13 The Gauntlet
At night Florian built himself a hut of some sheaves in a harvest-field and slept in it.
In a tavern he had stolen a knife, having at the same time concealed twelve creutzers in the salt-cellar: with this implement he now scraped off his mustache.
Nevertheless, he had no sooner crossed the frontier than he was arrested. This time he did not stop to enlist the pity of the gens d’armes, but defended himself with all his might and made desperate efforts to get free: he was thrown down, however, and manacled.
He was now forwarded from circuit to circuit by the hands of the gens d’armes. In silence he walked along, his right hand chained to his right foot: he looked upon himself as upon an animal driven to the slaughter.
But when, coming from Sulz, he issued from the Empfingen copse and found that he was to be dragged in chains through his native village, he fell on his knees before the gens d’armes and begged him with tears to be so merciful as to take him around outside of the village.
But the voice of authority answered “No,” and Florian struck his left hand into his eyes to blind himself to his own degradation: his right hand rattled helplessly in the chain. Florian—the cynosure of neighboring eyes, he who had known no keener joy than to be the object of universal attention—was now to be exposed in these shameful trappings and in such disgraceful company. For the first time in his life he could have prayed that people might not have eyes to cast upon him. As he passed the Red Tailor’s house, Crescence was chopping wood at the pile. The hatchet dropped from her hand, and for a moment she stood paralyzed: the next instant she rushed upon Florian with open arms and fell upon his neck. The gens d’armes disengaged her gently. “I’ll go with you through the village,” said Crescence, without weeping. “You sha’n’t bear your shame alone. Does the iron hurt you? Don’t fret too much, for my sake.”
Florian, unable to speak, motioned to her with his left hand to turn back; but she walked by his side,She walked by his side. as if riveted to him by an invisible chain. The news spread through the village like wildfire. Caspar and Babbett were standing before the Eagle: the former had a mug of beer in his hand, and brought it to Florian to drink. The gens d’armes would not permit it. Florian begged them not to let Crescence go any farther, and Babbett at last persuaded her to remain. All were weeping.
He went alone through the rest of the familiar streets.
George the blacksmith, prevented by the cold from sitting in front of his door, saw him from behind his window and touched his cap from sheer embarrassment. At the manor-house farmer’s he met the French simpleton, who pointed to his upper lip, saying, “Mus a loni ringo.” In spite of himself, a painful smile passed over Florian’s features.
When at last he had left the last hut behind him, he vowed never to return to his old home again.
His incarceration was now more severe than it had been: though in the same tower as formerly, he was kept in the most secure apartment. He often looked through the grating; but when a Nordstetter passed he started back as if he had been shot.
As the anguish of his mind became more subdued, he tried many devices to pass away the time. He walked about with a blade of straw standing on his forehead: when this became easy, he added others, until at last he could build a whole house and take it to pieces again. With much exertion, he learned to stand out horizontally from the iron bars, and even acquired the art of placing his knees behind his head.
One day, in looking through the grating, he saw Crescence coming to town. Hot tears fell on the iron bars: he could not speak to her,—scarcely give her a sign.
At night he heard a cough beneath the window, which was repeated several times. Recognising Crescence, he returned the signal. Crescence unwound the red ribbon which had adorned her hair since the bel-wether dance, tied it round a letter and a stone, and flung it up to Florian, who caught it adroitly. She went briskly away; but in the distance Florian caught the last words of the song,—
“The fire may be extinguish’d,
Love cannot be diminish’d;
Fire burns to scathe and kill,
But love burns hotter still.”
Florian never dosed an eye that night: he had a letter from Crescence, and yet he could not read it. At the first ray of morning, he was at the window, and read:—
“I don’t know whether this letter will get into your hands or not; and so I won’t sign my name. I have been to town to get my certificate of settlement. Betsy has got a place for me in Alsace: I’m going off the day after to-morrow. I have had a long dress made, too. My mother is dead, and my father is going to marry Walpurgia the seamstress. I need not tell you that I can never forget you, even if you had done I don’t know what. If you have been bad once, you’re not bad now. I know that. Be good and patient, and bear your fate. Our Lord is my witness, I’d gladly take it on myself. I got your father to give me your knife, which you always liked so much; I hope, with God’s blessing, to see you work honestly with it, someday. Only don’t give up hope; for then you would be quite lost. Don’t reproach yourself about what’s past and gone: that won’t do any good: but be good now. With the first money I earn I’m going to redeem your ring and my garnets. Oh, I have so much to tell you! ten clerks couldn’t write it down. I will close, and be yours till death.”
The letter was bathed in a flood of happy tears. Never till now did Florian know the treasure he possessed in Crescence. And he had not a little joy left, besides, for the thought that his precious knife was safe.