Short Stories, - [books to read fiction .txt] 📗

As the ghost, notwithstanding his rueful look, seemed more disposed for banter than for seriousness, and had played his guest a scurvy trick—not done him any real injury, the panic of the latter had now almost subsided. So he ventured the experiment, and beckoned to the ghost to take the seat from which he had himself just risen. The goblin instantly obeyed, threw off his coat, laid his barber tackle on the table, and placed himself in the chair, in the posture of a man that wishes to be shaved. Franz carefully observed the same procedure which the spectre had observed to him; clipped his beard with the scissors, cropped away his hair, lathered his whole scalp, and the ghost all the while sat steady as a wig-block. The awkward journeyman came ill at handling the razor; he had never had another in his hand, and he shore the beard right against the grain, whereat the goblin made as strange grimaces as Erasmus’s ape when imitating its master’s shaving. Nor was the unpracticed bungler himself well at ease, and he thought more than once of the sage aphorism, “What is not thy trade make not thy business;” yet he struggled through the task the best way he could, and scraped the ghost as bald as he himself had been scraped.

Hitherto the scene between the spectre and the traveler had been played pantomimically; the action now became dramatic. “Stranger,” said the ghost, “accept my thanks for the service thou hast done me. By thee I am delivered from the long imprisonment which has chained me for three hundred years within these walls, to which my departed soul was doomed, till a mortal hand should consent to retaliate on me what I practiced on others in my lifetime.

“Know that of old a reckless scorner dwelt within this tower, who took his sport on priests as well as laics. Count Hardman, such his name, was no philanthropist, acknowledged no superior, and no law, but practiced vain caprice and waggery, regarding not the sacredness of hospitable rights; the wanderer who came beneath his roof, the needy man who asked a charitable alms of him, he never sent away unvisited by wicked joke. I was his castle barber, still a willing instrument, and did whatever pleased him. Many a pious pilgrim, journeying past us, I allured with friendly speeches to the hall; prepared the bath for him, and when he thought to take good comfort, shaved him smooth and bald, and packed him out of doors. Then would Count Hardman, looking from the window, see with pleasure how the foxes’ whelps of children gathered from the hamlet to assail the outcast, and to cry, as once their fellows to Elijah:

“‘Baldhead! Baldhead!’

“In this the scoffer took pleasure, laughing with a devilish joy till he would hold his pot-paunch, and his eyes ran down with water.

“Once came a saintly man from foreign lands; he carried, like a penitent, a heavy cross upon his shoulder, and had stamped five nail marks on his hands and feet and side; upon his head there was a ring of hair like to the crown of thorns. He called upon us here, requested water for his feet and a small crust of bread. Immediately I took him to the bath to serve him in my common way; respected not the sacred ring, but shore it clean from off him. Then the pious pilgrim spoke a heavy malison upon me: ‘Know, accursed man, that when thou diest, heaven, and hell, and purgatory’s iron gate are shut against thy soul. As goblin it shall rage within these walls, till unrequired, unbid, a traveler come and exercise retaliation on thee.’

“That hour I sickened, and the marrow in my bones dried up; I faded like a shadow. My spirit left the wasted carcass, and was exiled to this castle, as the saint had doomed it. In vain I struggled for deliverance from the torturing bonds that fettered me to earth; for thou must know that when the soul forsakes her clay she panteth for her place of rest, and this sick longing spins her years to aeons, while in foreign elements she languishes for home. Now self-tormenting, I pursued the mournful occupation I had followed in my lifetime. Alas! my uproar soon made desolate this house. But seldom came a pilgrim here to lodge. And though I treated all like thee, no one would understand me, and perform, as thou, the service which has freed my soul from bondage. Henceforth shall no hobgoblin wander in this castle; I return to my long-wished-for rest. And now, young stranger, once again my thanks that thou hast loosed me! Were I keeper of deep-hidden treasures, they were thine; but wealth in life was not my lot, nor in this castle lies there any cash entombed. Yet mark my counsel. Tarry here till beard and locks again shall cover chin and scalp; then turn thee homeward to thy native town; and on the Weser-bridge of Bremen, at the time when day and night in autumn are alike, wait for a friend who there will meet thee, who will tell thee what to do, that it be well with thee on earth. If from the golden horn of plenty blessing and abundance flow to thee, then think of me; and ever as the day thou freedst me from the curse comes round, cause for my soul’s repose three masses to be said. Now fare thee well. I go, no more returning.”

