THE LOVE OF ULRICH NEBENDAHL By Jerome K. Jerome Author of "Paul Kelver, " "Three Men in a Boat, " etc. , etc. NEW YORK DODD, MEAD & COMPANY 1909 COPYRIGHT, 1904, BY JEROME K. JEROME COPYRIGHT, 1908, BY DODD, MEAD &COMPANY Published, September, 1908 THE LOVE OF ULRICH NEBENDAHL Perhaps of all, it troubled most the Herr Pfarrer. Was he not the fatherof the village? And as such did it not fall to him to see his childrenmarry well and suitably? marry in any case. It was the duty of everyworthy citizen to keep alive throughout the ages the sacred hearth fire, to rear up sturdy lads and honest lassies that would serve God, andthe Fatherland. A true son of Saxon soil was the Herr PastorWinckelmann--kindly, simple, sentimental. "Why, at your age, Ulrich--at your age, " repeated the Herr Pastor, setting down his beer and wiping with the back of his hand his largeuneven lips, "I was the father of a family--two boys and a girl. Younever saw her, Ulrich; so sweet, so good. We called her Maria. " The HerrPfarrer sighed and hid his broad red face behind the raised cover of hispewter pot. "They must be good fun in a house, the little ones, " commented Ulrich, gazing upward with his dreamy eyes at the wreath of smoke ascending fromhis long-stemmed pipe. "The little ones, always my heart goes out tothem. " "Take to yourself a wife, " urged the Herr Pfarrer. "It is your duty. Thegood God has given to you ample means. It is not right that you shouldlead this lonely life. Bachelors make old maids; things of no use. " "That is so, " Ulrich agreed. "I have often said the same unto myself. Itwould be pleasant to feel one was not working merely for oneself. " "Elsa, now, " went on the Herr Pfarrer, "she is a good child, pious andeconomical. The price of such is above rubies. " Ulrich's face lightened with a pleasant smile. "Aye, Elsa is a goodgirl, " he answered. "Her little hands--have you ever noticed them, HerrPastor--so soft and dimpled. " The Pfarrer pushed aside his empty pot and leaned his elbows on thetable. "I think--I do not think--she would say no. Her mother, I have reasonto believe--Let me sound them--discreetly. " The old pastor's redface glowed redder, yet with pleasurable anticipation; he was a bornmatchmaker. But Ulrich the wheelwright shuffled in his chair uneasily. "A little longer, " he pleaded. "Let me think it over. A man should notmarry without first being sure he loves. Things might happen. It wouldnot be fair to the maiden. " The Herr Pfarrer stretched his hand across the table and laid it uponUlrich's arm. "It is Hedwig; twice you walked home with her last week. " "It is a lonesome way for a timid maiden; and there is the stream tocross, " explained the wheelwright. For a moment the Herr Pastor's face had clouded, but now it clearedagain. "Well, well, why not? Elsa would have been better in some respects, butHedwig--ah, yes, she, too, is a good girl a little wild perhaps--it willwear off. Have you spoken with her?" "Not yet. " "But you will?" Again there fell that troubled look into those dreamy eyes. This timeit was Ulrich who, laying aside his pipe, rested his great arms upon thewooden table. "Now, how does a man know when he is in love?" asked Ulrich of thePastor who, having been married twice, should surely be experienced uponthe point. "How should he be sure that it is this woman and no other towhom his heart has gone out?" A commonplace-looking man was the Herr Pastor, short and fat and bald. But there had been other days, and these had left to him a voice thatstill was young; and the evening twilight screening the seared face, Ulrich heard but the pastor's voice, which was the voice of a boy. "She will be dearer to you than yourself. Thinking of her, all else willbe as nothing. For her you would lay down your life. " They sat in silence for a while; for the fat little Herr Pfarrer wasdreaming of the past; and long, lanky Ulrich Nebendahl, the wheelwright, of the future. That evening, as chance would have it, Ulrich returning to hishomestead--a rambling mill beside the river, where he dwelt alone withancient Anna--met Elsa of the dimpled hands upon the bridge that spansthe murmuring Muhlde, and talked a while with her, and said good-night. How sweet it had been to watch her ox-like eyes shyly seeking his, topress her dimpled hand and feel his own great strength. Surely heloved her better than he did himself. There could be no doubt of it. Hepictured her in trouble, in danger from the savage soldiery that cameand went like evil shadows through these pleasant Saxon valleys, leavingdeath and misery behind them: burnt homesteads; wild-eyed women, hidingtheir faces from the light. Would he not for her sake give his life? So it was made clear to him that little Elsa was his love. Until next morning, when, raising