Part 11

The student who had addressed Gabriel was a strange figure.--He was the Nestor of the Prague students.--He had numbered fifty years. Devoted to the continual study of the Talmud he had found it best after a mature deliberation of five and twenty years to renounce all ideas of marriage. In early days these may very well have been wrecked upon his outward appearance, which in fact offered little that was attractive. His unusual height did not in the remotest degree harmonise with a remarkable leanness that served as a foil to an enormous humped back. His dress was moreover calculated to intensify the strange impression produced by his appearance. Of a poor family, and too devoted to study to earn a living by teaching, he was perpetually driven to make use of his friends' cast off clothes. This he did without paying the least attention to their physical stature, and so it came to pass, that his threadbare silken doublet scarce covered his hump, that the much-darned slovenly cloth-breeches turned up their ends at the knee, where they should by right have joined on to the somewhat ragged silk stockings and left a notable gap very imperfectly filled up by a linen band; that the little close fitting cap, whose original black tended towards a very significant red, rested but lightly on his head covered with thick masses of hair, and shook about at the slightest movement of the vivacious man. A grey beard, that hung untended down on his breast, was continually combed out by the fingers of his right hand, and when its bearer was engaged in any animated discussion was forced to submit to have its end turned up artistically into his mouth, and to be bitten, and in fact Reb Mordechai Wag's--that was the student's name--teeth had manifestly thinned this ornamental hair appendage. Notwithstanding this very unattractive exterior, Reb Mordechai Wag was everywhere well received. He had a quick intelligence that readily grasped the essence of Talmud truth, and a good heart. On account of his dialectics, he was a terror to all itinerant teachers who wished to lecture in Prague and a patron of all the humble students who came to the high school there. Often, when as was the custom at that time, he was invited by some member of the community to dinner, he sent some one else in his place, who, less fortunate than himself had found no host that day, and while he gave out that he was ill, chewed his small crust of dry bread at home, and laughed at his own cunning. Study of the Talmud was the one highest aim of his life. It seemed to him impossible that a student could take interest in anything besides a lecture, and even to-day, when everything was in the greatest uproar, it was perfectly indifferent to him, whether the Palatine or the Duke Maximilian gained the victory, and his thoughts ran only in their accustomed track.--It was very unpleasant for Gabriel, just in his present temper, to have fallen into the hands of the sympathetic Reb Mordechai, and yet he was unwilling to draw the attention of the students to himself by making off in too great a hurry. He enveloped himself therefore more closely in the cloak that concealed his arms, and said struggling with his impatience: "I am sorry to have missed to-day's lecture, I shall take the earliest opportunity of asking you to impart to me what the...."

"Why put it of? I will tell you at once: what have we got better to do now?"

"I thought," replied Gabriel forcing a laugh, "a moment when every one looks excitedly forward to see what will happen next, when it will be decided whether the Emperor or the Palatine...."

"What does that matter to us students?" interrupted Reb Mordechai, provoked by Gabriel's opposition.... "The Emperor will be a mild ruler.... the Palatine and the Bohemian nobility have also protected us Jews, but how can that be helped, they haven risen against the government, and you know, that is not right.--But let us leave all that to the Holy one, praised be his name--and occupy ourselves with an exposition of his words.... the master then...."

"Reb Mordechai," now interposed a young man with a dark expressive countenance, whom the others called Reb Michoel; "leave that for the present. It is a fine thing when learning is combined with knowledge of the world.... The affairs of this world are also of importance even though you cannot understand it; you come from outside," he continued turning to Gabriel, "have you perchance heard anything more authentic about the battle? It is reported, that the Hungarian cavalry was at first victorious, but that the heavy artillery of the Imperialists had silenced the fire of the small...."

"What does it signify to a student," asked Reb Mordechai vehemently, "whether the cavalry fired on the infantry, or the infantry on the cavalry, whether they first let off the small firelocks and then the great guns, or contrariwise? What rightly constituted student troubles him about such things? A student may become a Rabbi, or a butcher, or peaceful father of a family, but have you ever seen a student that became a soldier?"

A third youth who had as yet taken no share in the conversation drew nearer. "I have only been a short time in Prague," he said, "I have up to this time been studying at Frankfurt on Main, I am not aware whether the name of Gabriel Suess is known to you.... he was first an able student, and then became a soldier."

Gabriel shrunk within himself; he heard himself thus named for the first time since many years, he made no answer, but Michoel shook his head negatively. "Gabriel Suess.... Suess"--repeated Reb Mordechai thoughtfully, "was not he a bastard? I once heard something about it.... but I have no memory for such trifling matters."

"What happened to him?" asked Michoel inquisitively, "tell us, I pray you."

