HARUN KNOWS THE WAY
Before the dawn the moon had gone down; the twinkling stars only
made the vast night blacker. A wind was tumbling the forest boughs
till they clashed and groaned like the spirits of lost souls. The
fox was crouching in his covert, the sleepy redbreast in his hollow
peered forth once to see if the dawn were near,--only blackness in
the east, and the bird again hid his drowsy head. Yet there was life
in the forest,--a living thing was moving. Here the twigs snapped;
there a thorn-bush crackled. A deer was roving, or what else? Had any
eyes pierced through the dark, they might have seen a form--a human
form--thrusting across the thickets. Witch Martha seemed to need no
eyes; if eyes she had, they were those of an owl or of an angel who
saw the hidden things of the night. On her shoulders sat the two
ravens, and once when she stumbled over a rotted bough the twain
croaked out together, but she bade them “silence” in so sharp a voice
that Zodok and Zebek kept their wisdom shut within their heads. Once
Martha’s little body ceased its gliding, and she laid her head down to
the ground and listened.
“I can hear it,--the gushing of the stream. I approach the Dragon’s
Dale.”
Then with surer motion she went onward. Soon the leafy roof was
breaking overhead. She saw the stars blink down at her. There was a
clearing, and the traced outlines of a tiny hut. And Witch Martha
stopped and looked about her.
No glow of embers from the door; no stir of human life. The long boughs
above moaned out her only welcome. But of a sudden there was a stealthy
footfall from the thicket, and then a whining cry, low and plaintive as
a child in pain, but ending with a wild and brutish wail; and Martha
turned quickly toward the sound, whilst the two ravens flapped and
cawed again.
“Harun!” cried Martha; and again in answer came that wail. Then a dark
form slipped out of the covert, a damp muzzle sniffed at Martha’s
hands, into her face peered two great coals of fire,--the great wolf’s
eyes,--and Harun whined with his delight.
“Gone; he is gone,” spoke Witch Martha. “They have borne St. Jerome to
the Wartburg, and the little lady--she is vanished too.” To which Harun
whined yet more.
“And you are lonely, and have sought for him in vain?” Another whine.
“And he is in peril, and war rages round the Wartburg?”
The wolf stood waiting, wagging assent with his tail. Then Martha
changed her voice. “Hark, Harun, we must find the little lady.” He gave
back a bark. “You must show me the way. You must sniff at this.” And
she held to his muzzle something white. “Do you understand? Yes?” for
Harun’s bark was knowing now. “You will lead the way; I will follow. We
will find the little lady together.”
Well that Martha had the airy elves or some other potent sprites to
aid. Over thorn and bush, over dale and hillock, led Harun, now swift,
now slow. Once he missed the scent, and whined hard till he found it.
When he reached the spot where Agnes had cried out the former night he
stopped; but Martha would not let him stay. Weariness, darkness,--what
were they to fright her? Then he found the way to the deserted garden,
just as the first glimmer of pale dawn spread over the Thuringerwald,
and presently Harun held his mouth close to the ground, and gave a
little cry different from any before.
“Another in the forest? Some one has joined the little lady? It is so?”
Thus Martha; and Harun answered with another cry. Then he shambled off
so rapidly, that his comrade, swift and cat-footed as she was, might
scarce keep up with him. Now the grey dawn burst into red gold, and the
gold turned into fire. Now the birdsong woke in the forest, and the
strong breeze sank to a dreamy whisper, as if to lull to the last fond
sleep ere the waking. The great beech avenues spread off into dimming
vistas, and through their midst peered out the purple-breasted hills.
But Witch Martha only looked before her keenly, and said within her
sly old breast:--
“As I feared,--to the Rothenstein and the hold of Fritz the Masterless.
What now is best? Back to the Lord Graf, and ask him for men? But in
that time there is room for many a deed.”
Hereupon Zodok shook his glossy wings and cried:--
“Good Christians, look out!
The Devil’s about!”
“Ay,” quoth his mistress; “for Fritz is no small devil, and Dame Gerda
is one greater,--the less cause to leave a dove inside their cage.”
And now her feet ran swift beside those of Harun.