his eyes from the whirling saw, therestood before him Margot, laughing. Margot, mischief-loving, wayward, that would ever be to him the baby he had played with, nursed, andcomforted. Margot weary! Had he not a thousand times carried hersleeping in his arms. Margot in danger! At the mere thought his faceflushed an angry scarlet. All that afternoon Ulrich communed with himself, tried to understandhimself, and could not. For Elsa and Margot and Hedwig were not the onlyones by a long way. What girl in the village did he not love, if it cameto that: Liesel, who worked so hard and lived so poorly, bullied by hercross-grained granddam. Susanna, plain and a little crotchety, who hadnever had a sweetheart to coax the thin lips into smiles. The littleones--for so they seemed to long, lanky Ulrich, with their pleasantways--Ulrich smiled as he thought of them--how should a man love onemore than another? The Herr Pfarrer shook his head and sighed. "That is not love. Gott in Himmel! think what it would lead to? The goodGod never would have arranged things so. You love one; she is the onlywoman in the world for you. " "But you, yourself, Herr Pastor, you have twice been married, " suggestedthe puzzled wheelwright. "But one at a time, Ulrich--one at a time. That is a very differentthing. " Why should it not come to him, alone among men? Surely it was abeautiful thing, this love; a thing worthy of a man, without which a manwas but a useless devourer of food, cumbering the earth. So Ulrich pondered, pausing from his work one drowsy summer's afternoon, listening to the low song of the waters. How well he knew the windingMuhlde's merry voice. He had worked beside it, played beside it all hislife. Often he would sit and talk to it as to an old friend, readinganswers in its changing tones. Trudchen, seeing him idle, pushed her cold nose into his hand. Trudchenjust now was feeling clever and important. Was she not the mother of thefive most wonderful puppies in all Saxony? They swarmed about his legs, pressing him with their little foolish heads. Ulrich stooped and pickedup one in each big hand. But this causing jealousy and heartburning, laughing, he lay down upon a log. Then the whole five stormed over him, biting his hair, trampling with their clumsy paws upon his face; tillsuddenly they raced off in a body to attack a floating feather. Ulrichsat up and watched them, the little rogues, the little foolish, helplessthings, that called for so much care. A mother thrush twittered abovehis head. Ulrich rose and creeping on tiptoe, peeped into the nest. Butthe mother bird, casting one glance towards him, went on with her work. Whoever was afraid of Ulrich the wheelwright! The tiny murmuring insectsbuzzed to and fro about his feet. An old man, passing to his eveningrest, gave him "good-day. " A zephyr whispered something to the leaves, at which they laughed, then passed upon his way. Here and there a shadowcrept out from its hiding-place. "If only I could marry the whole village!" laughed Ulrich to himself. But that, of course, is nonsense! The spring that followed let loose the dogs of war again upon theblood-stained land, for now all Germany, taught late by common sufferingforgetfulness of local rivalries, was rushing together in a mighty wavethat would sweep French feet for ever from their hold on German soil. Ulrich, for whom the love of woman seemed not, would at least be thelover of his country. He, too, would march among those brave sternhearts that, stealing like a thousand rivulets from every German valley, were flowing north and west to join the Prussian eagles. But even love of country seemed denied to Ulrich of the dreamy eyes. His wheelwright's business had called him to a town far off. He had beenwalking all the day. Towards evening, passing the outskirts of a wood, a feeble cry for help, sounding from the shadows, fell upon his ear. Ulrich paused, and again from the sombre wood crept that weary cry ofpain. Ulrich ran and came at last to where, among the wild flowers andthe grass, lay prone five human figures. Two of them were of the GermanLandwehr, the other three Frenchmen in the hated uniform of Napoleon'sfamous scouts. It had been some unimportant "affair of outposts, " oneof those common incidents of warfare that are never recorded--neverremembered save here and there by some sad face unnoticed in the crowd. Four of the men were dead; one, a Frenchman was still alive, thoughbleeding copiously from a deep wound in the chest that with a handful ofdank grass he was trying to staunch. Ulrich raised him in his arms. The man spoke no German, and Ulrichknew but his mother tongue; but when the man, turning towards theneighbouring village with a look of terror in his half-glazed eyes, pleaded with his hands, Ulrich