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Page 6
Strange to say, a bundle of some kind lay upon her knees, and her haggard
eyes were directed upon distant objects in the white landscape.
Spencer drew off to the left, giving the hideous object as wide a berth
as he could, and I had some difficulty in following him.
"Now," I cried, "what is all this for? Are you joking?"
"Joking?--assuredly not! I never joke about such serious matters. I am
not given to superstition, but I confess that I am alarmed at this
meeting!"
Then turning his head, and noticing that the old woman had not moved, and
that her eyes were fixed upon the same one spot, he appeared to gather a
little courage.
"Fritz," he said solemnly, "you are a man of learning--you know many
things of which I know nothing at all. Well, I can tell you this, that a
man is in the wrong who laughs at a thing because he can't understand it.
I have good reasons for calling this woman the Black Plague. She is known
by that name in the whole Black Forest, but here at Nideck she has earned
that title by supreme right."
And the good man pursued his way without further observation.
"Now, Sperver, just explain what you mean," I asked, "for I don't
understand you."
"That woman is the ruin of us all. She is a witch. She is the cause of it
all. It is she who is killing the count by inches."
"How is that possible?" I exclaimed. "How could she exercise such a
baneful influence?"
"I cannot tell how it is. All I know is, that on the very day that the
attack comes on, at the very moment, if you will ascend the beacon tower,
you will see the Black Plague squatting down like a dark speck on the
snow just between the Tiefenbach and the castle of Nideck. She sits there
alone, crouching close to the snow. Every day she comes a little nearer,
and every day the attacks grow worse. You would think he hears her
approach. Sometimes on the first day, when the fits of trembling have
come over him, he has said to me, 'Gideon, I feel her coming.' I hold him
by the arms and restrain the shuddering somewhat, but he still repeats,
stammering and struggling with his agony, and his eyes staring and fixed,
'She is coming--nearer--oh--oh--she comes!' Then I go up Hugh Lupus's
tower; I survey the country. You know I have a keen eye for distant
objects. At last, amidst the grey mists afar off, between sky and earth,
I can just make out a dark speck. The next morning that black spot has
grown larger. The Count of Nideck goes to bed with chattering teeth. The
next day again we can make out the figure of the old hag; the fierce
attacks begin; the count cries out. The day after, the witch is at the
foot of the mountain, and the consequence is that the count's jaws are
set like a vice; his mouth foams; his eyes turn in his head. Vile
creature! Twenty times I have had her within gunshot, and the count has
bid me shed no blood. 'No, Sperver, no; let us have no bloodshed.' Poor
man, he is sparing the life of the wretch who is draining his life from
him, for she is killing him, Fritz; he is reduced to skin and bone."
My good friend Gideon was in too great a rage with the unhappy woman to
make it possible to bring him back to calm reason. Besides, who can draw
the limits around the region of possibility? Every day we see the range
of reality extending more widely. Unseen and unknown influences,
marvellous correspondences, invisible bonds, some kind of mysterious
magnetism, are, on the one hand, proclaimed as undoubted facts, and
denied on the other with irony and scepticism, and yet who can say that
after a while there will not be some astonishing revelations breaking in
in the midst of us all when we least expect it? In the midst of so much
ignorance it seems easy to lay a claim to wisdom and shrewdness.
I therefore only begged Sperver to moderate his anger, and by no means to
fire upon the Black Plague, warning him that such a proceeding would
bring serious misfortune upon him.
"Pooh!" he cried; "at the very worst they could but hang me."
But that, I remarked, was a good deal for an honest man to suffer.
"Not at all," he cried; "it is but one kind of death out of many. You are
suffocated, that is all. I would just as soon die of that as of a hammer
falling on my head, as in apoplexy, or not to be able to sleep, or smoke,
or swallow, or digest my food."
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