Brigadier Frederick, The Dean's Watch

I took this all in with one look, and then I continued to call, to cry, and at last I fell into a chair, utterly exhausted, saying to myself that all was lost, my daughter, my son-in-law, my country – all, and that it would be better for me to die, too.

My cries had been heard; some people came up stairs, Father and Mother Michel, I think. Yes, it was they who sent for the doctor. I was like one distracted, without a sign of reason; my ears were singing; it seemed to me that I was asleep and was having a horrible dream.

Long after the voice of Dr. Carrière roused me from my stupor; he said:

"Take him away! Do not let him see this! Take him away!"

Some people took me by the arms; then I grew indignant, and I cried:

"No, sir; I will not be taken away! I want to stay, she is my daughter! Have you children, that you tell them to take me away? I want to save her! I want to defend her!"

"Let him alone," said the doctor, sadly; "let the poor fellow alone. But you must be silent," he said to me; "your cries may kill her."

I fell back in my seat, murmuring:

"I will not cry out any more, sir; I will say nothing. Only let me stay by her; I will be very quiet."

A few minutes after, Dr. Carriére left the room, making a sign to the others to withdraw.

A great many people followed him, a small number remained. I saw them moving to and fro, arranging the bed and raising the pillows, whispering among themselves. The silence was profound. Time passed. A priest appeared with his assistants; they began to pray in Latin. It was the last offices of the church. The good women, kneeling, uttered the responses.

All disappeared. It was then about five o'clock in the evening. The lamp was lighted. I rose softly and approached the bed.

My daughter, looking as beautiful as an angel, her eyes half open, still breathed; I called her in a whisper: "Marie-Rose! Marie-Rose!" crying bitterly as I spoke.

It seemed every minute as if she was about to look at me and answer, "Father!"

But it was only the light that flickered on her face. She no longer stirred. And from minute to minute, from hour to hour, I listened to her breathing, which was growing gradually shorter and shorter. I looked at her cheeks and her forehead, gradually growing paler. At last, uttering a sigh, she lifted her head, which was slightly drooping, and her blue eyes opened slowly.

A good woman, who was watching with me, took a little mirror from the table and held it to her lips; no cloud dimmed the surface of the glass; Marie-Rose was dead.

I said nothing, I uttered no lamentations, and I followed like a child those who led me into the next room. I sat down in the shadow, my hands on my knees; my courage was broken.

And now it is ended. I have told you all, George.

Need I tell you of the funeral, the coffin, the cemetery? and then of my return to the little room where Marie-Rose and I had lived together; of my despair at finding myself alone, without relations, without a country, without hope, and to say to myself, "You will live thus always – always until the worms eat you!"

No, I cannot tell you about that; it is too horrible. I have told you enough.

You need only know that I was like a madman, that I had evil ideas which haunted me, thoughts of vengeance.

It was not I, George, who cherished those terrible thoughts; it was the poor creature abandoned by heaven and earth, whose heart had been torn out, bit by bit, and who knew no longer where to lay his head.

I wandered through the streets; the good people pitied me; Mother Ory gave me all my meals. I learned that later. Then I did not think of anything; my evil thoughts did not leave me; I talked of them alone, sitting behind the stove of the inn, my chin on my hands, my elbows on my knees, and my eyes fixed on the floor.

God only knows what hatred I meditated. Mother Ory understood all, and the excellent woman, who wished me well, told M. d'Arence about me.

One morning, when I was alone in the inn parlour, he came to talk things over with me, reminding me that he had always shown himself very considerate towards me, that he had always recommended me as an honest man, a good servant, full of zeal and probity, in whom one could repose perfect trust, and that he hoped it would be that way till the end; that he was sure of it; that a brave, just man, even in the midst of the greatest misfortunes, would show himself the same that he was in prosperity; that duty and honour marched before him; that his greatest consolation and his best was to be able to say to himself: "I am cast down, it is true; but my courage remains to me; my good conscience supports me; my enemies themselves are forced to confess that fate has been unjust to me."

He talked to me in this manner for a long time, pacing up and down the room; and I, who had not shed a tear at my daughter's funeral, I burst out crying.

