FRIEDMUND IN THE CLOUDS
THE stone was quarried high on the mountain, and a direct road was made
for bringing it down to the water-side. The castle profited by the road
in accessibility, but its impregnability was so far lessened. However,
as Ebbo said, it was to be a friendly harbour, instead of a robber crag,
and in case of need the communication could easily be destroyed. The
blocks of stone were brought down, and wooden sheds were erected for the
workmen in the meadow.
In August, however, came tidings that, after two amputations of his
diseased limb, the Kaisar Friedrich III. had died—it was said from over
free use of melons in the fever consequent on the operation. His death
was not likely to make much change in the government, which had of late
been left to his son. At this time the King of the Romans (for the title
of Kaisar was conferred only by coronation by the Pope, and this
Maximilian never received) was at Innspruck collecting troops for the
deliverance of Styria and Carinthia from a horde of invading Turks. The
Markgraf of Wurtemburg sent an intimation to all the Swabian League that
the new sovereign would be best pleased if their homage were paid to him
in his camp at the head of their armed retainers.
Here was the way of enterprise and honour open at last, and the young
barons of Adlerstein eagerly prepared for it, equipping their vassals and
sending to Ulm to take three or four men-at-arms into their pay, so as to
make up twenty lances as the contingent of Adlerstein. It was decided
that Christina should spend the time of their absence at Ulm, whither her
sons would escort her on their way to the camp. The last busy day was
over, and in the summer evening Christina was sitting on the castle steps
listening to Ebbo’s eager talk of his plans of interesting his hero, the
King of the Romans, in his bridge, and obtaining full recognition of his
claim to the Debateable Strand, where the busy workmen could be seen far
below.
Presently Ebbo, as usual when left to himself, grew restless for want of
Friedel, and exclaiming, “The musing fit is on him!—he will stay all
night at the tarn if I fetch him not,” he set off in quest of him,
passing through the hamlet to look for him in the chapel on his way.
Not finding Friedel there, he was, however, some way up towards the tarn,
when he met his brother wearing the beamy yet awestruck look that he
often brought from the mountain height, yet with a steadfast expression
of resolute purpose on his face.
“Ah, dreamer!” said Ebbo, “I knew where to seek thee! Ever in the
clouds!”
“Yes, I have been to the tarn,” said Friedel, throwing his arm round his
brother’s neck in their boyish fashion. “It has been very dear to me,
and I longed to see its gray depths once more.”
“Once! Yea manifold times shalt thou see them,” said Ebbo.
“Schleiermacher tells me that these are no Janissaries, but a mere
miscreant horde, even by whom glory can scarce be gained, and no peril at
all.”
“I know not,” said Friedel, “but it is to me as if I were taking my leave
of all these purple hollows and heaven-lighted peaks cleaving the sky.
All the more, Ebbo, since I have made up my mind to a resolution.”
“Nay, none of the old monkish fancies,” cried Ebbo, “against them thou
art sworn, so long as I am true knight.”
“No, it is not the monkish fancy, but I am convinced that it is my duty
to strive to ascertain my father’s fate. Hold, I say not that it is
thine. Thou hast thy charge here—”
“Looking for a dead man,” growled Ebbo; “a proper quest!”
“Not so,” returned Friedel. “At the camp it will surely be possible to
learn, through either Schlangenwald or his men, how it went with my
father. Men say that his surviving son, the Teutonic knight, is of very
different mould. He might bring something to light. Were it proved to
be as the Schneiderlein avers, then would our conscience be at rest; but,
if he were in Schlangenwald’s dungeon—”
“Folly! Impossible!”
“Yet men have pined eighteen years in dark vaults,” said Friedel; “and,
when I think that so may he have wasted for the whole of our lives that
have been so free and joyous on his own mountain, it irks me to bound on
the heather or gaze at the stars.”
“If the serpent hath dared,” cried Ebbo, “though it is mere folly to
think of it, we would summon the League and have his castle about his
ears! Not that I believe it.”
“Scarce do I,” said Friedel; “but there haunts me evermore the
description of the kindly German chained between the decks of the
Corsair’s galley. Once and again have I dreamt thereof. And, Ebbo,
recollect the prediction that so fretted thee. Might not yon
dark-cheeked woman have had some knowledge of the East and its captives?”
Ebbo started, but resumed his former tone. “So thou wouldst begin thine
errantry like Sir Hildebert and Sir Hildebrand in the ‘Rose garden’?
Have a care. Such quests end in mortal conflict between the unknown
father and son.”
“I should know him,” said Friedel, enthusiastically, “or, at least, he
would know my mother’s son in me; and, could I no otherwise ransom him, I
would ply the oar in his stead.”
“A fine exchange for my mother and me,” gloomily laughed Ebbo, “to lose
thee, my sublimated self, for a rude, savage lord, who would straightway
undo all our work, and rate and misuse our sweet mother for being more
civilized than himself.”
“Shame, Ebbo!” cried Friedel, “or art thou but in jest?”
“So far in jest that thou wilt never go, puissant Sir Hildebert,”
returned Ebbo, drawing him closer. “Thou wilt learn—as I also trust to
do—in what nameless hole the serpent hid his remains. Then shall they be
duly coffined and blazoned. All the monks in the cloisters for twenty
miles round shall sing requiems, and thou and I will walk bareheaded,
with candles in our hands, by the bier, till we rest him in the Blessed
Friedmund’s chapel; and there Lucas Handlein shall carve his tomb, and
thou shalt sit for the likeness.”
