It was Thursday. Stoffel came home with the important news that the
king--I don't know what king--had arrived in the city unexpectedly
and would visit the theatre that evening. Everything and everybody
was in a commotion; for in republican countries much importance is
given to pomp and title.
This time curiosity was more wrought up than usual. Many foreign
princes, including an emperor, were visiting the king; and these
distinguished personages would follow the court to Amsterdam, coming
from The Hague, Utrecht and Haarlem. To put it tamely, it was to be
a great occasion.
That republican populace was to get to see the countenance and
coat-tails not only of their tyrant, but also the countenances and
coat-tails of many other tyrants, not to mention female tyrants.
The old doughnut women on the "Dam," which the city rented to them as
a market-place, were threatening to bring suit against the city. They
felt that it was hard to have to pay rent for the fresh air, day after
day, with the prospect of selling a few doughnuts to the youth of
the street, and now be run out because his majesty wanted to exhibit
himself to the people from the balcony of the old City Hall.
Why shouldn't the old women be seen at their accustomed places? Must
the doughnut industry be carried on secretly? Was it for fear of
imitations and unprincely competition? Or was it to keep the old
women from seeing the king?
At any rate, the whole kit of them had to leave. At most, they could
only mix with the crowd incognito, and afterwards might join in
the prearranged "Long live the King!" or somebody else, as the case
might be.
It is really remarkable that princes die. Seemingly the "vivats"
are of no avail.
The crowd was especially large, on account of the many majesties and
highnesses who had gathered about the tyrant.
Among the number was the Prince of Caramania, who had especial claims
upon the sympathy of the people, so all the newspapers said. One of
his ancestors had been a captain in the service of the state and had,
therefore, spilt his blood for the freedom of the Netherlands.
This blood, and perhaps the freedom as well, was newspaper
arabesque. It was certain, however, that the prince wore a green
coat with gold frogs; and upon his head he had a big plume. It was,
therefore, quite proper for the crowd to cry occasionally "Long live
the Prince of Caramania!"
Among the eminent gentlemen was a certain duke, who, by reason of his
virtues, had got himself banished from his country. The man was thrifty
and economical, though without neglecting himself. Nevertheless,
the rabble had dethroned him and sent him across the border with a
bushel of diamonds. Of these diamonds he was now to display a few
dozen in the shape of coat-buttons and the like. The newspapers gave
the crowd their cue accordingly. They were to cry: "Long live the
Duke with his diamonds!"
Princess Erika was the niece of the king, and was to marry the
crown-prince of a great empire, which was indebted to the Netherlands
for its prominence. The newspapers gave the assurance that this empire
would pay off the national debt of the Netherlands if the people
would only put enough enthusiasm into a "Long live Princess Erika!"
The old Countess-palatine of Aetolia was descended directly from
a certain knight who treated his hostlers like princes. In this
case it was not inappropriate for a republican populace to ask for
a prolongation of her ladyship's life. The cry was: "Long live the
Countess-palatine of Aetolia!"
The Grand-duke of Ysland was the handsome grandson of a shopman. His
merits would fill three columns of fine print. The man was a master
of the type-case himself, and by exerting himself could even set up
his own name. The newspapers said that having safely passed an ocean
of pitfalls, he had now perfected himself as the brother-in-law of
a demi-god. Therefore, whoever had the interest of his country at
heart could not afford to fail to bellow at the top of his voice:
"Long live the Grand-duke of Ysland!"
There were still more potentates and ladies of quality who had honored
Amsterdam with a visit. They had heard that the city was la VÈnise
du Nord, that it was tres interessant, tres interessant! etc.
And the Holland herrings! DÈlicieux! Unfortunately the Netherlanders
didn't know how to cook them; they must be baked.
And the Holland school of painting! Rambr‡nn--magnifique!
There were still other good things in Holland, as their highnesses
testified with patronizing kindness.
"Il parait qu'un certain WondËle a Ècrit des choses, des choses--mais
des choses--passablement bien!"
And the dikes! And the Katwyk sluice--gigantesque!
Whatever spare time they might have after making cheese and cooking
herrings, the Holland people liked to devote to fighting the
elements. After skating and racing this was the favorite recreation
of the nation.