Then he told me that the time had come to depart; that the sight of the Prussians only embittered my nature; that he would give me a letter of recommendation for one of his intimate friends in Paris; that I would obtain there a situation with a small salary, either on the railway or elsewhere; and that in this way, when my pension was paid to me, I could live in peace, not happy, but far from all that reminded me unceasingly of my misfortunes.

I was ready to do anything that he wished, George, but he wanted nothing but for my own good.

So I set out, and for the last three years I have been one of the superintendents of the Eastern Railway Station.

XL

When I arrived in the midst of the great confusion after the siege, I had the pain of seeing a terrible thing, the recollection of which adds to my suffering – Frenchmen fighting against Frenchmen. The great city was in flames, and the Prussians outside looked at this sight with a barbarous joy.

"There is no longer any Paris," they said; "no longer any Paris."

The horrible envy that gnawed these people was satisfied.

Yes, I have seen that! I thought that it was all over with us; I shuddered at it. I cried, "The Almighty has determined that France shall descend into the abyss!"

But that, thanks to Heaven, has also passed away. The recollection remains; let us hope that it will never perish.

And that was not all. After these great calamities I was obliged to witness, as I fulfilled the duties of my post, pass, day by day, before my eyes, the great emigration of our brothers of Alsace and Lorraine; men, women, children, old men, by thousands, going to earn their living far from their native land – in Algeria, in America, everywhere.

Our poor countrymen all recognised me by my face; they said, "He is one of our people."

The sight of them does me good also; it is like a breath from one's native land of good and wholesome air. We shook hands. I pointed them out the hotel where one can live cheaply; I rendered them all the little services that one can render to friends of a day, who will retain a kind remembrance of him who held out his hand to them.

And in the evening, when I went back to my little room under the roof, and thinking about these things, I am still glad at not being quite useless in this world; it is my only consolation, George; sometimes this thought gives me a good night's rest.

Other days, when the weather is gloomy, when it rains, when it is cold, or when I have met in the street the bier of a young girl, with its white wreath, then sad thoughts get the upper hand. I wrap my old cloak around me when my work is over, and I wander aimlessly through the streets, among the people who are all occupied by their own affairs and pay no attention to any one. I walk very far, sometimes to the Arc de Triomphe, sometimes to the Garden of Plants, and I return utterly exhausted. I fall asleep, trying not to think of the happy days of the past, for those remembrances make my heart throb even in a dream, and suddenly I awake, covered with perspiration, and crying:

"All is over. You have no longer a daughter. You are alone in the world."

I am obliged to rise, to light my lamp, and to open the window in order to calm myself a little, to soothe myself and to restore myself to reason.

Sometimes, too, I dream that I am at the forest house with Jean Merlin and Marie-Rose. I see them; I talk to them; we are happy. But when I awake – do not let us talk of it; what is ended cannot return.

Things will go on this way as long as they can. I shall not be buried with the old people, neither with Jean; nor with my daughter. We will all be scattered. This thought also gives me pain.

I must confess, George, that our brothers of Paris have received us very well; they have helped us, they have aided us in a hundred ways; they have done all that they could for us. But after such terrible disasters, they themselves having been so severely tried, the poverty was still very great; for a long time in the garrets of La Villette, of La Chapelle, and of the other suburbs, we suffered from cold and hunger.

To-day the greatest portion of the stream of emigration has passed; almost all the labourers have got work; the women and the old people have found a refuge, and the children are receiving instruction in the public schools.

Others are always coming, the emigation will last as long as the annexation, for Frenchmen cannot bow their heads like the Germans under the Prussians' despotism, and the annexation will last long if we continue to dispute over party questions instead of uniting together in the love of our fatherland.

But do not let us speak of our dissensions; that is too sad.

The only thing that I have still to say to you before ending this sorrowful story is, that in the midst of my misfortunes, I do not accuse the Almighty; no, the Almighty is just; we deserve to suffer. Whence came all our misfortunes? From one man who had taken an oath before God to obey the laws, and who trampled them under his feet, who had those killed who defended them, and transported far away to the islands thousands of his fellow beings whose courage and good sense he feared. Well, this man we approved of; we voted for him, not once but twenty times; we took, so to speak, his evil actions upon ourselves; we threw aside justice and honour; we thought, "Interest does everything; this man is shrewd; he has succeeded; we must support him."

