The mother slept in her chamber. Thoma sat at the table in the
living-room before a large, handsomely-bound book, filled with
beautiful pictures. It was an illustrated history of the last war,
which Anton had given her. Many book-marks lay between the leaves, at
the places where the battles in which Anton had taken part were
described. There were many soldiers in the pictures, but Anton's face
was not distinguishable. She had heard that he was not at the
celebration to-day. It was on her account. What could she do for him?
There seemed to be nothing that she could do. Thoma had intended to
read, but she could not bring herself to it; and to-day it horrified
her to see in the pictures the men murdering each other, and shell
tearing them to pieces.
For a long time she stared before her into the empty air. She was weary
after the harvest work. Her head sank forward on the open book, and she
fell asleep.
A cry awoke her; for her mother was calling,
"Landolin! For God's sake! don't do it! Stop!"
Thoma hastened to her mother, who looked at her wildly, as though she
scarcely knew who and where she was.
"Is it you?" she asked at length. "Where is your father?"
"At the celebration."
"He must come home. Has not Peter found him yet? Where is he staying so
long? Oh, Thoma! The eye-glass on the little black ribbon! He kneeled
down on Titus, and tried to choke him! The farmer must come home,
home!" she cried, weeping. She was in a fever. Thoma succeeded in
quieting and undressing her. With chattering teeth she begged that a
messenger should be sent for her husband, and Thoma obeyed her request.
Boys and girls rode past the house in the decorated wagons,
singing,--the people on foot talked and laughed,--while in the house
the farmer's wife lay in a fever. But at last, with burning cheeks, she
fell asleep.
Thoma had ordered the messenger she sent for her father to go for the
physician at the same time. The messenger found the doctor, but not the
farmer.
It was late at night when Landolin crossed the bridge on his way home.
He hit against the railing, and cried, "Oho!" as though it were some
one blocking his way.
"Are you drunk?" he said, laying his finger on his nose; then laughed
and went on.
The meadow was empty; not a soul was there. Landolin crossed it with a
steady step, and ascending the speaker's stand--
"All you people there together, may the devil catch you all! Hutadi!
Hutadi!" he cried, in a terribly strong voice. He seemed to expect that
some one would come and fight with him; but no one came; so he
descended from the stand, and went up the mountain road.
A sober Landolin struggled with a tipsy one.
"Fie! shame on you, Landolin!" he said to himself, "what a fellow you
are--Fie upon you! A man like you drunk on the open road, before
everybody--Let me alone, Titus! I don't want anything to do with
you--I'm not drunk. And if I am--no--. The cursed wine at the Sword--at
that time--Go away--away!--If you don't go, Vetturi, you shall--There,
there you lie--"
He bent over to pick up a stone, and fell down.
Getting up again, he said to himself, as he would to an unruly horse:
"Keep quiet, quiet! So, so!" And then he cried angrily: "If I only had
a horse! At home there are twelve, fourteen horses and one colt--Who's
coming behind me? Who is it? If you have any courage, come on! 'Tisn't
fair to hit from behind. Come in front of me! Come, and I'll fight with
you!"
From the steep hillside a stone rolled into the road, loosened by who
knows what animal's flying foot? Landolin clenched both hands in his
hair, that rose on end with fright, and cried:
"Are you throwing stones? That's it, self-defense! self-defense! Just
wait!"
He stopped and said, "Don't drive yourself crazy, or they'll put you in
an asylum."
A railroad train rushed through the valley. The locomotive's red lights
appeared like the flaming eyes of a snorting monster. Landolin stared
at it, and in doing so he became calmer, for ghosts cannot haunt a
locomotive's track. The sweat of fear ran down his face, and with
loudly beating heart he hastened up the road. At length he breathed
more freely; he took off his hat; a refreshing breeze blew over the
plateau: he saw his house, and said:
"The light is still burning; they are waiting for me; supper is on the
table. Control yourself; you are Landolin of Reutershoefen. You have a
wife called Johanna, a daughter called Thoma, and a son called Peter. I
care nothing for the hammering in my temples. I am not drunk--tipsy:
three times three are nine--and one more is ten. You lie when you say I
am drunk. I can walk straight. So, there is the well. Oh well, you are
happy; you can stay at home, and yet be full all the time. Ha! ha!
Hush! don't try to make jokes. Hush!"
Again he stood at the well, and cooled his hands and face, then went
into the yard, and without stopping to speak to the dog, passed up the
steps and into the living-room, where he found the doctor sitting at
the table, writing.
"What is it? There's nothing the matter?"
"Your wife is sick."
"It is not serious?"
"I don't know yet. At any rate you must keep quiet. You may go in; but
don't talk much, and come right away again."
The walls, the tables, the chairs, seemed to reel; but his step was
firm as he went to his wife's side and said:
"Walderjoergli sent his greeting to you; he charged me with it twice."
He had sufficient self-control to say all this with a steady voice, and
his wife replied:
"I know it already; the doctor told me that Walderjoergli was there.
Where he is, everything goes right. Thank him. Good-night."
Landolin threw himself into the great chair out in the living-room, and
cried:
"Oh, what misery it is to come home and find your wife sick, and no
joy, no welcome, nothing!"
He looked at Thoma, who, without moving or making a sound, stood
leaning against the bedroom door.
To what a pass has it come when, in the midst of such misery, the
father thinks of himself alone!
Landolin arose wearily and whispered to Thoma:
"You've noticed that I'm tipsy? Yes, I am; and if you do not treat me
affectionately, as you used to, I will be so every day,--then you'll
see what will come of it!"
"I cannot keep you from doing what you choose, either to yourself or to
us."
"Bring me something to drink. I'm very thirsty," ordered Landolin.
Thoma went, and returned with a bottle.
"That is nothing but water! But never mind; you're right. You're
sharp."
For the first time in many days, father and daughter laughed together,
but their laughter soon died away.