“So may it end,” said Friedel, “but either I will know him dead, or
endeavour somewhat in his behalf. And that the need is real, as well as
the purpose blessed, I have become the more certain, for, Ebbo, as I rose
to descend the hill, I saw on the cloud our patron’s very form—I saw
myself kneel before him and receive his blessing.”
Ebbo burst out laughing. “Now know I that it is indeed as saith
Schleiermacher,” he said, “and that these phantoms of the Blessed
Friedmund are but shadows cast by the sun on the vapours of the ravine.
See, Friedel, I had gone to seek thee at the chapel, and meeting Father
Norbert, I bent my knee, that I might take his farewell blessing. I had
the substance, thou the shadow, thou dreamer!”
Friedel was as much mortified for the moment as his gentle nature could
be. Then he resumed his sweet smile, saying, “Be it so! I have oft read
that men are too prone to take visions and special providences to
themselves, and now I have proved the truth of the saying.”
“And,” said Ebbo, “thou seest thy purpose is as baseless as thy vision?”
“No, Ebbo. It grieves me to differ from thee, but my resolve is older
than the fancy, and may not be shaken because I was vain enough to
believe that the Blessed Friedmund could stoop to bless me.”
“Ha!” shouted Ebbo, glad to see an object on which to vent his secret
annoyance. “Who goes there, skulking round the rocks? Here, rogue, what
art after here?”
“No harm,” sullenly replied a half-clad boy.
“Whence art thou? From Schlangenwald, to spy what more we can be robbed
of? The lash—”
“Hold,” interposed Friedel. “Perchance the poor lad had no evil
purposes. Didst lose thy way?”
“No, sir, my mother sent me.”
“I thought so,” cried Ebbo. “This comes of sparing the nest of thankless
adders!”
“Nay,” said Friedel, “mayhap it is because they are not thankless that
the poor fellow is here.”
“Sir,” said the boy, coming nearer, “I will tell _you_—_you_ I will
tell—not him who threatens. Mother said you spared our huts, and the
lady gave us bread when we came to the castle gate in winter, and she
would not see the reiters lay waste your folk’s doings down there without
warning you.”
“My good lad! What saidst thou?” cried Ebbo, but the boy seemed dumb
before him, and Friedel repeated the question ere he answered: “All the
lanzknechts and reiters are at the castle, and the Herr Graf has taken
all my father’s young sheep for them, a plague upon him. And our folk
are warned to be at the muster rock to-morrow morn, each with a bundle of
straw and a pine brand; and Black Berend heard the body squire say the
Herr Graf had sworn not to go to the wars till every stick at the ford be
burnt, every stone drowned, every workman hung.”
Ebbo, in a transport of indignation and gratitude, thrust his hand into
his pouch, and threw the boy a handful of groschen, while Friedel gave
warm thanks, in the utmost haste, ere both brothers sprang with headlong
speed down the wild path, to take advantage of the timely intelligence.
The little council of war was speedily assembled, consisting of the
barons, their mother, Master Moritz Schleiermacher, Heinz, and Hatto. To
bring up to the castle the workmen, their families, and the more valuable
implements, was at once decided; and Christina asked whether there would
be anything left worth defending, and whether the Schlangenwalden might
not expend their fury on the scaffold, which could be newly supplied from
the forest, the huts, which could be quickly restored, and the stones,
which could hardly be damaged. The enemy must proceed to the camp in a
day or two, and the building would be less assailable by their return;
and, besides, it was scarcely lawful to enter on a private war when the
imperial banner was in the field.
“Craving your pardon, gracious lady,” said the architect, “that blame
rests with him who provokes the war. See, lord baron, there is time to
send to Ulm, where the two guilds, our allies, will at once equip their
trained bands and despatch them. We meanwhile will hold the knaves in
check, and, by the time our burghers come up, the snake brood will have
had such a lesson as they will not soon forget. Said I well, Herr
Freiherr?”
“Right bravely,” said Ebbo. “It consorts not with our honour or rights,
with my pledges to Ulm, or the fame of my house, to shut ourselves up and
see the rogues work their will scatheless. My own score of men, besides
the stouter masons, carpenters, and serfs, will be fully enough to make
the old serpent of the wood rue the day, even without the aid of the
burghers. Not a word against it, dearest mother. None is so wise as
thou in matters of peace, but honour is here concerned.”
“My question is,” persevered the mother, “whether honour be not better
served by obeying the summons of the king against the infidel, with the
men thou hast called together at his behest? Let the count do his worst;
he gives thee legal ground of complaint to lay before the king and the
League, and all may there be more firmly established.”
“That were admirable counsel, lady,” said Schleiermacher, “well suited to
the honour-worthy guildmaster Sorel, and to our justice-loving city; but,
in matters of baronial rights and aggressions, king and League are wont
to help those that help themselves, and those that are over nice as to
law and justice come by the worst.”
“Not the worst in the long run,” said Friedel.
“Thine unearthly code will not serve us here, Friedel mine,” returned his
brother. “Did I not defend the work I have begun, I should be branded as
a weak fool. Nor will I see the foes of my house insult me without
striking a fair stroke. Hap what hap, the Debateable Ford shall be
debated! Call in the serfs, Hatto, and arm them. Mother, order a good
supper for them. Master Moritz, let us summon thy masons and carpenters,
and see who is a good man with his hands among them.”
Christina saw that remonstrance was vain. The days of peril and violence
were coming back again; and all she could take comfort in was, that, if
not wholly right, her son was far from wholly wrong, and that with a free
heart she could pray for a blessing on him and on his arms.