When I remember that I voted for that wretch, knowing that it was not just, but afraid of losing my place, when I remember that, I cry, "Frederick, may God forgive you! You have lost everything, friends, relatives, country – everything. Confess that you deserved it. You were not ashamed to support the man who caused thousands of Frenchmen, as honest as yourself, also to lose their little all. You voted for strength against justice; you must bow beneath the law that you accepted. And, like millions of others, you, too, gave that man the right to declare war; he did so. He staked you, your country, your family, your possessions, those of all Frenchmen in the interests of his dynasty, without thinking of anything, without reflecting or taking any precautions; he lost the game. Pay and be silent. Do not reproach the Almighty with your own stupidity and injustice; beat your breast and bear your iniquity." That is what I think.

May others profit by my example; may they always nominate honest people to represent them; may honesty, disinterestedness and patriotism come before anything else; people who are too cunning are often dishonest, and people who are too bold, who do not fear to cry out against the laws, are also capable of upsetting them and of putting their own will in the place of them.

That is the best advice to be given to the French; if they profit by it all will go well, we will regain our frontiers; if they do not profit by it, that which happened to the Alsatians and Lorrainers will happen to them also, province by province; they may repent, but it will be too late.

As to the Germans, they will reap what they have sown. Now they are at the pinnacle of power; they made all Europe tremble, and they are foolish enough to rejoice at it. It is very dangerous to frighten every one; we learned it at our own expense; they will learn it in their turn. Because Bismark has succeeded in his enterprises, they look upon him as a kind of a god; they will not see that this man employed only dishonest means: strategy, lies, espionage, corruption and violence. Nothing is ever firm that is erected on such a foundation.

But to tell all this or nothing to the Germans would come to the same thing; they are intoxicated by their victories, and will only awake when Europe, wearied by their ambition and by their insolence, will rise to bring them to reason; then they will be forced to acknowledge, as we have acknowledged ourselves, that, if strength sometimes overwhelms right, justice is eternal.

THE END OF BRIGADIER FREDERICK

THE DEAN'S WATCH

I

The day before the Christmas of 1832, my friend Wilfrid, his double-bass slung over his shoulder, and I with violin under my arm, were on our way from the Black Forest to Heidelberg. An extraordinary quantity of snow had fallen that season. As far as our eyes could see over the great desert plain before us, not a trace of the route, either of road or path, was to be discovered. The north wind whistled its shrill aria about our ears with a monotonous persistence, and Wilfrid, with wallet flattened against his thin back, his long heron-legs stretched to the utmost, and the visor of his little flat cap pulled down over his nose, strode along before me, humming a gay air from "Ondine." Every now and then he turned his head with a grim smile, and cried:

"Comrade, play me the waltz from 'Robin' – I wish to dance!"

A peal of laughter always followed, and then the brave fellow would push on again with fresh courage. I toiled on behind in his footsteps, with the snow up to my knees, and my spirits sinking lower and lower every moment.

The heights about Heidelberg had begun to appear on the distant horizon, and we were hoping to reach the town before nightfall, when we heard the gallop of a horse behind us. It was about five o'clock, and great flakes of snow were whirling about in the gray light. Soon the rider was within twenty steps. He slackened his pace, examining us out of one corner of his eye. We also examined him.

Imagine a big man with red beard and hair, wrapped in a brown cloak, over which was loosely thrown a pelisse of fox-skins; on his head a superb cocked-hat; his hands buried in fur gloves reaching to the elbows. On the croup of his stout stallion was strapped a well-filled valise. Evidently he was some burly sheriff, or burgomaster.

"Hey, my lads!" he cried, drawing one of his big hands from the muff which hung across his saddle-bow, and clapping his charger's neck, "we are going to Heidelberg, I see, to try a little music."

Wilfrid eyed the traveller askance.

"Is that any affair of yours, sir?" he answered, gruffly.

"Eh? yes; I should have a piece of advice to give you."

