Part 20

At that he lurched on again, and came into the path between the hedges of broom. There he pretended to fall down, and as he did so, he placed his trap upon the side from which the wolf was coming. Then he loaded his crossbow, and went forward about ten paces, standing up again in a drunken posture. He still went on staggering to right and to left, nor did he cease to retch and to hiccup, but all the time his mind was taut as a bowstring, and he was all eyes and ears for what might be going to happen. Yet he saw nothing save the dark clouds racing in the sky, and again that large and heavy form of blackness coming down the path towards him. Neither did he hear aught but the dismal wailing of the wind, and the angry thunder of the sea, and the sound that the shells on the path gave forth beneath a heavy step that tapped upon them. Feigning to be about to sit down, Ulenspiegel fell forwards on to the path, very heavily like a drunken man. After that he heard as it were a piece of iron clinking close to his ear, and then the sound of the trap shutting, and a human voice that cried out in the darkness.

"The werwolf," said Ulenspiegel to himself. "He's got his front paws caught in the trap. Now he is howling and trying to run away, dragging the trap with him. But he shall not escape." And he drew his crossbow and shot an arrow at the legs of the werwolf.

"He's wounded now," said Ulenspiegel, "and he has fallen down."

Thereupon he whistled like a seagull, and straightway the church bell clanged out from the village and a boy's shrill voice was heard crying from afar off:

"Awake! Awake, you sleepers! The werwolf is caught."

"Praise be to God," said Ulenspiegel.

Now the first to arrive on the scene of the capture were Toria the mother of Betkin, and Lansaen her husband, and her two brothers Josse and Michael. And they brought lanterns with them.

"You have caught him?" they asked.

"Look on the path," answered Ulenspiegel.

"Praise be to God," they exclaimed, crossing themselves.

"Who is it that is calling out the news in the village?" asked Ulenspiegel.

"It is my eldest boy," Lansaen answered. "The youngster is running through the village knocking on all the doors and crying out that the wolf is caught. Praise be to thee!"

"The ashes beat upon my heart," answered Ulenspiegel.

Suddenly the werwolf began to speak:

"Have mercy on me! Have mercy, Ulenspiegel!"

"This wolf can talk!" they exclaimed, crossing themselves again. "He is a devil in very truth, and knows Ulenspiegel's name already!"

"Have mercy! Have mercy!" the voice cried again. "I am no wolf. Order the bell to stop ringing. For thus it is that it tolls for the dead. And my wrists are torn by the trap. I am old and I am bleeding. Have mercy! And what is this--this shrill voice of a child awakening all the village? Oh pray, have mercy!"

"I have heard your voice before," said Ulenspiegel passionately. "You are the fishmonger. The murderer of Claes, the vampire that preys upon poor maids! Have no fear, good mother and father. This is none other than the Dean of the Fishmongers on whose account poor Soetkin died of grief." And with one hand he held the man fast by the neck, and with the other he drew out his cutlass.

But Toria the mother of Betkin prevented him.

"Take him alive," cried she. "Take him alive. Let him pay!"

Meanwhile there were many fisherfolk, men and women of Heyst, who were come out at the news that the werwolf was taken and that he was no devil but a man. Some of these carried lanterns and flaming torches, and all of them cried aloud when they saw him:

"Thief! Murderer! Where hide you the gold that you have stolen from your poor victims?"

"He shall repay it all," said Toria. And she would have beaten him in her rage had she not fallen down there and then upon the sand in a mad fury like unto one dead. And they left her there until she came to herself.

And Ulenspiegel, sad at heart, beheld the clouds racing like mad things in the sky, and out at sea the white crests of the waves, and on the ground at his feet the white face of the fishmonger that looked up at him in the light of the lantern with cruel eyes. And the ashes beat upon his heart.

And they walked for four hours, and came to Damme where was a great crowd assembled that already was aware of what had happened. Every one desired to see the fishmonger, and they pressed round the fishermen and fisherwives, crying out and singing and dancing and saying: "The werwolf is caught! He is caught, the murderer! Blessed be Ulenspiegel! Long live our brother Ulenspiegel!--Lange leve onzen broeder Ulenspiegel." And it was like a popular rising. And when the crowd passed in front of the bailiff's house, he came out, hearing the noise, and said to Ulenspiegel:

"You are the conqueror; all praise to you!"