I can assure the reader that the aristocratic party took their
departure thoroughly satisfied with our country. The only person who
received quite a different impression--but I will not anticipate the
feelings of our hero. Even a writer has his duties.
The first evening everything was to be illuminated. Two hundred
and fifty thousand candles were to proclaim the enthusiasm of the
people. Two hundred and fifty thousand fiery tongues were to cry:
"Hosanna! Blessed be he who comes in the name of----" In whose
name? Hosanna for whom? For what?
Well, that was a matter of indifference to the people. They knew
that there was something doing, that there was a crowd, and that
was enough. People are somewhat like children, who amuse themselves
immensely in the confusion of a "moving," of a death, or of anything
that causes commotion and excitement.
Walter had got permission to see the illumination. Unconsciously
he assumed that stupid expression which is obligatory on such
occasions. He listened to the conversation of those about him.
"That's what I call illuminating! Nine candles for such a big house!"
"Twelve!" cried another.
"No, nine."
"Twelve!"
"Nine!"
"Three--three--three--and three. Look there are twelve, or I can't
count."
"No, the three above don't count. That story is rented. I know it."
"Well--if you mean it that way. I only said that four times three
are twelve. What do you say, Hannes?"
Hannes found the calculation correct.
"How long will the candles burn?"
"Till about one o'clock, I suppose."
"I don't believe it!"
"Well, I do!"
"But I don't!----"
"Have you been in the Sukkelgracht?"
"Oh, it isn't pretty there."
"You think so? Prettier than here."
"Oh, no!"
"Yes, it is!----"
"Look there; there's a verse."
"Yes, a verse. Can you read it?"
"Certainly! Let me see, what is it?"
"I can read it, too."
"It's about 'illustrious blood'----"
"Yes, and 'our country,' and 'dedicated to honor and virtue.'"
"And 'his illustrious blood'----"
"No, there it stands--'torn from the barbarians'----"
"That comes later. 'Illustrious blood'----"
"Of Holland's hero----"
"Welcome, hero!"
"I wonder if the king looks at the candles. Do you suppose he reads
such verses and copies them?"
"Oh, he has his ministers for that."
"Or generals. He has seen or read about lots of nice things."
"As nice as here?"
"Why, of course!"
"I don't believe it."
"Well, I do."
"Do you know what I think? He likes to look at the lights too."
"You think so?"
"Yes."
"No, you don't believe that."
"Don't crowd so!"
"I can't help it. They're crowding me."
"The people are pushing and shoving as if they were crazy."
"Did you ever see the like? You know what I think? Kalver Street
ought to be as wide again as it is."
"Yes, as wide again. The street's too narrow."
"That's why everybody's scroudging so."
There was much truth in this. Pressure was high. People were mashed
and squeezed together. Those who, by reason of a lack of avoirdupois,
were less firmly attached to the ground, were lifted bodily. Walter
hung suspended in mid-air and looked over the heads of men much taller
than he.
"Are you walking on stilts?" asked a big fat woman, whose hips had
come into collision with Walter's knees. "Well, that's something."
The pressure was increasing. It seemed that the fat woman would soon
have Walter on her shoulder, like a gun; while Walter was thinking
that soon he would be roaming over the country like a knight. No one
was looking at the candles now. People were finding their amusement
in crowding and being crowded.
No, Kalver Street ought not to be widened. For, properly understood,
this crowding and pushing and shoving was the nicest part of the
whole business.
How tedious it would have been quietly to watch those two hundred
and fifty thousand candles from some comfortable position.
Our little man lay on the heads and shoulders of his brothers. Like
some aspirants to a throne, he threw himself upon the masses. But he
was beginning to feel generally uncomfortable. He wanted to hold on
fast to something, or somebody--to somebody's ears, or nose. That,
however, did not suit the masses. They didn't mind being squeezed;
but they didn't like to be held on to.
Crash!
Don't let the reader be alarmed. Walter had not burst under the strain;
but the pressure of the crowd had broken in the double doors of a
cafÈ! The irruption was terrible. The way the crowd streamed in might
be compared to the flow of molten lava. Walter described a parabolic
curve and landed on a table, without suffering any damage.
