Part 19 (1/2)

”I'd almost like to,” said she, but hurried away nevertheless.

The old men were sitting deep in pleasant conversation; most of the crowd in the hall had changed but they stuck fast to their table and let life surge about them. Hermine went up to them laughing and cried:

”Karl wants you to come and get him; he's won a cup!”

”What! How's that?” they cried and rejoiced loudly; ”so that's what he's up to?”

”Yes,” said an acquaintance who had just come up, ”and, moreover, he won the cup with twenty-five shots, that doesn't happen every day! I was watching the young couple and saw how they did it.”

Master Frymann looked at his daughter in astonishment. ”You didn't shoot too, did you? I hope not. Women sharpshooters are all right in general, but not in particular.”

”Don't be alarmed,” said Hermine, ”I didn't shoot, I only ordered him to shoot straight.”

Hediger, however, paled with wonder and satisfaction to think that he should have a son gifted with eloquence, and famous in the use of arms, who would go forth with deeds and actions from his obscure tailor-shop into the world. Inwardly he began to sing small, and decided that he would no longer try to act the guardian. But now they all started for the trophy-temple where they really found the young hero, standing beside the buglers, the s.h.i.+ning cup already in his hand, waiting for them. And so to the tune of a merry march off they went with him to the festival hall to christen the cup, as the saying goes, and again their steps were short and firm, their fists were clenched and they looked triumphantly about them. Arrived again at their headquarters, Karl filled the cup, set it in the middle of the table and said,

”I herewith dedicate this cup to the Band of Seven, that it may never leave their banner.”

”Accepted!” they shouted. The cup began to go the round and new merriment rejuvenated the old men, who had now been in good spirits since dawn. The evening sun streamed in under the countless beams of the hall and gilded thousands of faces already transfigured with pleasure, while the resounding tones of the orchestra filled the room.

Hermine sat in the shadow of her father's broad shoulders, as modest and quiet, as if she couldn't count three. But golden lights from the sun, falling across the cup before her and flas.h.i.+ng on its golden lining and the wine, played about her rosy and glowing face and danced with every movement of the wine when the old men in the heat of discussion pounded on the table; and then one could not tell whether she herself was smiling or only the playing lights. She was now so beautiful that young men, looking about the hall, soon discovered her.

Merry groups settled themselves near her in order to keep her in sight and people asked one another: ”Where is she from? Who is the old man?

Doesn't anyone know him?” ”She's from St. Gallen; they say she's a Thurgovian,” answered one. ”No, all the people at that table are from Zurich,” said another. Wherever she looked, merry young fellows raised their hats in respectful admiration and she smiled modestly and without affectation. But when a long procession of young men pa.s.sed the table and all took off their hats she had to cast down her eyes, and still more when a handsome student from Berne suddenly appeared beside her, cap in hand, and with courteous audacity said that he had been sent by thirty friends who were sitting at the fourth table from there, to inform her, with her father's permission, that she was the most charming girl in the hall. In short, everyone did regular homage to her, the sails of the old men swelled with new triumph, and Karl's fame was almost obscured by Hermine's. But he too was to come to the front once more.

For a stir and a crush arose in the middle aisle caused by two cowherds from Entlibuch who were pus.h.i.+ng their way through the throng. They were regular b.u.mpkins with short pipes in their mouths, their Sunday jackets under their brawny arms, little straw hats on their big heads and s.h.i.+rts fastened together across their chests with silver buckles in the shape of hearts. The one who went ahead was a clodhopper of fifty and rather tipsy and unruly; for he wanted to try feats of strength with every man he saw and kept trying to hook his clumsy fingers into everything, at the same time blinking pleasantly, or at times challenging, with his little eyes. So his advance was everywhere marked by offense and confusion. Directly behind him, however, came the second, a still more uncouth customer of eighty, with a shock of short yellow curls, and he was the father of the fifty-year-old. He guided his precious son with an iron hand, without ever letting his pipe go out, by saying from time to time:

”Laddie, keep quiet! Orderly, laddie, orderly!” and at the same time pus.h.i.+ng and pulling him in accordance with his words. So he steered him with able hand through the angry sea until, just as they reached the table of the Seven, a dangerous stoppage occurred, as a group of peasants came up who wanted to call the quarrelsome fellow to account and attack him from both sides. Fearing that his laddie might do some fiendish damage, the father looked about for a place of refuge and saw the old men. ”He'll be quiet among these old baldpates,” he growled to himself, grasped his son with one fist in the small of his back and steered him in between the benches, while with the other he fanned the air behind him to keep off the irritated pursuers, for several of them had already been properly pinched, in all haste.

”With your permission, gentlemen,” said the octogenarian to the younger old men, ”let me sit down here a minute so that I can give my laddie another gla.s.s of wine. Then he will grow sleepy and be as quiet as a little lamb.”

So he wedged himself into the party with his offspring, and the son really did look about him meekly and respectfully. But presently he said:

”I want to drink out of the little silver mug over there.”

”Will you be quiet, or I'll knock the senses out of you before you can turn round,” said his father. But when Hediger pushed the full cup towards him he said: ”Well, then, if the gentlemen will allow it, take a drink, but don't guzzle it all.”

”That's a lively youngster you've got there, my good man,” said Frymann, ”how old is he?”

”Oh,” replied the father ”around New Year's he'll be about fifty-two; at least he was screaming in his cradle in 1798 when the French came, drove away my cows and burnt my house. But because I took a couple of them and knocked their heads together, I had to fly, and my wife died of misery in the meantime. That's why I have to bring up my boy alone.”

”Didn't you get a wife for him who could have helped you?”

”No, he's still too clumsy and wild; it won't do, he smashes everything to pieces.”

In the meantime the youthful ne'er-do-well had drained the fragrant cup. He filled his pipe and looked round the circle blinking most happily and peacefully. Thus he discovered Hermine and the womanly beauty that radiated from her suddenly rekindled ambition in his heart and the desire to show his strength. As his eye fell simultaneously on Karl who was sitting opposite him, he invitingly stretched out his crooked middle finger across the table.

”Stop that, Sonny! Has Satan got into you again?” cried his father wrathfully, and was about to take him by the collar, but Karl told him to let the other be and hooked his middle finger into that of the young bear and then they tried, each to pull the other over to him.