Reb Nochum--that was the name of the Frankfurt student--complied with Reb Michoel's urgent request, and related Gabriel's history, departing indeed here and there somewhat from the truth, but on the whole correctly enough. His story concluded thus, that Gabriel had once since his baptism been seen by early acquaintances on horseback with several Imperial troopers, but might perhaps, as he had disappeared since that time, have met his death in the Juliers and Cleves war.

"Yes, I have heard something of the kind," said Mordechai, when the Frankfurt student had finished; "but it was not known in Prague that he had become a soldier, it was reported that he had drowned himself; who knows however whether it was true.... Besides you know, he might have been declared legitimate, yes truly," added Mordechai hastily, feeling himself once more on firm ground, "The mothers declaration is worth nothing, Gabriel Suess ought not to be looked upon as a bastard, refer to the Jad-ha-Chasaka cap. 15 &c." ...

"That's all very well, Reb Mordechai," replied Michoel, "but you forget, it was a dying mother, a dying mother will not part from her child with a lie.... and moreover she had ever till then, as this story is told, loved her son.... besides, what would be the use to him? Will any one, will any one person doubt, that he is a bastard? If you had a sister or daughter, would you give her to him to wife? think of that, Reb Mordechai: _No power on earth could establish the legality of his birth before our inward convictions!_"

Michoel's glance chanced to rest upon Gabriel's face, he noticed the fiery red, and deadly pallor that coursed in quick succession over Gabriel's features.--"_Not before inward conviction_," echoed Gabriel, feebly.--Reb Mordechai had no answer to make, and a pause ensued. Gabriel might now have got away, but he would not, the conversation was too interesting to him not to hear the end of it.

"The law: that a bastard may not enter into the congregation of the Lord," began Reb Nochum again, "is unreasonable. Why should the innocent be punished for the sins of his parents? Why is he cast forth from the closest, loveliest union? Why may he never lead home a loving woman as wife? Why may he not be happy in the circle of his family? Yet consider, even in this law the spirit of the Lord comes to light, which breathes upon the faithful out of every word of Holy Scripture. Contemplate this bastard, this Gabriel Suess.... he cursed his inanimate mother: ... only a bastard could do that, no man could perpetrate such an iniquity, unless he were born in sin.... The transgression, that called him into life, urges him ever farther forward, and involuntarily he trod the paths of sin.... therefore the Lord in his wisdom may...."

"You are a thinker," Michoel interrupted the speaker, "and I am glad to have met you: such are not often found among students.... _A firm faith in God is not shaken by reasonable speculations, if they are kept properly subordinate_. But you are in error friend! God forbid, that any man should be obliged to follow a path absolutely fixed beforehand, the path of sin.--Where would his free will be? that is not so. You may not give a daughter or sister to a bastard as wife, so the commentaries enjoin us--but only that and nothing further is declared by the Talmud--that is a command, like many others, a command of the Lord's, obscure and inexplicable to man's mind.... but a bastard may be noble, great, a shining light to his people. Are you not acquainted with the article 'a bastard profoundly versed in scripture is superior in dignity to a high priest who is less deserving.' Is it not true," Michoel turned to Mordechai, "that it is so. Gabriel Suess ought not to have despaired, ought not to have acted as he did. The Lord had blessed him with earthly wealth, had endued him with a powerful intellect: he might have been a benefactor of the poor, a staff to the infirm, a teacher of his people, an example of humble submission. In the enjoyment of the highest mental activity, the undisturbed study of God's word, in strivings for a future state, he might have found consolation, and peace even in this world. _His fate was in his own hands.... it was his own fault that he perished_."

Gabriel felt as if a blazing thunderbolt had fallen in the depths of his soul. He pressed his hands spasmodically against his heart and was forced to sit down upon the curb-stone. Mordechai, whose understanding was not transcendent enough to appreciate the force of what had just been said, observed this as little as Reb Nochum, whose attention remained entirely fixed upon Michoel's words. It was only the sharp glance of this latter that noticed Gabriel's emotion, which he was incapable of controlling.--_The state of frightful excitement_, of feverish expectation in which he found himself, _had still more intensified and exaggerated the impression of those words_. He felt at this moment with the whole power of his comprehension that in the most decisive events of his life the torch of his wild hatred had been his only light, that everything had come grinning to meet him distorted by its gloomy dismal rays.... The words which might once have fallen like assuaging balsam upon his bleeding heart now struck him with the whole weight of their convincing truth. The thought, that might once have saved him, now filled him with nameless unutterable woe. The audacious confidence with which he had believed himself irresponsible for all that he had done was broken--Michoel had shown him what he might have been--how different had he become!

A pause had again ensued. Mordechai now observed with horror that he was almost too late for evening-prayer, and hurried with Reb Nochum into the nearest synagogue. Michoel remained standing before Gabriel who seemed nearly to have lost consciousness. At last he asked, recovering himself, in a dull voice: "Who are you and what is your name?"