Then before them, tawny, steep, the Rothenstein reared clearly, and in
front a thin, grey vapor of rising smoke. Whereat Witch Martha halted,
and her finger warned Harun that he lag behind. Soon this was the song
which Fritz the Masterless and Wolf heard whilst they placed the kettle
before the cave. At first they thought only the trees were crooning;
then that the thrushes talked. Then their stout knees knocked
together, and they began to mutter a prayer to good Saint Anne.
“I have come down the moonbeam’s path soft veering,--
Forth! forth,--from your bat-black den!--
On the wings of the night-doves silent steering,--
Swift! swift,--ere I call again!
Oh, woe to the peasant,--oh, woe to the knight!
To the lad or the lass who my summons may slight.
“I have tethered my car with the spider’s glister,--
Forth! forth,--for my weirds are fleet!--
Its driver skilled was the wood-moth’s sister,--
Swift! swift,--come my goblin’s feet!--
Oh, ’twere wiser to win the elf-king’s spite
Than that lad or lass should my summons slight!
“I have learned the lore which the wild owl whistles!
Forth! forth,--for my mercy dies!--
I have wove me a dress from the silk of thistles!
Swift! swift,--see my sprites arise!--
Oh, the hawk’s grey wing or the sable of night
Shall not save nor hide, who my summons slight!”
Now Fritz the Masterless would have faced with a stout heart an old
bear or three men; but to hear such a singing from the wood was a sore
test for any Christian. Likewise young Wolf who stood at his father’s
side let the crossbow clatter out of his hands almost into the fire.
And when they saw the black figure of Witch Martha--the redoubtable
woman whom half of Thuringia knew had Baalberith, Behemoth, Elimi, and
divers other lively devils at her constant beck--only the saints kept
their hair from rising. Such an hour! such a song! such a spell on them
already! The two stared at her with wide-open mouths and eyes.
Martha came straight on, gliding--never walking. She approached the
fire and the twain. Upon the turf from right to left she drew a circle
with her staff around them. Then she spun about on one foot till their
wicked eyes grew dizzy watching her. When halting suddenly she looked
on Fritz the Masterless, who blurted out a blunt question as to her
errand, and grew of a sudden tongue-tied; whereat Witch Martha answered
in a chant that made Fritz and Wolf helpless as young calves.
“The maiden ye hold,
In evil hands bold
Release her, release!
Or, by every spell
In heaven or red hell,
Your bating breaths cease.
“The efreets of night,
The angels of light,
Have laid the command;
From the Dawn-spirit’s hall,
At the Dragon-prince’s call,
I am sent, I am sent,
Agnes, maid, to demand!”
Had the witch’s voice power to freeze their breasts to ice? Fritz’s
hand twitched on his hunting-knife. A flash from Martha’s eye--it sank
palsied from the hilt. But Wolf was stouter hearted than his sire. So
much good silver from Jew Mordecai lost? Not without one struggle. As a
doe poises for the bound he made to leap from the charmed circle, but
his captor’s glance was too quick. He hesitated, was lost. For Martha’s
hands flew in mystic passes, the two ravens screamed together, and the
enchantress sang:--
“Cross the line, the fiends are waiting;
Death is sure, none shuns the fating
Writ up large on high!
Either now obedient bending
Soon afar Maid Agnes sending
Or thou’lt doom-struck lie.”
Then her hands twirled swifter, and now Wolf felt the chills within his
marrow.
“Moment, moment, swiftly gliding,
Mortals’ woe or weal deciding,
Never slack’ning nor abiding,--
Thou shalt tell how chance shall fly!”
“Ho, Gerda!” called Fritz, ready to give a thousand _bezants_ (if he
had had them) to loose those fetters unseen; “bring out Maid Agnes, and
quickly, in Our Lady’s name.”
He hoped the mention of that blessed name would rob the witch’s eyes
of their power, but that desire was vain. Forth ran Gerda and the
girls, but the latter shrank back into the hut a-shivering. Gerda was
of bolder stuff. She tried to brave out Martha’s gaze, to parley,
question, and refuse to give the prisoner; for even she was not bold
enough to deny that they held the maid. But her shrill tongue tripped,
her proud front fell, and she grew chill also at the witch’s new
singing:--
“Woman bold, I see them flutter,
Now they menace, now they mutter,--
Elf and goblin round thy head!
Witless wight, thine eyes are holden,
Thou see’st not the silk-spells moulden,
Woven with the shuttles golden,
By which captive thou’lt be led.”