"It was the ashes of Claes that beat upon my heart," said Ulenspiegel.

Then the bailiff said:

"Half the murderer's fortune shall be yours."

"Let it be given to his victims," answered Ulenspiegel.

Now Lamme and Nele were there too--Nele laughing and crying with joy and kissing her lover; Lamme jumping heavily and striking his belly while he cried out at the same time:

"Brave, trusty, and true! My comrade, my well-beloved! You cannot match him anywhere, you other men of the flat country."

But the fisherfolk laughed and made mock of Lamme.

XXVI

The great bell, the Borgstorm, rang out on the morrow to summon to the Vierschare the aldermen and the clerks of the court. There they sat on four banks of turf under the noble lime-tree which was called the Tree of Justice. And round about stood the common people. When he was examined the fishmonger would confess nothing. All he did was to repeat continually:

"I am poor and old, have mercy upon me."

But the people howled at him, saying:

"You are an old wolf, destroyer of children; have no pity, sir judges."

"Let him pay! Let him pay!" cried Toria.

But the fishmonger entreated again most piteously:

"I am poor. Leave me alone."

Then, since he would not say anything of his own free will, he was condemned to be tortured until he should confess how he had committed the murders, whence he came, and where he had hidden the remains of the victims and their money.

So now he was brought to the torture chamber, and on his feet were put the iron shoes of torture, and the bailiff asked him how it was that Satan had inspired him with designs so black and crimes so abominable. Then at last he made answer:

"Satan is myself, my essential nature. Even as a child, ugly as I was and unskilled in all bodily exercises, I was regarded as a simpleton by every one and was continually being beaten. Neither girl nor boy had any pity for me, and as I grew up no woman would have anything to do with me, not even for payment. So I conceived a hatred for the whole human race, and for this reason I betrayed the man Claes who was beloved by all. Thereafter I was attracted more than ever by the idea of living like a wolf, and I dreamed of tearing flesh with my teeth. And I killed two wolves in the woods of Raveschoet and Maldeghem, and I sewed together their two skins as a covering. And by day and by night I wandered along the sand-dunes, and especially on Saturdays--the day of the market at Bruges."

Then the bailiff said:

"Repent and pray to God."

But the fishmonger blasphemed, saying:

"It is God himself who willed me to be as I am. I did all in spite of myself, led on by the will of nature. Evil tigers that you are, you will punish me unjustly."

But he was condemned to die the death, and Toria cried aloud: "Justice is done. He shall pay the penalty."

And all the people cried:

"Lang leve de Heeren van de wet!--Long live the Officers of the Law!"

The next morning at early dawn, as they were bringing him to the place of punishment, he saw Ulenspiegel standing near the pile and he pointed his finger at him, crying:

"There is a man who ought to die no less than I. For ten years ago it was that he threw me into the Damme canal because I had denounced his father. But in that I had acted as a loyal subject to His Most Catholic Majesty."

And the bells of Notre Dame tolled for the dead.

"For you also the bells are tolling," said he to Ulenspiegel. "You will be hanged. For you have committed murder."

"Is this true?" demanded the bailiff.

Ulenspiegel answered:

"I threw into the water the man who denounced Claes and was the cause of his death. The ashes of my father beat upon my heart."

And the women that were in the crowd said to him:

"Why confess it, Ulenspiegel? No one saw the deed. But now you also will die the death."

And the prisoner laughed aloud, leaping in the air with a bitter joy.

"He will die," he said. "He will leave this earth for hell. He will die. God is just."

"He shall not die," said the bailiff, "for after the lapse of ten years no murderer can lawfully be brought to punishment in the land of Flanders. Ulenspiegel did a wicked act, but it was done for love of his father: and for such a deed as that Ulenspiegel shall not be summoned to trial."

"Long live the law!" cried the crowd. "Lang leve de wet!"

