house, and concealed the key under a stack of
kindling-wood. The well before the town-hall was empty and locked up;
the upper well, also under lock and key, was only opened by Soges every
morning and evening, and water distributed to each family in proportion
to the number of its inmates. This scarcity of water is a great evil,
particularly in the heat of summer. On the way our heroine was stopped
by Anselm the Jew's Betsy, who cried,--
"Wait, Crescence: I'll go with you."
"Hurry up, then. When is your intended coming back?" returned
Crescence.
"At our Pentecost,--this day fortnight."
"When is it to be?"
"Some time after the Feast of Tabernacles. You must dance with us all
day, mind. We'll have one more good time of it: we've always been good
friends, haven't we?"
"Betsy, you ought to have married Seligmann and stayed here. A bird in
the hand's worth two in the bush. Going all the way to Alsace! How do
you know what's to become of you after you get there?"
"Why, how you talk!" replied Betsy. "With my four hundred florins, how
am I to choose? And over there it counts for almost a thousand francs;
and that's more like. Are you going to live in the village always? When
your geometer gets an appointment, won't you have to go with him? Oh,
did I tell you?--my intended went with Florian to the Schramberg market
the other day from Strasbourg. Florian had I don't know how many--at
least three hundred--ducats in his girdle, to buy beeves with. He
carries himself like a prince, and his master trusts him with all his
property. And they do say he's going to give him his daughter."
"I wish him much happiness."
"Now, you needn't make believe you didn't like Florian's little finger
better than the whole geometer."
"What if I did? He's got nothing, and I've got nothing; and 'twice
nothing is nothing at all,' says George the blacksmith."
The two girls had reached the well, where many of their companions were
already awaiting the arrival of the officer of Government.
"Have you heard, Crescence?" cried Christian's Dolly--"Florian's come
back an hour ago: you've got a full team to drive now."
"You preach to your grandmother," retorted Crescence: "such a beanpole
as you may open every shutter of her windows and '11 never catch a
gudgeon."
"That's it," said a girl with forward air and manners, who bore the
ominous designation of "Corpse Kitty," because she fitted the shrouds.
Passing her hand over her mouth, she went on:--"Give her her change,
Crescence: we know it's all cash-down where you come from." She
accompanied the words with a significant gesture.
"Oh, you're nervous because nobody will lend you any thing," replied
the assailed one. "You're a sweet one, Dolly, to set _her_ a-going."
"Well, what did you fly at Dolly that way for?" said Melchior's Lenore:
"she didn't mean any harm by it. Can't you take a little fun?"
"Has Florian really come home?" asked Crescence, softly.
"Of course he has," cried Corpse Kitty, aloud. "Just look out, you
hemp-toad: you'll find you've 'most done carrying your head as high as
a sleigh-horse: Florian will take the geometer's bearings before you
know what's what."
Soges now appeared as another Moses to open the well for the daughters
of Jethro: he did not seem to woo any of them, however, for he was not
by any means in a bland or amiable frame of mind.
"Give Crescence the cream of the water: she's got to have the
geometer's standees washed to-night," cried Kitty.
"Let her talk," said Lenore: "you can't worry her more than by not
listening to her. She's just like the dogs: they bark at you, and if
you walk on quietly they run home again and bark at the next person
that comes along the road. She's after making everybody out as bad as
she is herself, if she can. But you must be on the look-out about
Florian now, or you'll get into trouble."
"Yes," said another girl: "he's brought lots of money with him, and the
first thing he did was to give his father a gold ducat. The money must
'a' looked scared when it got into that room. The old fellow's so poor
that the mice all ran away from him."
"Florian can dress and undress himself five times over and not take all
the fine clothes out of his chest," said a third.
"And he speaks French 'most all the time."
"And he has a watch, with a chain, and all the tools of his trade hung
to it in silver for charms."
"And he's got a black mustache you can hardly help kissing."
A dispute interrupted this torrent of items.
"What're you pushing me so for?" said Corpse Kitty to Kilian's Annie:
"I'm not a rich chap."
"Hold your jaw, you!--you've been to the House of Correction twice
already, and the third time's written on your forehead now."
"I'll mark your forehead," screeched Kitty, striking at Annie with her
bucket; but she parried the blow, and struck another. A fierce struggle
ensued: the buckets were dropped, and the combatants "clinched" hand to
hand. After looking on passively a while, the others interfered, Soges
particularly dealing official blows to the right and left with great
vigor and impartiality. Like two fighting-cocks torn asunder, the
hostile parties looked daggers at each other as they picked up their
buckets. Annie brushed her hair out of her face, crying bitterly, and
complaining that nobody was safe, nor ever would be, until Corpse Kitty
was in the House of Correction for life.
Crescence's turn having come at last, she carried the heavy bucket home
on her head and a still heavier load in her heart. Tears were rolling
down her cheeks; but she pretended that they were drops from the
bucket, and always wiped the lower rim of it with her apron. There was
confusion in her heart now, and she foresaw still greater troubles in
the future.
Having returned home, she went through with her work, but without
singing another note.
Lest our readers should be at a loss to divine what a titled personage
like a geometer should be doing in the village, it is proper to remind
them that the general survey of the country took place about this time.
Every nook and corner of the land was mapped, labelled, and numbered;
and in the course of the operation a new element was infused into the
life of the people. A race of "city fellows," belonging neither to the
order of parsons nor to that of schoolmasters, made their way into the
village: they were generally young, smart, and fond of enjoyment; and
the importance they soon acquired among the female portion of the
community has already become apparent.