"Walter Pieterse!" cried the astonished party sitting around the table.
"Have you hurt yourself, Walter?"
No, he hadn't hurt himself; but he was rigid with surprise. Firstly,
over his ascent; secondly, over his aÎrial journey; then over his
descent among all kinds of glassware; and, finally--and that was not
the least surprising thing--he was surprised to find himself all at
once in the bosom of the Holsma family.
It was Sietske who asked him if he was hurt.
All the glasses, both great and small, were broken; but Walter was
still in one piece. Uncle Sybrand helped him to his feet. It wasn't
easy, for the press was great. However, Walter's size facilitated
matters.
The proprietor couldn't reach the scene of action, but he was able
to make his voice heard to the effect that everything broken must be
paid for. From other tables came the noise of more breaking glass. The
man was desperate. He cursed kings and masses indiscriminately.
"One bottle of wine, three lemonades, six glasses!" cried Holsma,
assuming the responsibility for Walter's unintentional work of
destruction.
Uncle Sybrand was holding up the money to pay for everything.
"Oh, M'neer, I'm afraid to go home after this," cried Walter. "How
can I pay for that? And my mother----"
In the noise and jumble Holsma did not understand; but Sietske
understood.
"Sh!" she whispered. "Papa will pay for it all. Besides, I have money;
and William, too; and Hermann. Just be quiet."
Walter still did not understand. When, under the protection of the
Holsmas, he was safe on the outside again, and the entire party had
escaped the mob by taking a side street, he reiterated that he did
dare show his face to his mother and Stoffel.
"It doesn't make any difference about the money," said Holsma. "I
will attend to that. Why, boy, you're scared half to death. You're
shaking. Come along home with us where you can rest a bit and quiet
yourself."
The distance, however, proved too short to have the desired quieting
effect on Walter.
"My mother will be angry when I come home late."
Holsma told him that a messenger should be sent to his mother at once,
so that she would know where he was.
The doctor gave him a sedative and led him into a room adjoining that
in which the Holsma family were sitting. Walter was to walk up and
down the room till he felt better; but he soon got tired of this and
did the very thing that he was not to do; he sat down on a sofa and
fell asleep.
Whether, in general, it is a good thing to keep in motion after a
fright--that I do not know. Walter, on the contrary, always felt the
need of sleep under such circumstances; and this remedy, with which
nature provided him, usually restored his mental equilibrium. Perhaps,
after all, it wasn't real sleep: he merely dreamed.
Again he was lifted up, higher and higher, borne by strong hands. A
man bit him in the hand. The fact was he had scratched his hand on
a refractory horsehair, which had become tired of acting as stuffing
for a sofa-pillow.
An angry woman assailed him with abuse. Stupid? Not stupid? We, the
masses? She let him fall. But he fell in Sietske's lap; and there
wasn't a single sliver of glassware.
He was happy--but the horsehair scratched him again. Then he heard
a voice. Was he still dreaming? Yes, dreaming again of soaring and
falling. There was Femke.
Of course there had to be something about her in his dream, and about
bleaching the clothes. Father Jansen was there, too, exhibiting to
the stars the particular garment that Femke had patched. Orion and
the Great Bear admired this specimen of her handiwork. Walter did not.
"Did you do it yourself?" he heard Sietske asking in the next room. "Or
couldn't you get through the crowd?"
"No, it was impossible to get through such a mob. I turned it over
to the man with the peddler's wagon."
What was that? Walter sat up. Father Jansen was gone; Orion, too;
and the clouds, and the "masses"; but--that voice!
He heard it again.
"I know him very well--oh, so well! He's a good boy." This he heard
Femke say!
He jumped up and ran into the room where the Holsmas were. He saw
a triangular piece of a woman's dress disappear through the door;
then the door closed.
He didn't have the courage--or was something else beside courage
necessary to ask, "Is that Femke?"
On his way home that evening Walter did not suffer in the least
from the sensation of being borne through the air; or from anything
similar. He was on the earth, very much on the earth. He felt lowly.
If he had only seen that bit of Femke's dress somewhere else, and
not at the Holsmas--not in that swell family; not in the company
of Sietske, who had so much money in her "savings-bank," nor in the
presence of the vain William, who was studying Latin!