With these words the ghost, having by his copiousness of talk satisfactorily attested his former existence as court-barber in the castle of Rummelsburg, vanished into air, and left his deliverer full of wonder at the strange adventure. He stood for a long while motionless, in doubt whether the whole matter had actually happened, or an unquiet dream had deluded his senses; but his bald head convinced him that there had been a real occurrence. He returned to bed, and slept, after the fright he had undergone, till the hour of noon. The treacherous landlord had been watching since morning, when the traveler with the scalp was to come forth, that he might receive him with jibing speeches under pretext of astonishment at his nocturnal adventure. But as the stranger loitered too long, and midday was approaching, the affair became serious; and mine host began to dread that the goblin might have treated his guest a little harshly, have beaten him to a jelly perhaps, or so frightened him that he had died of terror; and to carry his wanton revenge to such a length as this had not been his intention. He therefore rung his people together, hastened out with man and maid to the tower, and reached the door of the apartment where he had observed the light on the previous evening. He found an unknown key in the lock; but the door was barred within, for after the disappearance of the goblin, Franz had again secured it. He knocked with a perturbed violence, till the Seven Sleepers themselves would have awoke at the din. Franz started up, and thought in his first confusion that the ghost was again standing at the door to favor him with another call. But hearing mine host’s voice, who required nothing more but that his guest would give some sign of life, he gathered himself up and opened the door.

With seeming horror at the sight of him, mine host, striking his hands together, exclaimed, “By heaven and all the saints! Redcloak” (by this name the ghost was known among them) “has been here, and has shaved you bald as a block! Now, it is clear as day that the old story is no fable. But tell me, how looked the goblin; what did he say to you? what did he do?”

Franz, who had now seen through the questioner, made answer: “The goblin looked like a man in a red cloak; what he did is not hidden from you, and what he said I well remember: ‘Stranger,’ said he, ‘trust no innkeeper who is a Turk in grain. What would befall thee here he knew. Be wise and happy. I withdraw from this my ancient dwelling, for my time is run. Henceforth no goblin riots here; I now become a silent incubus to plague the landlord; nip him, tweak him, harrass him, unless the Turk do expiate his sin; do freely give thee food and lodging till brown locks again shall cluster round thy head.’”

The landlord shuddered at these words, cut a large cross in the air before him, vowed by the Holy Virgin to give the traveler free board so long as he liked to continue, led him over to his house and treated him with the best. By this adventure Franz had well-nigh got the reputation of a conjurer, as the spirit thenceforth never once showed face. He often passed the night in the tower; and a desperado of the village once kept him company, without having beard or scalp disturbed. The owner of the place, having learned that Redcloak no longer walked in Rummelsburg, was delighted at the news, and ordered that the stranger, who, as he supposed, had laid him, should be well taken care of.

By the time when the clusters were beginning to be colored on the vine, and the advancing autumn reddened the apples, Franz’s brown locks were again curling over his temples, and he girded up his knapsack; for all thoughts and meditations were turned upon the Weser-bridge, to seek the friend, who, at the behest of the goblin barber, was to direct him how to make his fortune. When about taking leave of mine host, that charitable person led from his stable a horse well saddled and equipped, which the owner of the castle had presented to the stranger, for having made his house again habitable; nor had the count forgot to send a sufficient purse along with it to bear his traveling charges; and so Franz came riding back into his native city, brisk and light of heart. He sought out his old quarters, but kept himself quite retired, only inquiring underhand how matters stood with the fair Meta, whether she was still alive and unwedded. To this inquiry he received a satisfactory answer, and contented himself with it in the meanwhile; for, till his fate was decided, he would not risk appearing in her sight, or making known to her his arrival in Bremen.

With unspeakable longing he waited the equinox; his impatience made every intervening day a year. At last the long-wished-for term appeared. The night before he could not close an eye for thinking of the wonders that were coming. The blood was whirling and beating in his arteries, as it had done at the Castle of Rummelsburg, when he lay in expectation of his spectre visitant. To be sure of not missing his expected friend, he rose by daybreak, and proceeded with the earliest dawn to the Weser-bridge, which as yet stood empty, and untrod by passengers. He walked along it several times in solitude, with that presentiment of coming gladness which includes in it the real enjoyment of all terrestrial felicity; for it is not the attainment of our wishes, but the undoubted hope of attaining them, which offers to the human soul the full measure of highest and most heartfelt satisfaction. He formed many projects as to how he should present himself to his beloved Meta, when his looked-for happiness should have arrived; whether it would be better to appear before her in full splendor, or to mount from his former darkness with the first gleam of morning radiance, and discover to her by degrees the change in his condition. Curiosity, moreover, put a thousand questions to Reason in regard to the adventure. Who can the friend be that is to meet me