Werner called another. I no longer saw anything. Some one helped me
to get my arms in my coat-sleeves. Then I found myself upon the
stairs, and while Catharine asked me what had poised, I sobbed aloud
and would have fallen from top to bottom if Aunt Gredel had not
supported me.
We went out by the rear-way and crossed the little court. I wept like
a child, and Catharine did too. Out in the hall, in the shadow, we
stopped to embrace each other.
Aunt Gredel cried out:
"Oh the robbers! They are taking the lame and the sick. It is all the
same to them; next they will take us."
A crowd began collecting, and Sepel the butcher, who was cutting meat
in the stall, said:
"Mother Gredel, in the name of Heaven keep quiet. They will put you in
prison."
"Well, let them put me there!" she cried, "let them murder me. I say
that men are fools to allow such outrages!"
But the _sergent-de-ville_ was coming up, and we went on together
weeping. We turned the corner of Cafe Hemmerle, and went into our own
house. People looked at us from the windows and said, "There is
another one who is going."
Monsieur Goulden knowing that Aunt Gredel and Catharine would come to
dine with us the day of the revision, had had a stuffed goose and two
bottles of good Alsace wine sent from the "Golden Sheep." He was sure
that I would be exempted at once. What was his surprise, then, to see
us enter together in such distress.
"What is the matter?" said he, raising his silk cap over his bald
forehead, and staring at us with eyes wide open.
I had not strength enough to answer. I threw myself into the arm-chair
and burst into tears. Catharine sat down beside me, and our sobs
redoubled.
Aunt Gredel said:
"The robbers have taken him."
"It is not possible!" exclaimed Monsieur Goulden, letting fall his arms
by his side.
"It shows their villainy," replied my aunt, and growing more and more
excited, she cried, "Will a revolution never come again? Shall those
wretches always be our masters?"
"Calm yourself, Mother Gredel," said Monsieur Goulden. "In the name of
Heaven don't cry so loud. Joseph, tell me how it happened. They are
surely mistaken; it cannot be otherwise. Did Monsieur the Mayor and
the hospital surgeon say nothing?"
I told the history of the letter between my sobs, and Aunt Gredel, who
until then knew nothing of it, again shrieked with her hands clinched.
"O the scoundrel! God grant that he may cross my threshold again. I
will cleave his head with my hatchet."
Monsieur Goulden was astounded.
"And you did not say that it was false. Then the story was true?"'
And as I bowed my head without replying he clasped his hands, saying:
"O youth! youth! it thinks of nothing. What folly! what folly!"
He walked around the room; then sat down to wipe his spectacles, and
Aunt Gredel exclaimed:
"Yes, but they shall not have him yet! Their wickedness shall yet go
for nothing. This very evening Joseph shall be in the mountains on the
way to Switzerland."
Monsieur Goulden hearing this, looked grave; he bent his brows, and
replied in a few moments: "It is a misfortune, a great misfortune, for
Joseph is really lame. They will yet find it out, for he cannot march
two days without falling behind and becoming sick. But you are wrong,
Mother Gredel, to speak as you do and give him bad advice."
"Bad advice!" she cried. "Then you are for having people massacred
too!"
"No," he answered; "I do not love wars, especially where a hundred
thousand men lose their lives for the glory of one. But wars of that
kind are ended. It is not now for glory and to win new kingdoms that
soldiers are levied, but to defend our country, which had been put in
danger by tyranny and ambition. We would gladly have peace now.
Unhappily, the Russians are advancing; the Prussians are joining them:
and our friends, the Austrians, only await a good opportunity to fall
upon our rear. If we do not go to meet them, they will come to our
homes; for we are about to have Europe on our hands as we had in '93.
It is now a different matter from our wars in Spain, in Russia, and in
Germany; and I, old as I am, Mother Gredel, if the danger continues to
increase and the veterans of the republic are needed, I would be
ashamed to go and make clocks in Switzerland while others were pouring
out their blood to defend my country. Besides, remember this well,
that deserters are despised everywhere; after having committed such an
act, they have no kindred or home anywhere. They have neither father,
mother, church nor country. They are incapable of fulfilling the first
duty of man--to love and sustain their country, even though she be in
the wrong."
He said no more at the moment, but sat gravely down.
"Let us eat," he exclaimed, after some minutes of silence. "It is
striking twelve o'clock. Mother Gredel and Catharine, seat yourselves
there."
They sat down, and we began dinner. I thought of the words of Monsieur
Goulden, which seemed right to me. Aunt Gredel compressed her lips,
and from time to time gazed at me as if to read my thoughts. At length
she said:
"I despise a country where they take fathers of families after carrying
off the sons. If I were in Joseph's place, I would fly at once."
"Listen, Aunt Gredel," I replied; "you know that I love nothing so much
as peace and quiet, but I would not, nevertheless, run away like a
coward to another country. But, notwithstanding, I will do as
Catharine says; if she wishes me to go to Switzerland, I will go."
Then Catharine, lowering her head to hide her tears, said in a low
voice:
"I would not have them call you a deserter."
"Well, then, I will do like the others," I cried; "and as those of
Phalsbourg and Dagsberg are going to the wars, I will go."
Monsieur Goulden made no remark.
"Every one is free to do as he pleases," said he, after a while; "but I
am glad that Joseph thinks as I do."
Then there was silence, and toward two o'clock Aunt Gredel arose and
took her basket. She seemed utterly cast down, and said:
"Joseph, you will not listen to me, but no matter. With God's grace,
all will yet be well. You will return if He wills it, and Catharine
will wait for you."
Catharine wept again, and I more than she; so that Monsieur Goulden
himself could not help shedding tears.
At length Catharine and her mother descended the stairs, and Aunt
Gredel called out from the bottom:
"Try to come and see us once or twice again, Joseph."
"Yes, yes," I answered, shutting the door.
I could no longer stand. Never had I been so miserable, and even now,
when I think of it, my heart chills.