Chapter 10

WAR OFTEN OPPOSES THE TEACHINGS OF CHRISTIANITY.

Conrad was detained for three days in the Swedish camp. It was on an overcast, rainy evening that he at length received permission to return. He hastened to reach the Münzbach, which flows into the town in two streams between the Erbis and Donat Gates. In the year 1297, an enemy had made treacherous use of this river to enter and plunder the town; and the points of its entrance and exit had from that time been guarded against surprise by strong towers, beneath the arched foundations of which the river now flowed. It was towards the tower of exit that Conrad made the best of his way.

The sentries either did not see the boy approaching through the gloom, or did not consider him dangerous, for he succeeded in creeping unhindered beneath the vaulted archway that spanned the river. All soon grew quite dark around him as he waded on, and he found himself obliged to make his hands do the work of eyes. He had not proceeded far in this fashion, when he suddenly found further progress barred by a strong iron grating reaching down into the bed of the river and up to the stonework above his head. How was he to pass this unexpected obstacle? He cautiously rapped and felt the bars one by one, until, to his great delight, he found that the last bar could be quite easily pushed aside, thus leaving an opening through which the slender lad found but little difficulty in forcing his body. As he came to each of the two similar gratings that barred his way farther up the tunnel, he found the same course practicable. He continued to follow the subterranean bed of the stream for some distance farther, until it emerged into the open air again in a tanner's yard, and Conrad could leave the wet path he had followed so long. He did not let the grass grow under his feet, and very soon was listening cautiously at his mother's door. Hearing no sound, he stepped on tiptoe into the room. No one was to be seen, though a lamp was burning on the table. He crept across to the door of the bedroom, and thought he heard sounds of breathing. As he opened the door, a feeble ray of light streamed through the crevice, and he saw his mother lying in bed, with the faithful cat sitting beside her as her only companion. Puss, recognising the boy, began to purr and wave her tail, but the blind woman seemed to be stupefied by the burning heat of fever.

'Mother! mother!' cried Conrad, at first softly, then louder; at last he ventured to pull the sleeve of her night-dress.

The blind woman sat up suddenly. 'What is it?' she cried. 'Who is calling me?'

'It is I, mother,' said Conrad, with chattering teeth; for by this time the cold seemed to have spread from his wet feet all over his body.

'And have you come for me at last, my darling child?' said his mother, in tones of rapture. 'How often have I prayed that God would send you to take me home to the mansions of the blest! I come, my son; I come!'

'Why, how funny you talk, mother!' said Conrad. 'I only wanted to ask you for a pair of clean stockings, because mine have got so wet wading along the Münzbach. I have only just come in from the Swedish camp, and I've brought you the box you buried in our old cellar.'

'Swedish camp!--box!--cellar!' repeated the bewildered woman, as though she were still in a dream. 'Have you not been dead these three days? And is not this your spirit, that a poor blind woman cannot even see?'

'Why, mother, whatever are you thinking about?' cried Conrad, laughing in spite of his cold feet. 'Here, catch hold of me, feel me; I'm flesh and blood. Did not father tell you he had sent me off to the Swedes to get this box? They didn't do me one bit of harm; they didn't even starve me. But they would not let me go and dig in our cellar; they said that was not work for stupid boys. So they did all the digging, and brought me the box all right; and, considering what a lot of thieves they are, I think that was almost a miracle. I say, mother, whatever did you put in the box? It's all nailed up so tight I couldn't open it.'

He placed a case about fifteen inches long, by six inches broad and high, in his mother's hands. The blind woman felt it all over in wonder.

'I don't know anything about any box,' she said. 'And I'm sure I never had anything to bury.'

'Perhaps Master Prieme was right after all, then,' said Conrad.

'Who is this talking in here?' cried Jüchziger, coming suddenly into the room. 'Ha! is it you, you young good-for-nothing? Where have you sprung from? Quick now, confess, or I'll warm you soundly.'

'Well, I'm sure I'm cold enough, father,' said Conrad, with a feeble attempt at a joke; 'and it was on your business, too, that I got so cold. Is that all the thanks I am to have for bringing you the box all safe and sound?'

'What! is that true? You're a very fine fellow. Give it me here, quick!' cried Jüchziger in a tone full of joy.

'But,' said his wife, 'I never buried a box with treasure in it. What can we have to do with this?'

'Oh, I had a dream the other night,' answered Jüchziger, 'as life-like a dream as if I had really been standing in the cellar of our old house. And see here, my dream has come true, and no mistake about it. A little mountain-troll dressed, in grey stood before me in my dream, and said, "Let your son, Conrad Schmidt, dig here in this corner of the cellar. He is a Sunday's bairn and will have good luck."'

'But I didn't dig for it,' said Conrad. 'The Swedes did it for me.'

'It all comes to the same thing,' said Jüchziger, 'so long as we have the box. Do you know, my son, what there is inside it?'

'How should I? See how it's all nailed and screwed up!'

'Have you brought back the safe-conduct?'

'Oh yes; I forgot that. One of the Swedish officers tied the paper over my heart and under my left arm. I was not to let a soul see it, he said, except the one from whom I first had it, and that was you, you know, father. But I'm sure it's a different letter, and it's uncommonly heavy.'

'Give it me here this instant,' said Jüchziger, scarcely trying to conceal his joy. 'It will be nothing but right if the Swedes have sent their poor prisoners a ducat or two that they may get me to buy them a few things. But mind you, don't say a word about it to a living soul; for if you do, the money will all be taken from them, and I shall be punished for my kindness into the bargain.'