"I am Michoel Glogau, I was born in Silesia, and have finished here my course of Talmudic study. I have been summoned to Breslau as preacher--and what is your name?"

"I am called Gabriel Mar," he replied to the interrogation in a trembling unsteady voice.

"Gabriel Mar, Mar, Mar," echoed Michoel quite softly and thoughtfully, his eyes fast fixed on Gabriel: "strange!... are you unwell, that you sit there thus languidly on the stones?"

"Yes.... no.... rather--I shall soon be better. Why do you gaze at me so fixedly? only go away, Reb Michoel, do not be disturbed on my account.... I am often wont.... to suffer so. Away, I pray you, away, away...."

Michoel went off, stopping from time to time to look round after Gabriel. He sat for some minutes as if changed to stone, but--whether it was recovered self-possession, or whether the heavy snow which began to fall had roused him--he got up suddenly, wiped the cold sweat from his forehead and looked motionlessly at the spot where Michoel had stood, as if to convince himself, that they were not fantastic dreams which hovered over him, then hurriedly strode to his dwelling. As he arrived at the end of the narrow lane that led out of the Jews-town to the Old-synagogue, he suddenly heard his old name Gabriel Suess called. Taken by surprise he involuntarily turned his head--he saw no one and hastened with redoubled speed to his house by the Old-synagogue.

"It is he!" said Michoel stepping from behind the corner of a wall that had concealed him from Gabriel's sight, "my suspicion was correct, Gabriel Mar--is Gabriel Suess. I must speak with him."

* * *

Gabriel was once more in his room by the Old-synagogue. In a few hours, since the forenoon when Schlemmersdorf had summoned him to the battle-field, what numberless events had happened within and without him. Frederick had lost his crown, the Emperor had won a highly important victory. He had been present at this weighty catastrophe, had been a witness, a participator in the hot combat, his life had been threatened on all sides. He had stood opposed to Pappenheim, the most accomplished knight in the Imperial army, and believed that he had slain him--and all these occurrences of which any one would have been sufficient to have put the most strong minded into a state of intensest excitement disappeared and left no trace in Gabriel's soul. Michoel's words had called forth a fresh flood of emotion in his overcharged breast. A new sorrow never before anticipated strove with the old grief in his breast. With the whole gigantic strength of his intellect he endeavoured to swing himself up out of the wild chaos of thoughts which would have indubitably thrown any one of weaker mould into the black night of madness.--With both his mighty hands pressed against his inflamed and glowing lofty brow, as if to force all thoughts to one point, he sat for hours by the table in strong inward struggle.

"No, no, no!" he cried out at length impetuously, "now it is too late, too late! Gabriel, thou hast gone, too far, too far, now thou canst never recede.--Thou art like that Acher, he that heard said of himself: 'Turn again ye stiffnecked children.... all but Acher!'--Yes Michoel. Thou man with a beautiful voice, with mild friendly gleaming eyes! Hadst thou stood at my mother's death-bed, hadst thou then addressed me thus.... but they had all rejected me.... Oh, Blume! Blume! Why did you treat me so? Had you but extended to me, _I will not say your hand, but your compassion_.... Alas! one single word of comfort on that day of atonement, in my fierce wrestling with the unutterable grief! Why did you not speak like this Michoel? Oh! I should have been quite another man, surely, surely, I should have been a changed man!... Blume! you might have been the preserving angel of my life.... You cast me from you, you became my demon!... Gabriel held both hands before his face: yes, _you_, _you_," he now suddenly cried, and wild fury repressed all gentle feelings, "_you_ have forced me to take the path which I tread.... you have poisoned my existence, annihilated my hopes!... If I now stand between a comfortless past and a hopeless future, I will at least turn the present to account, I will at least bring my ruined wretched life to a consistent conclusion. I will avenge myself, sweetly, fearfully.... This night I dedicate to revenge--and then--myself to certain death: the next battle I will hurl myself where the enemies' ranks are thickest, will bathe my naked breast in a warm shower of bullets. One blade, one ball will surely find its way to my heart broken with sorrow!--and when alone and forsaken, trampled by horses' feet on the bloody plain, I expire: then will I raise my failing eyes for one last defiant look, then with unbending spirit I will once more exclaim: Where art thou whom men call, all just, all mighty, all merciful? Dost thou behold? I die desolate forsaken unwept,--cursed by the woman whom once I madly loved, rejected by the father...."

This thought, that had been woven like a red thread through Gabriel's spiritual life, this thought, that had continually buoyed him with hope or racked him with despair, according as the waves of his troubled spirit were rising or falling, now worked upon Gabriel, only if possible more violently, if possible, with greater tenacity. He tore open the window in almost mad haste, and looked up to the partially clouded starry heaven: "Give me my father, if thou art Almighty, let me find him, find him _to-day_, _to-day_.... and I will offer up to thee the greatest sacrifice, the woefullest sacrifice, the sacrifice of my revenge; let me die in my father's arms ..., and I will perform my vow, yes, yes, I will bow my stiff neck as I die, _I will repent, will say that I have sinned, that thou art all merciful, all just, Almighty!_ my last breath shall be a 'Hear o Israel'.--I will die like a pious Jew: but thou must give me my father, give him _to-day_! Canst thou do that. Almighty one?"

