Read Ebook: Fiddles 1909 by Smith Francis Hopkinson

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Ebook has 85 lines and 7977 words, and 2 pages

"'Fritz, the stable-boy has just seen him.'

"'What's the matter with him?'

"Gretchen hung her head, and the tears streamed down her cheeks,

"'He is--he is--Oh, Meinherr--it is not the beer--nobody ever gets that way with our beer--it is something he--'

"' Drunk!'

"'Yes, dead drunk, and under the table like a hog in the mud--Oh, my poor Wilhelm! Oh, who has been so wicked to you! Oh! Oh!' and she ran from the room.

"I started on the run, Gretchen and the good landlady close behind. If the Rudesheimer had upset Fiddles it had worked very slowly; maybe it had revived an old conquered thirst, and the cheap cognac at the public-house was the result. That he was not a man of humble birth, nor one without home refinements, I had long since divined. Had I not suspected it before, his manner in presenting me to the old Baroness, and his behavior in the dining-hall, especially toward the servants, would have opened my eyes. How then could such a man in an hour become so besotted a brute?

"And yet every word of Gretchen's story was true. Not only was Fiddles drunk, soggy, helplessly drunk, but from all accounts he was in that same condition when he had staggered into the place, and, falling over a table, had rolled himself against the wall. There he had lain, out of the way, except when some dram-drinking driver's heavy cowhide boots had made a doormat of his yielding body--not an unusual occurrence, by the way, at the roadside taverns frequented by the lower classes.

"We worked over him, calling him by name, propping him up against the wall, only to have him sag back; and finally, at the suggestion of one of the truckmen--he was in a half-comatose state really from the liquor he had absorbed--we carried him out into the stable yard, and I held his shapely head, with its beautiful hair a-frowze, while a stream of cold water from the pump struck the back of his head and neck.

"The poor fellow stared around wildly as the chill reached his nerves and tried to put his arm around me, then he toppled over again and lay like a log. Nothing was left but to pick him up bodily and carry him home; that I did with Fritz's, the stable-boy's, help, Gretchen carrying his cap, and the landlady following behind with his coat, which I had stripped off when his head went under the pump. The bystanders didn't care--one drunken man more or less made no difference--but both of the women were in tears, 'Poor Wilhelm! Somebody had drugged him; some wicked men had played a trick, etc., etc. I thought of the Rudesheimer, and then dismissed it from my mind. Something stronger than Rhine wine had wrought this change.

"We laid him flat out on a cot in a room on the second floor, and dragged it near the open window so he could get the air from the garden, and left him, I taking the precaution to lock the door to prevent his staggering downstairs and breaking his neck.

"The next morning, before I was dressed, in fact, a row downstairs brought me into the hall outside my door, where I stood listening over the banister. Then came the tramp of men, and three gendarmes mounted the steps and halted at Fiddles's door.

"Bang! bang! went the hilt of a short-sword on the panel. 'Open, in the name of the law.'

"'What for?' I demanded. Getting drunk was not a crime in Rosengarten, especially when the offender had been tucked away in bed.

"'For smashing the face of a citizen--a worthy cobbler--the night before, at the hour of eight,--just as he was closing his shutters. The cobbler lay insensible until he had been found by the patrol. He had, however, recognized Fuedels-Shimmer as the--'

"'But, gentleman, Herr Fiddles was dead drunk at eight o'clock; he hasn't stirred out of the room since. Here is the key,' and I unlocked the door and we all stepped in, Gretchen and the landlady close behind. They had told the officers the same story downstairs, but they would not believe it.

"At the intrusion, Fiddles rose to a sitting posture and stared wonderingly. He was sober enough now, but his heavy sleep still showed about his eyes.

"The production of the key, my positive statement, backed by the women, and Fiddles's wondering gaze, brought the gendarmes to a halt for a moment, but his previous arrest was against him, and so the boy was finally ordered to put on his clothes and accompany them to the lock-up.

"I got into the rest of my duds, and began waving the American flag and ordering out gunboats. I insisted that the cobbler had lied before in accusing Fiddles of shooting the rabbit, as was well known, and he would lie again. Fiddles was my friend, my servant--a youth of incorruptible character. It is true he had been intoxicated the night before, and that I had in consequence put him to bed, but that was entirely due to the effects of some very rare wine which he had drunk at a luncheon given in his honor and mine by our very dear friend the Baroness Morghenslitz, who had entertained us at her princely home. This, with the heat of the day, had been, etc., etc.