These gentlemen received the sounding title of "geometers." A surveyor
was a plain surveyor; and as these people, for some reason or other,
were to appear to the peasantry in the light of a superior rank of
beings, and, as it was important to disseminate a knowledge of and
taste for the classics, they received the Greek addition. Crescence's
playmate had married a geometer-general (should he not have been called
a hypergeometer?) and lived at Biberach: this had made Crescence
acquainted with one of his colleagues, and her parents were most
anxious to push matters, for a better "providence" could not have been
hoped for. The Red Tailor in his mind's eye already saw his daughter as
Madame Geometrix-General.
2.
FLYING OFF THE HANDLE.
It was dark. Crescence stood by the fire in the kitchen: the College
Chap came in with very audible steps, and said,--
"Crescence, how are you? I want a pound of that tobacco. Have you got
any left?"
"Yes, walk in: my mother 'll wait on you."
"I won't poison your soup if I do stay here a bit," he said aloud: then
he continued, very softly, "Florian's got home. Come out a little after
a while, and you shall hear us."
Without waiting for an answer, he went into the room. When he came out
again, Crescence was gone.
A little later the voices of the three comrades were heard before the
Red Tailor's house, singing, whistling, and laughing. Florian's, which
had long been wanting, was doubly clear and full. Finding all their
efforts unavailing, Peter cried under the window,--
"Crescence, isn't this your goose running about here?"
The College Chap, crouching behind the wood-pile, was cackling with the
accent of a native.
The window was opened; but, instead of Crescence, the tailor's wife
looked out, and said,--
"Crack your jokes before somebody else's house."
With a roar of laughter the College Chap returned to the middle of the
road.
Within, Crescence sat with the geometer, paying but little heed to his
blandishments: at last she feigned a headache and went to bed.
Tired of their fruitless watch, the three boys in the road bent their
steps toward the inn. They had not gone far before they encountered
Josey, the French simpleton. The College Chap cried, seizing him by the
collar,--
"_Qui vive? la bourse on la vie?_"
"_Paridadoin mullien_," calmly replied the person addressed, meaning to
say, "What do you want?"
"Here's a jolly lark!" cried the student, triumphantly. "Let's take
Josey with us and make him do the geometer. Come; we'll treat you to a
mug of beer."
"_Moin paroula goin_," answered Josey,--as if to say, "I've no
objections." His words were all formed by accident; and he eked them
out with nods and grins. Originally Josey was not more than half a
simpleton; but the half which Nature had denied had been carefully
educated into him by the wags of the village. If any villager has a
mole in his disposition, he may be assured that his townsmen will
stretch it into a mountain for their common behoof and education.
Nobody knew, or cared to know, what had given Josey the notion that he
was master of all the living tongues. Some contended that he had been
dry-nurse so long as to have acquired the baby-lingo by incessant
practice. Be that as it may, it was impossible to address him in any
real or imaginary language without receiving an instantaneous reply.
This apart, he was as good a field-hand as many others; and, whether he
understood the language of the beasts or not, they understood him and
did his bidding. In church Josey was the only member of the
congregation who nodded at every word of the Latin mass, to imply that
he understood it to perfection.
This individual was for this evening the fourth member of the usually
so exclusive confederacy of three.
"_Bon soir_," said Florian, as they entered the bar-room. He received a
kindly welcome at all hands. The assembled guests scanned him from head
to foot, and nodded to each other with looks that seemed to say, "A
fine fellow, Florian; yes, if you want to come home you must go abroad
first."
One who sat behind the stove said to his neighbor, "This is a better
way to come back than that thief Schlunkel's: he's been twice to the
penitentiary, and has just come back. I wish we were rid of him again."
Florian ordered a bottle of wine for himself and his comrades, while
Josey was regaled with a mug of beer at an adjoining table.
When Babbett brought the refreshments, he remarked, in an
under-tone, but yet loud enough to be heard by all, "_Comme elle est
jolie!_--_bien jolie!_"
"_Qui?_" returned the College Chap. The company nudged each other,--to
think they could talk French so well together.
Florian treated the whole company,--to their great satisfaction, for,
though frequenters of the tavern, they sat there as dry customers: the
stimulus made their hearts glad, and the sensation was reflected upon
the spirits of Florian. He seemed to have expended his stock of French;
for "Snuff the _chandelle_" is not pure Parisian.
The point of the joke was lost, nevertheless; for the geometer, who put
up at the Eagle, was not there.
"Are you going to stay with us, Florian?" asked Babbett.
"_Nous verrons_: we shall see."
"Tell us something of your travels," said Caspar, the host, who felt it
incumbent on him to promote the conversation. "Have you been to Paris?"
"Of course," answered Florian, in a tone of voice in which a shrewd
observer would have detected the ring of false metal; "but I didn't
like it there. Nancy's the finest place yet. Go into a tavern there,
and the walls are all looking-glasses, the tables are marble, and you
eat and drink out of nothing but silver. You ought to go there once:
you'd open your eyes and ears."
These signs of absorbing attention now showed themselves in Florian's
own features; for the geometer, with his two colleagues, entered the
room. They passed through to the little back parlor, where a table was
set for them.
Florian seized his glass, made it clink against those of his friends,
and said, "_A votre sante._"
Caspar had lost his interest in Florian's narration, and hastened to
meet the new-comers and light them to their supportable, which was set
in the back room. Florian, twirling his mustache, asked Constantine,
very softly, "Which is it?"
"The lobsided one, with long hair, that came in first."
For a time all were silent, and nothing was heard but the clatter of
knives and forks behind the screen.