"Well, you can keep it till it's asked for," retorted Wilfrid, quickening his pace.

I cast a second glance at our new companion. He looked exactly like a great cat, with ears standing out from his head, his eyelids half closed, and a long, bristling mustache; altogether he had a sort of purring, paternal air.

"My friend," he began again, this time addressing me, "the best thing you can do is to return whence you came."

"Why, sir?"

"The famous maestro Prinenti, from Novare, has announced a grand Christmas concert at Heidelberg. Everybody is going to it; you will not get a single kreutzer."

This was too much for Wilfrid.

"A fig for your maestro, and all the Prinentis in this world!" he cried, snapping his fingers. "This lad here, with his long curls and blue eyes, and not a hair yet on his chin, is worth an army of your Italian charlatans. Though he never played outside the Black Forest, he can handle a bow with the first musician in Europe, and will draw melody from his violin such as was never heard before in Heidelberg."

"Hear, hear!" cried the stranger.

"It is just as I tell you," said Wilfrid, blowing on his fingers, which were red with the cold.

Then he set out to run, and I followed him as best I might, thinking he wished to make game of the traveller, who kept up with us, however, at a little trot.

In this way we went on in silence for more than half a league. Suddenly the stranger cried out, in a harsh voice:

"Whatever your talents may be, go back to the Black Forest. We have vagabonds enough in Heidelberg already without you. It is good advice I give you – you had best profit by it."

Wilfrid was about to make an angry retort, but the rider had started off at a gallop, and already reached the grand avenue of the elector. At the same moment, a great flock of crows rose from the plain, and seemed to follow him, filling the air with their loud cries.

About seven o'clock in the evening we reached Heidelberg. There, in fact, we found posted on all the walls Prinenti's flaming placards, "Grand Concert, Solo, etc., etc." We wandered about among the different ale-houses, in which we met several musicians from the Black Forest, all old comrades of ours, who immediately engaged us to play in their band. There were old Bremer, the violoncellist; his two sons, Ludwig and Carl, capital second violins; Heinrich Siebel, the clarinet-player; and big Berthe with her harp. Wilfrid with his bass-viol, and myself as first violin, made up the troupe.

It was agreed that we should all go together, make one purse, and divide after Christmas. Wilfrid had already engaged a room for himself and me. It was on the sixth story of the little tavern "Pied-du-Mouton," in the middle of the Holdergasse, and was only a garret, though, luckily, it had a sheet-iron stove, in which we lighted a fire to dry ourselves.

While we were sitting quietly over the fire, roasting chestnuts and discussing a pot of wine, who should come tripping up the stairs and knock at the door but little Annette, the maid of the inn, in scarlet petticoat and black-velvet bodice, with cheeks like roses, and lips as red as cherries! Next moment she had thrown herself into my arms with a cry of joy.

We were old friends, the pretty Annette and I, for we were both from the same village, and, to say truth, my heart had long been captive to her bright eyes and coquettish airs.

"I saw you go up just now," she said, drawing a stool to my side, "and here I am, come for a minute's talk with you."

With that she began such a string of questions about this one and that – in fact, about every one in our village – that I declare to you it was as much as I could do to answer the half of them. Every little while she would stop and look at me with such a tender air – we would have been there till this time, had not suddenly Mother Gréder Dick screamed from the bottom of the stairs:

"Annette, Annette, are you ever coming?"

"This minute, madame, this minute," cried the poor child, jumping up in a fright. She gave me a little pat on the cheek, and flew to the door. But, just as she was going out, she stopped.

"Ah!" she cried, turning back, "I forgot to tell you. Have you heard – ?"

"What?"

"The death of our pro-recteur Zahn?"

"Well, what is that to us?"

"Ah, yes; but take care, sir, take care – if your papers are not all right! To-morrow morning, at eight o'clock, they will come to ask for them. They have arrested, oh! so many people during the last two weeks. The pro-recteur was assassinated yesterday evening, in the library, at the Cloister of Saint-Christophe. Last week the old priest, Ulmet Elias, who lived in the Jews' quarter, was killed in the same way. Only a few days before that they murdered the nurse, Christina Haas, and Seligmann, the agate-merchant of the Rue Durlach. So, my poor Kasper," she added, with a tender glance, "take good care of yourself, and be sure that your papers are all right."