Then Witch Martha went on to sing of other awful things right on the
edge of happening, if Dame Gerda stopped to bicker longer. And the
goodwife whimpered out that--
“They were poor folks, had meant no ill, and had found the little lady
in the forest. Let the good mother take her, with their blessing, and
unloose the spell.”
But here right from the hut ran Agnes,--fearless, glad, and flew to
Martha with wide-open arms. The witch laughed once,--a laugh that made
Dame Gerda sure the two ravens were a pair of fiends, very anxious for
her own and her children’s souls. Then the sorceress moved about the
circle, drawing the staff from left to right, and so lifting a great
load also from Fritz’s and Wolf’s blank minds. She took Maid Agnes by
the hand; the ravens cawed again. She flourished thrice on high, and
they saw her vanishing in the forest. But, even when hid, her song
pealed clearly:--
“Up away! the wood-thrush calls us,
Over ash and beech and thorn!
Up away! the king-oak calls us,
Singing with his leaves to morn.
For the wind-lord wakes,
Through the greenwood shakes
All the trees,
In his glees
As he greets the fire-kissed dawn!
“Swift away! the west wind bears us
Over mount and dale and hill.
Swift away! the flower-breath bears us
Where the bees their sweet stores fill.
For the wood-queen wakes,
And her rose-crown shakes,
Laughing clear,
To my ear,--
For her trilling lips are a bubbling rill!”
* * * * *
“Dear Martha,” said Agnes, “what did you do to Fritz and to Wolf and to
Gerda? By your songs could you really turn them into stone or give them
to the gnomes and to the brownies?”
Martha perked her head and answered:--
“Ah, little lady, whether I could or I could not, those three _thought_
I could, and by the lizard’s spawn” (at which uncanny oath Agnes
herself grew creepy), “it is what men and moles think, not what things
are, that makes all the rift betwixt popes and peasants.”
“Dear Martha,” said Agnes, sorely troubled, “say that you really do not
have friendship with the Devil.”
“Friendship little, but acquaintance;” yet here the smile which spread
on Witch Martha’s face grew tremulous, she stood stock still, took the
little maid in her arms, and kissed her. “Oh! may you never know! Oh!
may you never lose! Oh! may you always see the brightness of Our Lady’s
heaven, and forget that the dear God beside His mercy has His wrath!”
“What are you saying?” The child looked perplexed.
“Foolishness!” spoke Martha; but her little body shook with one long
sigh. “Ah, little one, I have frighted you. But I will never fright you
more. So be comforted, for, by Our Blessed Lord, I have never set eye
on gnome nor efreet nor devil. Only I use the wit that heaven sends,
and by its aid I saved you. And now hearken to strange news.”
Then she told Agnes how the Wartburg was beset by her father; of the
sore plight of Jerome; and how they must make all haste to reach the
besiegers ere the last attack, “lest the holy Jerome become a saint in
heaven in sorry deed.”
Agnes did not weep when she heard of Jerome’s danger.
“He must not die yet,” was all she said; “for I heard him praying and
saying that I was a temptress sent from Satan. He must never go up to
visit the dear God and tell Him that.” And for a while Witch Martha
found her feet too slow for those of the child.
They threaded the forest, not in the circling blind mazes which Agnes
had followed when alone, but in the straight path which Harun found for
them, and it was not long before they heard the brooklet brawling, and
Agnes clapped her hands.
“The hut, the stream, and the Dragon’s Dale! The dear Dragon’s Dale!”
But they might not tarry, and Martha saw with joy that the red banner
of Ulrich still was flying above the Wartburg.
“Not too late!”
Again they plunged into the greenwood, but now by familiar paths.
Agnes’s feet were heavy now, but she did not falter. Presently there
was a clatter of armour, and tall men-at-arms in plated hauberks stood
across their path,--an outpost of the besiegers.
“Who comes!”
But when Witch Martha declared who her companion might be, and when
the soldiers saw that the maid was indeed of their own master’s face
and eyes, and that her dress, though torn, was that of a great lady,
the dapper Freiherr, their young chief, swept his plumed cap across
his knees in knightly homage, and the shout flew up the slopes of the
Wartburg, through all the assailants’ camp:--
“Found! found! found! the little lady, the Gräfin!”
Then how Graf Ludwig turned from the attack, with his feet almost in
the castle court, there is no need to tell.
[Illustration]