The phrensied scornful laughter with which he accompanied these last words, echoed over the empty court, and reverberated dull and hollow from the spacious adjacent vaults of the opposite synagogue, the lofty windows of which chanced to be open.

In the highest state of bodily and mental tension Gabriel sank back in his chair, the warm stream of blood that had rushed to his head and threatened to burst his forehead, flowed again slowly back to his heart: a sudden collapse, as is often the case, followed after this indescribable excitement; after this, but later, a calm reflective mood. In this state his landlady Schoendel found him, when she opened the door, and asked: "Reb Gabriel, you are sitting in the dark, do you wish for candles?"

Accepting Gabriel's silence as consent, she disappeared directly to fetch a light.

On his return home Gabriel had laid his weapons upon the table; he wished to hide them quickly before Schoendel returned with a light. A large old bureau, belonging to his landlord, stood near him: but the key was not in the lock. Without stopping to reflect he opened its bottom drawer with a strong kick and threw the arms into it. A moment afterwards Schoendel entered with a light: Gabriel leaned heavily against the broken bureau to conceal it from Schoendel.

"Where have you been all day, Reb Gabriel?" she asked, "we have not seen you since early morning! What do you say to the news of to-day?... We in the Jews-town are absolutely without information; perhaps by to-morrow morning early the Imperialists will already occupy the circle of the Altstadt."

"Indeed, then I must make haste," said Gabriel.

"Why make haste?" enquired Schoendel with an air of surprise.

"That is quite clear," answered Gabriel recovering himself, with a forced laugh. "I have now been rather a long time in Prague and have to speak the truth not studied much Talmud. I must recommence. If the city is surrendered, everybody's attention will be diverted, I myself shall be disturbed, and my good intentions will be again postponed for some days. I will set to work this very day. At midnight I shall go to the lecture room and study all night long. Then before daybreak I shall go to prayers in the Old-synagogue. I suppose the gate will be open early enough?"

"Yes, but you must be in the Jews-town two hours before midnight or the gates will be shut ... Well, I am heartily rejoiced that you intend beginning to behave like a real student.... but you will not come to prayers to-morrow morning, I give you my word of that?"

"Why not?" asked Gabriel.

"Early to-morrow you will be sleeping a deep sleep, out of which a person does not easily awaken."--Schoendel heard her husband's voice calling her and hurried away. Gabriel had misunderstood the last words. Students, who staid awake the whole night in a lecture-room, were in the habit of falling asleep towards morning and so being late for early service. This was what Schoendel had meant jokingly to signify: but Gabriel was in no mood to understand a joke, and these words sounded gloomily and bodingly.... they accorded so strangely with the terror of the faithful armourer, with Bubna's affecting farewell, with the mournful presentiment that had many times in the course of the day taken possession of him!

The stroke of the clock on the Rathhaus indicated that hour which corresponds to eight in the evening. He wished to be in the Jews-town before the gates were shut, two hours before midnight, so that he had still some time before him. The superhuman excitement of the day, the delicious torment of the expectation of revenge, that kept all his manly energy on the stretch, could not long continue in such strength. He was afraid, that the excess of these sensations would drive him mad, would kill him. He passed his strong hand over his lofty brow, and firmly closed his eyes, as though to annihilate thought.... He sought for some object adapted to occupy his mind otherwise for two hours:--one suddenly offered itself to him. A manuscript had fallen out of the bureau when it was violently broken open.--He now noticed this for the first time. He picked up the sealed packet, it was written in Hebrew, and the envelope informed him, that it was the history, the testament of Reb Mosche, his landlady's father, which was to be first opened twenty years after his death. He locked the door of his room, pushed the chair to the table: unsealed the writings and read.--Its contents were as follows:

"On the 23d day of the month Tischri, that is the day which succeeds the feast of tents, in the year 371 according to the lesser Jewish reckoning. It will be seven and thirty years to-day since I kept my 13th birthday, and now I have reached my 50th year. On the same day too I left the ancient, worthy community of Prague--in which I had passed my youth, and where God willing, I will end my days--on a wide and weary wandering."

"I cannot employ this day more holily than by beginning to write the leaves of my biography; the leaves which I intend for you my children. When you break the seal of these writings I shall have been for years no longer among the living; but as a father's infinite love reaches far beyond the grave, so will your recollection of me survive, and you will not then refuse me the fullest sympathy.--I have written down the narrative of my life, that at least after my death there may be no mystery between us.