The Quest

"Things!" replied Death, drily.

"Are we going to be shipwrecked?"

Johannes had come to this conclusion without any special alarm. It even seemed to him just now that a shipwreck would be a rather interesting incident.

"No, no!" said Death. "Would you really like that?"

"I would not want it, but neither would I be afraid of it."

"The last time we met, Johannes, you asked me to take you with me."

"I would not ask you that now," said Johannes; "life is too pleasant now."

"Then you are not afraid of me this time, Johannes?"

"No; for now you look so much more friendly."

"And I am friendly, Johannes. The more you try your best to live a fine life, the more friendly I become."

"But what do you mean, friend Hein? I should think the finer life became, the harder it would be to leave it."

"It must be the right sort of fineness, Johannes – the right sort."

"Then it must certainly be that I am seeking the right kind now, or you would not look so much more friendly."

"You are indeed seeking it, Johannes; but look well to it that you also find it. Take care! Take care! I should like when I come again to look most friendly, dear Johannes, and you must be careful to have it so."

"What shall I do, friend Hein? How can I be certain of the right way to live? How can I make you look friendly when you come again?"

But Death turned away his pale face, gave a slight shake of the head, and continued to sit immovable and silent. Once again Johannes asked him a question, but it was of no avail. Then his head grew heavy, his eyelids drooped, and everything vanished under the veil of slumber, while his resting-place quivered and shivered above the heaving waters.

When on deck, the next morning, the world looked again most bright and cheerful. The sun was shining warmly, the fresh, blue sea was sparkling in the light, and there, in front of him – there lay the foreign land – a long line of grey-white coast, basking in the October sunshine. On the hills Johannes saw little houses standing out in full sight; and he thought of the pettiness of life in those houses – of dressing, of bread and butter, and of little children going to school; – everything so trite and trivial, in what for him was so strange and great.

They coursed up a large river, much broader than the Rhine. The sea-gulls circled over the yellow water, and rested on the sand-banks and the muddy shores. The fishing-boats tacked in zig-zags all about, and throngs of ships and steamboats came to meet them. At last there loomed in the distance, enshrouded with a grey fog, a giant city – a dark maze of masts and chimneys and towers. It was sombre, awful, incomprehensible.

If Johannes had not been so absorbed in thinking of the two children, he would have paid more attention to the city. As it was, he only accepted it for a fact – the unforeseen shadow of a mysterious substance – an ominous premonition, like the rumbling of the ground preceding an earthquake: an instant later all fear is over, and one thinks no further about it.

So it was with Johannes; the great city, the miners – everything was forgotten, when he heard the loved voices of the two little girls.

They lived in a country-seat which to Johannes seemed a small palace. It was built of red brick and grey limestone, and stood on the summit of a hill, close by the shore. In the garden were dark cedar-trees and holm-oaks, and large plots of rhododendrons. The grass was short and even – quite like green velvet; and through it led neat, trim paths of yellow gravel.

The day was far from being so pleasant as Johannes had expected. In fact, it was very unpleasant. To be waited upon by a lackey, as one conies without a trunk, from a third-class carriage, is far from funny. Johannes had not heretofore had such a trying experience.

Indoors, it was very still and stately. The children were at their lessons, and for the first hour were invisible. Johannes received an unfavorable impression of fashionable life. He wished that he had not come. His hopefulness and confidence suddenly took flight. He tripped over a rug of white bearskin, and ran against a glass door, thinking it was open – just as if he were a bumblebee behind a window-pane. He wondered which was the quickest way out, and wished he were with Markus again, in the small tavern. He was not very far from crying.

On a couch in the quiet reception-room, beside a softly crackling coal fire, sat the countess. Johannes strode up to her, and made an awkward bow. A number of dogs, as many as seven, snapped and yapped about his shin-bones. He thought of his dicky and the green glass studs, and felt that they could be making next to no impression. The countess looked as if she did not quite remember who he was, nor what could have been his object in coming.

"Sit down," she said, in English, with a formal smile, and a weary tone of voice; "I hope you have had a pleasant journey."

Johannes took a seat and, as he did so, observed that some one else was in the room. He tried again to bow, but his attempt was unnoticed.

That other indeed was a most impressive personage. She lay back in an armchair, so enswathed in white lace, swan's down, gauze, and tulle as to look still larger than she really was. Upon her head was a huge hat, bearing natural-sized plums and peaches, artificial blue flowers – forget-me-nots and corn-flowers – besides a blue gauze veil. Her face was amazingly big, and highly colored by nature, but toned down with powder to a rosy flush. It was somewhat pimply, and more or less moustached. Her fat, red, shiny hands were rigid with jeweled rings; and, although it was not at all warm, she waved incessantly a large fan of white ostrich-feathers, in the midst of which glittered purple and green precious stones. Most wonderful bangles of gold and silver – little pigs, crosses, hearts, and coins – hung in a great bunch upon her bosom, from a long, many-stranded necklace. A slender crutch with a gold handle stood beside her chair, and on the table at hand, a small green parrot was eating grapes. The seven little dogs – all of them white, with pale-blue ribbons around their necks – probably belonged to her. They sat in a threatening circle, as if awaiting the word, and sharply eyed Johannes' ankles.

