It was about ten o'clock, but, although the season was mid-summer and
the moon must have already risen, dark as only a moonless night in
autumn could be. And with autumnal chillness the wind blew over the rye
stubble, and the rain, which had just begun to fall again with renewed
violence, beat into their faces.
"Button your coat up," said Gotthold to his companion, who was swaying
to and fro uncomfortably in his seat. "You seem very much heated."
"Because I have kept buttoned up all the evening," answered the
Assessor. "I mean it in a literal sense, on account of the ten thousand
thalers I have had in my breast-pocket; figuratively I might have been
somewhat more so; but for all that, I beg of you, my dear friend, give
me some explanation of Brandow's mysterious conduct. He actually turned
me out of doors! And why? I don't understand it. After we had been on
the most cordial terms the whole evening; after we had been, so to
speak, hand-and-glove. And everything settled! The whole large sum paid
in cash, down to the last penny, which, to be sure, is the greatest
mystery of all. And he is to have the money from Wollnow! Did Wollnow
mystify me? And why? I no more see any light in all this than I can see
my hand before my eyes. Horrible darkness!"
"The moon has been up an hour already," said Hinrich Scheel.
"And is that why you have no lamps on the carriage?"
"Herr von Plueggen had none either."
"You thought your pipe would give us light enough, didn't you?"
"I needn't smoke, sir."
"Then don't; I can't say that the odor of your canaster is very
agreeable."
"Folks like us can't smoke nice tobacco, like fine gentlemen," said
Hinrich Scheel, emptying his pipe so roughly that the sparks flew in
all directions through the darkness, and thrusting it into his
breast-pocket.
"Isn't this the same fellow who drove us here this afternoon?" asked
the Assessor in a low tone.
"The same," answered Gotthold; "and I should advise you to use the same
precaution we adopted on the way here."
But the Assessor was not in the mood to follow Gotthold's counsel. The
intoxication, from which the scene with Brandow had only roused him for
a short time, returned with redoubled power, now that he was exposed to
the cold night air. He began to abuse Brandow, in whose favor he had
always spoken at the convent, who but for him would have been obliged
to leave Dollan a year ago, who was greatly indebted to him in every
respect, and now repaid him with the basest ingratitude. But his
friendship and protection were now at an end. He still had the fine
fellow under his thumb. The lease must yet be renewed. To be sure,
Brandow had paid this time, but what guarantee of future security was
there to be had from a man who, in his precarious situation, loaded
himself with a gambling debt of five thousand thalers? He need only
give the monks this piece of information, and Brandow would be cast
off. Did Brandow expect to satisfy the convent by the assurance that he
would win the race on Brownlock! Brownlock, nothing but Brownlock!
Brandow had not won yet, and they were strict in their rules at the
race-course. Only last year, young Klebenitz--eldest son of a nobleman
though he was--had been excluded because it got noised abroad that he
had been twenty-four hours late in paying a gambling debt. It was still
very doubtful whether Redebas would have the five thousand thalers he
had just won from Brandow lying on his desk by to-morrow noon.
Gotthold had tried in vain to interrupt his loquacious companion, and
was therefore not at all displeased when the latter, after stammering a
few incoherent words, suddenly relapsed into silence, and leaning back
in his corner seemed to wish to sleep off his intoxication. Gotthold
spread his own travelling-rug over his knees, turned up the collar of
his overcoat, and gazing out into the darkness, resigned himself to his
thoughts. Brandow's conduct was incomprehensible to him also. What
could have induced him to insult the Assessor in this way?--a man whose
favor he had every reason to keep. Had he been drunk too? But if so,
the fit of intoxication must have come upon him very suddenly, and had
at all events assumed a singular form--the form of the hatred which
veils itself under the garb of cold politeness. Or, had all this
concerned him alone? Had he been so anxious to get his enemy out of the
house that he had even suffered it to cost him the friendship of the
influential man? That was a solution so simple and natural, so unlike
the cold calculating man; but if it was not drunkenness, or hate that
wishes to satisfy itself, what was it?
And suppose it were hate that desires to satisfy itself at any cost?
Suppose this hate was directed towards her, no less than him, nay
perhaps even more. Suppose this terrible man wanted to clear the house
of guests in order to give free course to his furious hate, to be able
to riot in some fell vengeance.
Gotthold half started from his seat, groaning aloud, and then sank back
again, reproaching himself for conjuring up such horrible apparitions.
That was certainly the most improbable of all. Whatever means he had
used the night before to break down the pride of one of the proudest of
women, he had conquered, he was master of the situation; he might be
satisfied! And was he not? He now knew the secret of coining gold,
cunning alchemist that he was; and how soon he might be again in a
situation where he would be obliged to make use of his art, that very
evening had proved. What becomes of the water you take in your hand?
What becomes of the money you give a gambler? Cousin Boslaf had been
right.
But the more Gotthold endeavored to push aside the terrible thought as
improbable, nay impossible, the more distinctly the scene appeared
before his eyes. He saw him creep towards her chamber, cautiously open
the door, glide into the room, up to the bed. Merciful Heaven! what was
that? He had distinctly heard his name called in a piercing cry of
mortal agony.
It was only a trick of his excited fancy, a horned owl perhaps, which,
hurled along by the storm on noiseless wings, had swept close over his
head, and in its surprise uttered the cry. This, or something of the
sort.
Undoubtedly; but fancy continued the cruel sport none the less
zealously, and converted the long-drawn howling and hollow roaring of
the tempest over the moor, the rustling of the clumps of broom by the
wayside, the creaking of the carriage, and the panting of the weary
horses, into ghostly voices which muttered terrible words, voices and
words such as might be uttered by the shapes which glided through the
grayish black twilight over the masses of rock on the moor on the right
of the carriage, or flitted on the left through the impenetrable
darkness that brooded coldly over the morass.
The road had been gradually ascending for some time, and according to
Gotthold's belief, they had almost reached the crest of the hill, when
the horses suddenly stopped, snorting violently.
"What's the matter?" asked Gotthold.
Hinrich Scheel's only reply was several violent lashes, which urged the
horses onward again, but only a few paces, then they stopped once more,
snorting still louder, and pressing backward so that the carriage moved
a little down the hill.
"The damned jades!" cried Hinrich Scheel, who was no longer on his seat
on the box, but standing on the right of the carriage.
"What is the matter, I say?" cried Gotthold, starting up.
"Nothing at all," shouted Hinrich. "Sit still. The damned jades! This
little pull! I'll teach them to shirk. Sit still, we shall be up
directly! Damn the whip!"
Hinrich, who had been lashing the horses frantically, now disappeared
from the side of the carriage, the frightened animals made a few more
bounds forward--suddenly the vehicle leaned towards the left--farther
and farther; like a flash of lightning the thought passed through
Gotthold's mind, that if the carriage should upset here, it would
undoubtedly fall sixty feet down the slope into the morass; he already
had his hand on the back to swing himself out on the right, but would
not save himself without his companion. But the latter did not rise,
did not even stir. He seized him to drag him out of the carriage.
Too late! There was a dull roaring, rushing, rattling, as if the
earth itself was opening to engulf carriage, horses, and men; a
whizzing sound in their ears--a terrible shock, a falling, rolling,
crashing,--another crashing, rolling, shattering, and then--the horror
was over!