Part 2 (1/2)
He grunted doubtfully. ”Ugh!” he said, ”I can't be certain to a mile or so. It may be twelve or fourteen.”
”A good road?”
”Yes--a good road; but hilly. These Herren have only to keep straight forward. They cannot miss the way.”
And so he drives off, and leaves us standing in the road. The moon is now rising behind a slope of dark trees--the air is chill--an owl close by utters its tremulous, melancholy cry. Place and hour considered, the prospect of twelve or fourteen miles of a strange road, in a strange country, is anything but exhilarating. We push on, however, briskly; and Bergheim, whose good spirits are invincible, whistles and chatters, and laughs away as gaily as if we were just starting on a brilliant May morning.
”I wonder if you were ever tired in your life!” I exclaim by and by, half peevishly.
”Tired!” he echoes. ”Why, I am as tired at this moment as a dog; and would gladly lie down by the roadside, curl myself up under a tree, and sleep till morning. I wonder, by the way, what o'clock it is.”
I pulled out my fusee-box, struck a light, and looked at my watch. It was only ten o'clock.
”We have been walking,” said Bergheim, ”about half an hour, and I don't believe we have done two miles in the time. Well, it can't go on uphill like this all the way!”
”Impossible,” I replied. ”Rotheskirche is on the level of the river. We must sooner or later begin descending towards the valley of the Neckar.”
”I wish it might be sooner, then,” laughed my companion, ”for I had done a good twenty miles to-day before you overtook me.”
”Well, perhaps we may come upon some place half way. If so, I vote that we put up for the night, and leave Rotheskirche till the morning.”
”Ay, that would be capital!” said he. ”If it wasn't that I am as hungry as a wolf, I wouldn't say no to the hut of a charcoal-burner to-night.”
And now, plodding on more and more silently as our fatigue increased, we found the pine-forests gradually drawing nearer, till by and by they enclosed us on every side, and our road lay through the midst of them.
Here in the wood, all was dark--all was silent--not a breath stirred.
The moon was rising fast; but the shadows of the pines lay long and dense upon the road, with only a sharp silvery patch breaking through here and there. By and by we came upon a broad s.p.a.ce of clearing, dotted over with stacks of brushwood and great symmetrical piles of barked trunks. Then followed another tract of close forest. Then our road suddenly emerged into the full moonlight, and sometimes descending abruptly, sometimes keeping at a dead level for half a mile together, continued to skirt the forest on the left.
”I see a group of buildings down yonder,” said Bergheim, pointing to a spot deep in the shadow of the hillside.
I could see nothing resembling buildings, but he stuck to his opinion.
”That they are buildings,” he said, ”I am positive. More I cannot tell by this uncertain light. It may be a mere cl.u.s.ter of cottages, or it may be a farmhouse, with stacks and sheds close by. I think it is the latter.”
Animated by this hope, we now pushed on more rapidly. For some minutes our road carried us out of sight of the spot; but when we next saw it, a long, low, white-fronted house and some other smaller buildings were distinctly visible.
”A mountain farmstead, by all the G.o.ds of Olympus!” exclaimed Bergheim, joyously. ”This is good fortune! And they are not gone to bed yet, either.”
”How do you know that?” I asked.
”Because I saw a light.”
”But suppose they do not wish to take us in?” I suggested.
”Suppose an impossibility! Who ever heard of inhospitality among our Black Forest folk?”
”Black Forest!” I repeated. ”Do you call this the Black Forest?”
”Undoubtedly. All these wooded hills south of Heidelberg and the Odenwald are outlying spurs and patches of the old legendary Schwarzwald--now dwindling year by year. Hark! the dogs have found us out already!”
As he spoke, a dog barked loudly in the direction of the farm; and then another, and another. Bergheim answered them with a shout. Suddenly a bright light flashed across the darkness--flitted vaguely for a moment to and fro, and then came steadily towards us; resolving itself presently into a lanthorn carried by a man.