"The mention of the distinguished woman's name caused another halt. Further consultation ensued, resulting in the decision that we all adjourn to the office of the Mayor. If, after hearing our alibi--one beyond dispute, and submitting our evidence , his Honor could still be made to believe the perjured testimony of the cobbler--Fiddles's enemy, as had been abundantly proved in the previous rabbit case, when the same mendacious half-soler and heeler had informed on my friend--well and good; but if not, then, the resources of my Government would be set in motion for the young man's release.

"The Mayor's first words were: 'Ah, you have come again, is it, Meinherr Marny; and it is the same young man, too, Herr Fuddles. Well, well, it is much trouble that you have.'

"Fiddles never moved a muscle of his face. You would have thought that he was the least interested man in the room. Only once did his features relax, and that was when the cobbler arrived with his head swathed in bandages. Then a grim smile flickered about the corners of his mouth, as if fate had at last overtaken his enemy.

"Of course, the Mayor dismissed the case. Gretchen's tearful, pleading face, the landlady's positive statement of helping put the dear young gentleman to bed; the key and the use I had made of it; the reluctant testimony of the officers, who had tried the knob and could not get in until I had turned the lock, together with the well-known animosity of the cobbler , turned the tide in the lad's favor and sent us all back to the inn rejoicing.

"Some weeks later Fiddles came into my room, locked the door, pulled down the shades, looked under the bed, in the closet and behind the curtains, and sat down in front of me.

"You have been very good to me, Master,' he said with a choke in his voice. 'I love people who are good to me; I hate those who are not. I have been that way all my life--it would have been better for me if I hadn't.' Then he leaned forward and took my hand. 'I want you to do something more for me; I want you to promise me you'll take me home to America with you when you go. I'm tired dodging these people. I want to get somewhere where I can shoot and hunt and fish, and nobody can stop me. I snared that rabbit; been snaring them all summer; going to keep on snaring them after you're gone. I love to hunt them--love the fun of it--born that way. And I've got something else to tell you'--here a triumphant smile flashed over his face--'I smashed that cobbler!'

"'You, Fiddles!' I laughed. 'Why, you were dead drunk, and I put you under the pump and--'

"'Yes, I know you thought so--I intended you should. I heard every word that you said, and what little Gretchen said--dear little Gretchen, I had studied it all out, and to play drunk seemed the best way to get at the brute, and it was; they'd have proved it on me if I hadn't fooled them that way--' and again his eyes snapped and his face flushed as the humor of the situation rose in his mind. 'You'll forgive me, won't you? Don't tell Gretchen.' The light in his eyes was gone now. I'd rather she'd think me drunk than vulgar, and it was vulgar, and maybe cowardly, to hit him, but I couldn't help that either, and I'm not sorry I did it.'

"'But I locked you in,' I persisted. Was this some invention of his fertile imagination, or was it true?

"'Yes, you locked the door,' he answered, as he broke into a subdued laugh. 'I dropped from the window sill when it got dark--it wasn't high, about fifteen feet, and the waterspout helped--ran down the back way, gave him a crack as he opened the door, and was back in bed by the help of the same spout before he had come to. He was leaving the next day and it was my only chance. I wasn't out of the room five minutes--maybe less. You'll forgive me that too, won't you?'"

Marny stopped and looked into the smouldering coals. For a brief instant he did not speak. Then he rose from his chair, crossed the room, took the miniature from the wall where he had hung it and looked at it steadily.

"What a delightful devil you were, Fiddles. And you were so human."

"Is he living yet?" I asked.

"No, he died in Gretchen's arms. I kept my promise, and two months later went back to the village to bring him to America with me, but a forester's bullet had ended him. It was on the Baroness's grounds, too. He wouldn't halt and the guard fired. Think of killing such an adorable savage--and all because the blood of the primeval man boiled in his veins. Oh, it was damnable!"

"And you know nothing more about him? Where he came from?" The story had strangely moved me. "Were there no letters or notebooks? Nothing to show who he really was?"

"Only an empty envelope postmarked 'Berlin.' This had reached him the day before, and was sealed with a coat of arms in violet wax."

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