And the bells of Notre Dame tolled for the dead. And the prisoner ground his teeth and hung his head, and now for the first time he let fall a tear. And his hand was cut off and his tongue pierced with a red-hot iron, and he was burned alive in a slow fire in front of the Town Hall.

And Toria cried out:

"He is paying the penalty! He is paying the penalty! See how they writhe--those arms and those legs which helped him to his murdering! See how it smokes, the body of this brute! Burning is the hair of him, all pallid like the hair of a hyena, and burning is his pallid face. He pays! He pays!"

And the fishmonger died, howling like a wolf.

And the bells of Notre Dame tolled for the dead.

And once more did Lamme and Ulenspiegel ride away on their donkeys. And Nele stayed behind in sorrow with Katheline, who never stopped her ceaseless refrain:

"Put out the fire! My head is burning! Come back, come back to me, Hanske, my pet."

XXVII

Ulenspiegel and Lamme had come to Heyst-on-the-Dunes, and behold a fleet of fishing-boats that were come hither from Ostend and from Blankenberghe and Knokke. Filled they were with men-at-arms, the followers of the Beggarmen of Zeeland, who carried on their hats a silver crescent with this inscription: "Serve rather the Turk than the Pope."

Ulenspiegel is glad; he whistles like the lark and from every side there comes to answer him the warlike cockcrow. And Lamme and Ulenspiegel go aboard one of the ships and are carried to Emden and thence to Wieringen, where their ship is hemmed in by the ice. For by now it is the month of February.

Now all around the ship there was to be seen the most joyous sight imaginable: men all clad in velvet, sledging and skating on the ice; and women skating too, with skirts and jackets broidered with pearl and gold, blue and scarlet. And the boys and girls came and went hither and thither, laughing and following one another in line, or two by two in couples, singing the song of love upon the ice, and running to eat and drink at the stalls decorated with flags, where one could buy all kinds of brandy-wine and oranges and figs and eggs and hot vegetables with heete-koeken--pancakes, that is, with vegetables flavoured with vinegar. And all around them the sailing sledges made the ice to resound under the press of their sharp runners.

Lamme, who was still searching everywhere for his wife, wandered about on his skates like the rest of that happy crowd, but he kept falling down time and again.

Ulenspiegel, meanwhile, to satisfy his hunger and thirst, was wont to resort to a little tavern on the quay where the prices were not high, and where he used to have many a talk with the old lady who kept it.

One Sunday about nine o'clock he went to the inn and asked them to give him some dinner. A charming-looking young woman came forward to serve him.

"Dear me," he cried, "you rejuvenated hostess! Where-ever are those old wrinkles of yours gone to? And your mouth has found all its teeth again, and they are white with the whiteness of youth itself! And your lips are red like cherries! Is it for me this smile of yours so sweet and roguish?"

"Nay, nay," she said. "But what can I get you?"

"Yourself," he said.

The woman answered:

"That would be too big a meal for a lean little man like you. Will not some other kind of meat do for you?"

When Ulenspiegel made no answer:

"What have you done," she said, "with that handsome, well-set-up, but rather corpulent gentleman I have so often seen in your company?"

"Do you mean Lamme?" queried Ulenspiegel.

"Yes. What have you done with him?" she repeated.

"He is busy eating," answered Ulenspiegel, "eating anything he can set his teeth upon--hard-boiled eggs from the street stalls, smoked eels and salted fish: and all this, forsooth, to help him find his wife. But why are you not she, my sweet? Would you like fifty florins? Would you like a collar of gold?"

But she crossed herself, saying:

"I am not to be bought, nor yet taken."

"Do you love no one?" said Ulenspiegel.

"I love you as my neighbour; but above all I love Our Lord and Our Lady, they that command me to live an honest life. Hard indeed and oftentimes burdensome are the duties that are laid on us poor women. Nevertheless God gives us his aid. Yet some there are who succumb to temptation. But this fat friend of yours, come, tell me, is he well and happy?"

Ulenspiegel answered:

"He is gay when he is eating, but sad and pensive when he is empty. I will get him to come and see you."

"Do not do that," she said; "he would weep and so should I."

"Have you ever seen his wife?" asked Ulenspiegel.