Conrad handed the paper over to his step-father, who put it straight into his pocket without stopping to examine it. 'You need not go back to your mistress now,' he said, when the packet was safely stowed away. 'Much better stay here and attend to your sick mother. The good woman is in sore need of all the care and help you can give her.'

Conrad was not too bewildered by all his adventures to suspect some hidden meaning in his step-father's very sudden kindness. As he thought about the story of the box and the safe-conduct, it seemed to him to grow more and more suspicious, and he longed for some friend with whom he could talk the whole thing over.

He could not relieve his mind to his sick mother, that was clear, for she was far more helpless than himself. Master Prieme was a prisoner of war; Roller was gone. Who was there left that he could trust, but his comrade the Defensioner? Yet how could he get at Hillner, with his step-father watching him as a cat watches a mouse, scarcely permitting him even to cross the threshold of the house.

Meantime, the enemy had hauled a cannon up into the tower over the Peter Gate, which was soon scattering death among the defenders. The besieged also suffered severe loss from the fire of two heavy guns planted close beside the town moat, near the Peter Gate, and covering the next tower, that which guarded the Kreuz Gate. The Freibergers, on their part, were by no means backward in doing their utmost to harass the Swedes. Behind each defensive work as it was shot down, a new one arose. Trenches, palisadoes, covered ways, counter-mines, and batteries were all used as means of defence; the houses adjoining threatened spots were turned into strongholds, and pierced for sharp-shooters, who shot every Swede that showed himself within range. The commandant was at all points where fighting was going on, ordering and encouraging his men both by word and example.

On the second morning after the night of Conrad's return, Schweinitz approached the Defensioner Hillner where he stood at a loop-hole in the tower at the Kreuz Gate. Hillner respectfully made way for his superior officer, who wished to look out.

'Just see that impudent rascal!' cried the commandant, after a few moments' survey. 'He is riding his horse right up to the city moat in sheer bravado. Quick, Defensioner, and show the fellow that there are men in here. Put a bullet through his head.'

Alert and willing, Hillner at once placed the muzzle of his piece in the loop-hole. Just as he had covered the Swede, however, he lowered his weapon and turned pale.

'What's the matter?' cried Schweinitz. 'Why do you tremble? Are you hurt? Here, then, give me your weapon. I will chastise the insolent scoundrel myself.' As he spoke, Schweinitz grasped at the arquebuse, on which Hillner's hand closed like a vice.

'So please your excellency and my gracious commandant,' said the Defensioner in a tone of entreaty, 'do whatever you please with my life, but I cannot shoot the man out yonder; neither can I give you my weapon for you to do it.'

'What!' shouted Schweinitz. 'I, your general, command it. That weapon, instantly, or--you know the penalty that attaches to insubordination. Loose it, I tell you!'

'I know well,' replied the young man, 'what penalty belongs to insubordination; but ought I not to obey God rather than man?'

'No, a thousand times!' cried Schweinitz, his face aflame with rage. 'In war, God's command counts for nothing, and the general's for everything. What will happen next, if a soldier is to stand and argue instead of obeying the orders of his superior officer? The soldier is a mere machine at the absolute will and disposal of his officer, and must do whatever that officer commands--must kill father, son, or brother whenever he receives orders to do so. This is what war demands, and the morality of your catechisms has no place in it. War puts its trust in the strong arm, the sword, and the fire-lock alone. Speak, fellow! why would you not shoot that Swede?'

'Many of the enemy have already met their death by my hand during the past few weeks,' replied Hillner quietly; 'and only against one have I refused to raise my weapon, for that one was--my father;--an unnatural father, it is true, who deceived my poor mother, and shamefully deserted her, and made me fight against my fatherland,--but yet, in spite of all, my father. His blood flows in my veins; but for him I should never have existed. So I say again, let me die rather than kill him.'

'We can easily manage that,' said Schweinitz angrily. 'All such talk as this in war-time is so much rubbish. Bah! While I stand here debating with a traitor, the villain yonder has prudently taken himself out of range.' Defensioner, you will give me your weapons, both firelock and sabre. You are my prisoner. Ha! Schönleben doubtless had sound reasons for warning me against you.'

His step-father's absence and his mother's quiet slumber having given Conrad the opportunity he wanted, he was on the way to his mistress' house to find his friend Hillner, when he saw the Defensioner coming along the street, closely surrounded by the guard, and followed by a crowd of curious people. The boy stared in astonishment at hearing the ugly word 'traitor' applied to his old comrade, and did not fully recover himself until he caught sight of his step-father marching with a joyful face close beside the prisoner, on the way to lock him up in one of the strongest cells at the town hall.

When the news of Hillner's arrest reached Mistress Blüthgen's house, where it produced great excitement, the miller, who had not yet fully recovered, remarked dryly to the women:

'Seems to me as though our Defensioner must have acted rather like one of my donkeys. He could have obeyed the commandant's order, aimed his weapon, and fired over the Swede's head. He had it all in his own hands.'

'No,' said his wife, showing, what was very unlike her, the deepest emotion, 'Hillner was right not to lift his hand against his father, even in pretence. What marksman in the whole wide world can say where his bullet shall go, when it is once out of his gun and flying towards a mark that some mischievous sprite may shift at any moment. And to kill his father! Fie! I would rather see Hillner hanged, an innocent man, than do such a deed.'

These words of the miller's brave wife made deep and lasting impression on Conrad, who stood by and heard them. Though Jüchziger was a cruel stepfather, a hard struggle had been going on in the boy's mind as to whether it was his duty to bring a terrible suspicion on that father by telling all he knew. He now determined to let his secret remain locked up in his own heart.