All the while she was speaking, the cries below continued.

"Annette, O Annette, will you come? Oh, the miserable creature, to leave me here all alone!"

And now, too, we could hear the shouts of the guests in the saloon calling for wine, beer, ham, sausages. Annette saw that she must go, and ran down the stairs as quickly as she had come up.

"Mon Dieu! mon Dieu!" I heard her soft voice answering her mistress, "what can be the matter, madame, that you should make such an outcry? One would think the house were on fire."

Wilfrid closed the door after her, and came back to his seat. We looked at each other with some uneasiness.

"This is strange news," said he at last. "At any rate, your papers are all in order?"

"Certainly," I replied, and showed him my pass.

"Good! There is mine, I had it viséed before we left. But still, all these murders bode no good to us. I am afraid we shall make but a poor business here. Many families must be in mourning, and then, besides all these annoyances, the trouble which the police will give us."

"Bah!" cried I, "you take too dismal a view of everything."

We continued to talk about these strange events until long past midnight. The fire in our little stove lighted up the angles of the roof, the square dormer window with its three cracked panes of glass, the mattress spread upon the bare boards, the blackened beams overhead, the little fir table, which cast an unsteady shadow on the worm-eaten floor. A mouse, attracted by the heat, darted back and forth like an arrow along the wall. We could hear the wind without, whistling and bellowing around the high chimney-stacks, sweeping the snow from the gutters beneath the eaves in misty swirls. I was dreaming of Annette. Silence had fallen upon us. Suddenly Wilfrid, throwing off his coat, cried:

"It is time to sleep; put another stick of wood in the stove, and let us go to bed."

"Yes, that is the best thing we can do," said I, and began to pull off my boots. Two minutes afterward we were stretched on the mattress, the coverings drawn up to our chins, and a great log under our heads for a pillow. Wilfrid was asleep in a moment. The light from the little stove blazed up and died away, the wind redoubled its violence without, and, in the midst of dreams of Annette, I, too, in my turn, slept the sleep of the just.

About two o'clock in the morning I was awakened by a strange noise. At first I thought it was a cat running along the gutters; but, my ear being close to the rafters, I could not remain long in doubt. Some one was walking over the roof. I touched Wilfrid with my elbow to awaken him.

"Hist!" whispered he, pressing my hand.

He also had heard the noise. The fire was just dying out, the last feeble flame flickered on the crumbling walls. I was on the point of springing from the bed, when, at a single blow, the little window, kept closed by a fragment of brick, was pushed open. A pale face, with red hair, eyes gleaming with phosphorescent light, and quivering cheeks appeared in the opening, and looked about the room. Our fright was so great that we could not utter a sound. The man passed first one leg, then the other, through the window, and descended into the garret so carefully that not a board creaked under his footsteps.

This man, with heavy, round shoulders, short and thick-set, his face wrinkled and set like a tiger couched to spring, was none other than the rider who had overtaken us on the road to Heidelberg. But what a change in his appearance since then! In spite of the excessive cold, he was in his shirtsleeves, a pair of breeches belted about his waist, woollen stockings, and shoes with silver buckles. A long knife, flecked with blood, glittered in his hand.

Wilfrid and I gave ourselves up for lost. But he did not seem to see us under the shadow of the sloping roof, although the fire was fanned again into a blaze by the current of cold air from the open window. The intruder seated himself on a stool, cowering and shivering in a strange way. Suddenly his greenish-yellow eyes fixed themselves on me, his nostrils dilated; for more than a minute, which seemed to me an age, he stared at me. The blood stood still in my veins. Then at last, turning towards the fire, he coughed with a husky, hoarse sound, like that which a cat makes, without moving a muscle of his face. Drawing a watch from the fob of his pantaloons, he seemed to look at the hour, and then, whether from absence of mind or some other reason, I know not, laid it upon the table. At length, rising from his seat with an air of uncertainty, he looked towards the window, appeared for a moment to hesitate, and then passed out of the door, leaving it wide open behind him.