"She sinned with him once," the woman answered, "and was condemned therefor to a cruel punishment. She knows that he goes a-seafaring in the cause of the heretics, and this is a cruel thought for a Christian heart. But protect him, I pray you, if he is attacked, and nurse him if he is wounded: his wife ordered me thus to entreat you."

"Lamme is my brother and my friend," answered Ulenspiegel.

"Ah!" she said. "But why will you not return to the bosom of our Holy Mother Church?"

"She eats up her children," answered Ulenspiegel. And he departed.

But one morning in March, while still the cold winds of winter kept the ice frozen, so that the ship of the Beggarmen could not make away, Ulenspiegel came again to the tavern. And the pretty baesine said to him (and there was great emotion and sorrow in her voice):

"Poor Lamme! Poor Ulenspiegel!"

"Why do you pity us so?" he asked her.

"Alas! alas!" she cried. "Why will you not believe in the Mass? And you did, you would go straight to Paradise without a doubt, and I might be able to save you in this life also."

Seeing her go to the door and listen there attentively, Ulenspiegel said to her:

"Is it the snow that you hear falling?"

"No," she said.

"What then?"

"It is death that comes like a thief in the night."

"Death," exclaimed Ulenspiegel. "I do not understand you. Come back and tell me."

"They are there," she said.

"Who are?"

"Who?" she said. "Why, the soldiers of Simonen Bol, who are about to come in the name of the Duke and throw themselves upon you all. And if they treat you well while you are here, it is only as men treat the oxen they mean to kill. Oh why," she cried all in tears, "why did I not know all this before, so that I could have warned you!"

"You must not cry," said Ulenspiegel, "and you must stay where you are!"

"Do not betray me," she said.

Ulenspiegel went out of the house, ran as fast as he could, and went round to all the booths and taverns in the place, whispering to the sailors and soldiers these words: "The Spaniards are coming."

At that they ran every one to the ship, and prepared with all the haste they knew whatever things were necessary for battle. Then they waited for the evening. While they were waiting thus, Ulenspiegel said to Lamme:

"Do you see that pretty-looking woman on the quay there, in a black dress embroidered with scarlet?"

"It's all one to me," answered Lamme. "I am cold and I want to go to sleep."

And he threw his great cloak around his head, and became like a man who was deaf.

But presently Ulenspiegel recognized the woman and cried out to her from the vessel:

"Would you like to come with us?"

"Even to the death," she answered, "but I cannot...."

Then she came nearer to the ship.

"Take this ointment," she said. "It is for you and that fat friend of yours who goes to sleep when he ought to be awake."

And she withdrew herself, crying:

"Lamme! Lamme! May God keep you from harm and bring you back safe."

And she uncovered her face.

"My wife! My wife!" cried Lamme.

And he would have jumped down to her.

"Your faithful wife!" she said, running the while as fast as ever she could.

Lamme would have leaped down from the deck on to the ice, but he was restrained by a soldier who caught him by his cloak, and the provost addressed him, saying:

"You will be hanged if you leave the ship."

Yet again did Lamme try to throw himself down, but an old Beggarman held him back, telling him that the ice was damp and that he would get his feet wet. And Lamme sat down on the deck weeping and crying ever:

"My wife! My wife! Let me go and find my wife!"

"You will see her again," said Ulenspiegel. "She loves you, but she loves God more."

"Mad devil-woman that she is!" cried Lamme. "If she loves God more than her husband, why does she show herself to me so sweet and so desirable? And if she loves me, why does she leave me?"

"Can you see clearly to the bottom of a deep well?" demanded Ulenspiegel.

In the meanwhile the followers of Simonen Bol had appeared on the scene with a large force of artillery. They shot at the ship, which promptly repaid them in similar coin. And the bullets broke up the ice all around. And towards evening a warm rain began to fall, and the west wind blew from the Atlantic, and the sea grew angry beneath its covering of ice, and the ice was broken into huge blocks which could be seen rising and falling to hurl themselves one against the other, not without danger to the ship, which, nevertheless, as dawn began to dissipate the clouds of night, opened its sails like a bird of freedom and sailed out towards the open sea.