"What does that boy want?" she asked, in a deep, heavy voice, without even looking at Johannes. And before and answer could come, she called, "Alice!"

Instantly, there appeared from behind a curtain, just as in a comedy, a trim, spruce lady's-maid. She was dressed in black, with cap and cuffs of dazzling whiteness. With quiet little steps and mincing manners, she glided up to the large lady, and offered a smelling-bottle, at which that person began to sniff industriously.

Johannes sat there in extreme embarrassment. He felt that the costly cut-glass smelling-bottle concerned himself. It cried out, in the keen language of its hundreds of cut facets, "You smell of the third class!"

He sat like one rooted to the spot, and all unnerved, looking at the smelling-bottle as if he wished it was a dynamite bomb which would promptly send himself, the fine house, and all his beautiful illusions, flying into space.

Then Countess Dolores came to his rescue.

"Dear Lady Crimmetart," said she, in a coaxing voice, "this is a very interesting youth – really, very interesting. He is a young poet who sings his own compositions. Is it not so, Johannes? They are so charmingly melancholy – really, charmingly so! Indeed, you must hear them, dear friend. I am sure they will please you."

"Really?" said the deep voice; and the blue goggle-eyes in the frightfully big face glared at Johannes.

"Oh, yes, Lady Crimmetart," continued the countess; "but that is not all. Johannes is also a medium – a sensitive – who can see all kinds of elementals – sometimes even in broad daylight. Is it not so, Johannes?"

Johannes was too much distressed and confounded to do more than give a nod of stupefied acquiescence.

"Really?" said Lady Crimmetart, in a voice like that of a ship's commander in heavy weather. "Then he must come to my party next Saturday evening."

"Do you hear, Johannes? That is a great honor," said Countess Dolores. "Lady Crimmetart is one of the cleverest women in the world, and the elect of intellectual England attend her parties."

"Young man," said Lady Crimmetart, "I will let you talk with Ranji-Banji-Singh, of the University of Benares, the great Theosophist, and with Professor von Pennewitz, from Moscow."

One can well fancy what a fine prospect that opened out for poor little Johannes! But Lady Crimmetart did not request; she commanded. It did not seem possible to decline.

Then came another housemaid – just as trim and still and swift as the first one – to offer tea, little slices of bread and butter, and hot cake. Johannes watched nervously, to see how the others partook of them, and then tried to do as they did. But, under the cool, keen regard of the trig maid, of course he upset the milk.

"The bishop is coming, too! The angel!" burst forth Lady Crimmetart.

Johannes had before his mind's eye the mitre and crozier at the evening party. It made him think of Santa Claus. Thereupon the ladies began chatting about church affairs, the altar and the Lord's Supper, elections, and corn-laws, until he could follow them no further. At last Alice was again summoned, the carriage ordered, the smelling-bottle stored away in a big reticule, the seven small dogs were arranged upon a long, blue-silk cord – like a string of beads; and thus, with the parrot upon the hand of the lady's maid, the procession passed out. At the door, the great lady, who limped a little with gout, turned round once again, while still fanning herself, and thundered: "Come on time, mind! And do not forget your instrument!"

"A woman in a million," said Countess Dolores after she had gone. "Is she not a wonderful woman, Johannes? So good! So clever!"

"Yes!" replied Johannes, meekly, his thoughts occupied anxiously with that instrument he was expected to take to the party.

At last he heard the chattering of high-pitched little voices, and the pattering of light little feet through the quiet house.

His heart began to thump. Then the door opened, and in two seconds the dear, soft little hands put him into a tumultuous state, and the lively, high little voices quite overwhelmed him.

He was consoled; and when they led him away, out-of-doors, and he walked with them, one on each side, over the green cliffs, beside the broad ocean – then he felt something of the new happiness for which he had hoped.

But at night he could not sleep, and when it grew light he still lay in a state of excitement, gazing at the handsome ceiling of dark-brown wood whereon he could see little gilt stars.

He – Little Johannes – was being entertained by a countess, ushered into a sphere of refinement, and living with the dearest little creatures to be found among human beings. He was with his child friends now, but yet he was not happy. He was much too poor and too dull, and would be pitifully mortified here. When he thought of that glittering smelling-bottle, and of the upset milk-pitcher, he buried his face, in shame and bitterness, deep in the pillows.