understood, and lifting him gentlycarried him further into the wood. He found a small deserted shelter that had been made bycharcoal-burners, and there on a bed of grass and leaves Ulrich laidhim; and there for a week all but a day Ulrich tended him and nursed himback to life, coming and going stealthily like a thief in the darkness. Then Ulrich, who had thought his one desire in life to be to kill allFrenchmen, put food and drink into the Frenchman's knapsack and guidedhim half through the night and took his hand; and so they parted. Ulrich did not return to Alt Waldnitz, that lies hidden in the forestbeside the murmuring Muhlde. They would think he had gone to the war;he would let them think so. He was too great a coward to go back to themand tell them that he no longer wanted to fight; that the sound of thedrum brought to him only the thought of trampled grass where dead menlay with curses in their eyes. So, with head bowed down in shame, to and fro about the moaning land, Ulrich of the dreamy eyes came and went, guiding his solitary footstepsby the sounds of sorrow, driving away the things of evil where theycrawled among the wounded, making his way swiftly to the side of pain, heedless of the uniform. Thus one day he found himself by chance near again to forest-girdledWaldnitz. He would push his way across the hills, wander through itsquiet ways in the moonlight while the good folks all lay sleeping. Hisfoot-steps quickened as he drew nearer. Where the trees broke he wouldbe able to look down upon it, see every roof he knew so well--thechurch, the mill, the winding Muhlde--the green, worn grey with dancingfeet, where, when the hateful war was over, would be heard again theSaxon folk-songs. Another was there, where the forest halts on the brow of the hill--afigure kneeling on the ground with his face towards the village. Ulrichstole closer. It was the Herr Pfarrer, praying volubly but inaudibly. Hescrambled to his feet as Ulrich touched him, and his first astonishmentover, poured forth his tale of woe. There had been trouble since Ulrich's departure. A French corps ofobservation had been camped upon the hill, and twice within the monthhad a French soldier been found murdered in the woods. Heavy had beenthe penalties exacted from the village, and terrible had been theColonel's threats of vengeance. Now, for a third time, a soldier stabbedin the back had been borne into camp by his raging comrades, and thisvery afternoon the Colonel had sworn that if the murderer were nothanded over to him within an hour from dawn, when the camp was to breakup, he would before marching burn the village to the ground. The HerrPfarrer was on his way back from the camp where he had been to plead formercy, but it had been in vain. "Such are foul deeds!" said Ulrich. "The people are mad with hatred of the French, " answered the HerrPastor. "It may be one, it may be a dozen who have taken vengeance intotheir own hands. May God forgive them. " "They will not come forward--not to save the village?" "Can you expect it of them! There is no hope for us; the village willburn as a hundred others have burned. " Aye, that was true; Ulrich had seen their blackened ruins; the oldsitting with white faces among the wreckage of their homes, the littlechildren wailing round their knees, the tiny broods burned in theirnests. He had picked their corpses from beneath the charred trunks ofthe dead elms. The Herr Pfarrer had gone forward on his melancholy mission to preparethe people for their doom. Ulrich stood alone, looking down upon Alt Waldnitz bathed in moonlight. And there came to him the words of the old pastor: "She will be dearerto you than yourself. For her you would lay down your life. " And Ulrichknew that his love was the village of Alt Waldnitz, where dwelt hispeople, the old and wrinkled, the laughing "little ones, " where dweltthe helpless dumb things with their deep pathetic eyes, where the beeshummed drowsily, and the thousand tiny creatures of the day. They hanged him high upon a withered elm, with his face towards AltWaldnitz, that all the village, old and young, might see; and then tothe beat of drum and scream of fife they marched away; and forest-hiddenWaldnitz gathered up once more its many threads of quiet life and wovethem into homely pattern. They talked and argued many a time, and some there were who praised andsome who blamed. But the Herr Pfarrer could not understand. Until years later a dying man unburdened his soul so that the truthbecame known. Then they raised Ulrich's coffin reverently, and the young men carriedit into the village and laid it in the churchyard that it might alwaysbe among them. They reared above him what in their eyes was a grandmonument, and carved upon it: "Greater love hath no man than this. "