There they were joined by the fleet of Messire de Lumey de la Marche, Admiral of Holland and Zeeland; and on that day the ship of Messire Très-Long captured a vessel from Biscay that carried a cargo of mercury, gunpowder, wine, and spices. And the vessel was cleaned to its marrow, emptied of its men and its booty, even as the bone of an ox is cleaned by the teeth of a lion. And the Beggarmen took La Brièle, a strong naval base, well called the Garden of Liberty.

XXVIII

It was at the beginning of May. The sky was clear, the ship sailed proudly on the billows, and Ulenspiegel sang this song:

The ashes beat on my heart, The murderers are come; With daggers have they struck at us, Fiercely, with fire and sword have they struck at us, They have bribed us most vilely and spied on us, Where are love and fidelity now? In exchange for those sweetest of virtues, Betrayal and fraud have they heaped on us. Yet may they that have murdered be murdered themselves! Beat, beat, drum of war!

Long live the Beggarmen! Loud beat the drum! La Brièle has fallen, Flushing too, the key to the Scheldt! God is good, for Camp-veere is taken, Taken the place where the guns of all Zeeland were stored! Now cannon-balls, powder, and bullets are ours, Bullets of iron, bullets of brass. God is with us--against us, then, who?

The drum! Beat the drum of glory and war! Long live the Beggarmen! Beat the drum!

And again Ulenspiegel lifted up his voice and sang:

O Duke! Hark to the voice of the People, Murmuring so strong in the distance, Like the sea that swells in the season of tempest! Enough of silver and gold and of blood, Of ruins enough! Beat the drum! Beat the drum! The sword is drawn.

Duke! Duke of Alba, Duke of Blood, Behold the stalls and the shops, they are closed. Brewers and bakers, grocers and butchers, Refuse one and all to do business for nothing. When you pass who'll salute you? None. Do you feel, then, the pestilent mist Of hate and scorn closing around you?

For the fair land of Flanders, The gay land of Brabant, Now are sad as a churchyard. And where once in the days of our liberty Sounded the violas, screamed the fifes and the bagpipes, Now there is silence and death. Beat the drum, the drum of war.

And now, 'stead of all the glad faces Of those that drank and made love to the sound of sweet singing, Now is naught but pale faces Of they that await in dumb resignation The blade of the sword of injustice. Beat the drum, the drum of war.

O land of our fathers, suffering, belovèd, Bow not your head 'neath the foot of the murderer! And you, busy bees, fling yourselves now In swarms 'gainst the hornets of Spain. And you bodies of women and girls That are buried alive Cry to Christ: Vengeance!

Wander by night in the fields, poor souls, Cry to God! Every arm now trembles to strike. The sword is drawn. Duke, we will tear out your entrails, Yea, we will whip you in the face! Beat the drum. The sword is drawn. Beat the drum. Long live the Beggarmen!

And all the sailors and soldiers on the ship of Ulenspiegel, and they also that were on the ships near by, took up the refrain and sang out also:

The sword is drawn. Long live the Beggarmen!

And the sound of their voices was like the growl of the thunder of deliverance.

XXIX

It was the month of January, the cruel month that freezes the calf in the womb of the cow. Snow had fallen over all the land, and then frozen hard. The boys went out to snare with bird-lime the sparrows that came to seek what nourishment they could find on the hardened snow; and whatever they took they brought back to their cottages. Against the grey, bright sky the skeletons of the trees detached themselves in motionless outline, and their branches were covered as it were with cushions of snow, and the roofs of the cottages likewise, and the tops of the walls where showed the footprints of the cats who themselves went out hunting for sparrows in the snow. Far and wide the fields were hidden under that wonderful white fleece which warms the earth against the bitter cold of winter. The smoke of houses and cottages showed black as it mounted heavenwards, and over everything there brooded a great stillness.

And Katheline and Nele lived alone in their cottage, and Katheline wagged her head, crying continually:

"Hans, my heart is yours. But you must give back those seven hundred caroluses. Put out the fire! My head is burning! Alas! Where are your kisses cold as snow?" And she stood watching at the window.

Suddenly a horseman rode past at the gallop, crying:

"Here comes the bailiff, the high bailiff of Damme!"