He was brave enough to feel ashamed of himself; and that's all I can
say in his favor.
Let us now look at things from the point of view of Juffrouw
Pieterse. That lady was in the clouds. She was hoping that the
messenger who had brought her news of Walter had not been able to
find her flat at once. The idea of someone from Dr. Holsma's asking
for her through the neighborhood was decidedly pleasant. The longer
he might have had to inquire for her the better!
"Of course he was at the grocer's," she said. "Such messengers
never know where they have to go. Of course he told that the 'young
gentleman' was staying at Dr. Holsma's! And such a man always
tattles; such people don't do anything but tattle. But, as far as
I'm concerned, everybody can know it. I only mean that such people
like to tattle. But--say, Walter, how did it happen that you went
with the family? You're a nice rascal. Stoffel, what do you say?"
Stoffel made a serious face--as much as to say: "Hm! I'll have to
think over it. He's been up to something."
"I met the Holsma family in Kalver Street," Walter said. He told
the truth; he had met the family in Kalver Street. But why didn't he
tell anything about the extraordinary circumstances under which he
met them? Ah--there's the rub!
"Your back is so sticky!" complained Pietro, whose care it was to
look after the washing.
The family rubbed, and felt, and smelt; and then they declared
unanimously that Walter's back had been guilty of absorbing all kinds
of sticky gases and liquids.
"Really, it smells like lemon," said Trudie.
"And like wine!"
"And it's just coated with sugar. Boy, where have you been? Don't
you have any sense of shame? To go to visit such swell people with
lemon and sugar on your back! It's a disgrace, a disgrace."
"There was such a crowd on the street."
"That don't explain the wine on your back--nor the lemon--nor the
sugar. What say you, Trudie?"
There was complete unanimity. Timid, as usual, Walter didn't have the
courage to tell everything. Nor would this have done any good. The
understanding of the Pieterse family was like a rusty lock that no key
will open. Walter knew this, and remembering former sad experiences,
allowed the storm to rage above his head. Unfortunately he, too,
in a sense, was rusty. His nobility of character had suffered; he
had been guilty of cowardice.
He felt it. No minister could pray it away. Not even God himself
could revoke it. Everyone must act according to his conviction,
Mevrouw Holsma had said. He had not done this.
A dog would have kissed the hem of Femke's garment, meeting her after
such a long separation. For it was she. Certainly it was Femke--or----
Oh, he was hunting for or's!
Could it have been somebody else? It must have been somebody else. How
could Femke be at Dr. Holsma's?
No, no, it was she! Didn't she say that she knew me? Didn't she speak
with the same voice that I heard when she called me a dear boy and
gave me the kiss at the bridge?
She didn't know then what a coward I am! She wouldn't deny me and
betray me. She would say to everybody: That is Walter, my little
friend that I kissed that time, because he was so brave in fighting
off those boys!
And I? Oh, help me God!
No, God has nothing to do with it. I am a coward. I can't live
this way.
He thought of suicide; and in this mood he spent that Thursday
night. He arose Friday morning with the firm determination to put an
end to his unworthy existence.
Fortunately, just after breakfast he was put to work on a job that
is calculated to reconcile one with life.
He had been tried and convicted, the verdict being unanimous. The
penalty was that he should wash his jacket till it was clean. He
entered upon the task with such enthusiasm that in an hour he was
running to his mother crying triumphantly:
"Look, mother! You can't see a trace of it now!"
This little conquest dispelled all the clouds that had darkened
his life.
There are plenty of people who would gladly fall into a barrel of
lemonade if they only understood the salutary effects of cleaning
a coat.
The poor unfortunate who has never washed his own clothes does not
know what life is.
I will ask her pardon, thought Walter; and he pictured it all
to himself, wondering whether it would do for him to fall at her
feet at Holsma's, in the presence of the one who had delivered the
message. Finally, however, he quieted himself with the thought that
Femke would probably not be at the doctor's very long. He hoped to be
able then to settle the matter quietly, when only the two concerned
were present. This was not courageous, to be sure; but his punishment
was already on the way.