On the Heights Part 72

"And is she agreed?"

"She says she'll be satisfied with anything I do."

Walpurga came into the room, and with the words, "Welcome, and many congratulations to the hostess of the Chamois," the innkeeper extended his hand to her.

"Thanks for the first; but, before I accept the second, my husband must be landlord of the Chamois."

"Heigho!" exclaimed the innkeeper, "how clever! how studied! how dignified and polite! Look here, Hansei! haven't I always told you that you've got a wife who might be a queen?"

"And why not, if my husband were a king?"

The innkeeper's fist descended on the table, and he laughed so heartily at this clever sally, that his two dogs began to bark and thus accompanied his laughter with their applause. He showed the other visitors that it would not do to weary their hosts. He left soon afterward, the rest of the company going with him.

CHAPTER III.

"And for your mother I'll build a snug room looking toward the garden, where she can take her comfort. I always knew it before, but it wasn't till you were away, that I found out what a treasure she is to us. If the Lord only lets us keep her with us for many a year to come. Yes, your mother shall have the best room in the house."

Thus spake Hansei, with gleeful countenance. Walpurga inquired: "Where do you mean to build?"

Hansei looked around as if to express his surprise at her asking such a question. He had yielded so far as to promise that nothing should be done without his wife's consent. He thought that this was all that could in reason be expected of him, and that it was best to finish up the business at once.

With great self-command, he said:

"Why, at our inn, to be sure. I shan't do anything to this tumble-down cottage. But I've already told them that they mustn't disturb the nut-tree. You'll be surprised when you see how full it is. We shall get three measures of nuts this year, and a nut year is a good one for boys."

Walpurga clapped her hand to his mouth and, with downcast eyes, said: "You're a dear, good fellow: but, believe me, I know you better than you do yourself. I'm glad that you're much sharper than you used to.

be. I often used to tell you not to be so bashful and forever keeping in the background. You've so much common sense; more, indeed, than all the rest of them. If you could only have been behind the door, when I told the queen about you; and she promised me faithfully that she'll come to see us when she visits the mountains next year."

Hansei complacently swallowed the praise that his wife bestowed upon him, and kept on smiling to himself for some time afterward.

Husband and wife praised and extolled each other--a custom more honored in the breach than the observance, at least among peasants, who would feel ashamed if they knew of it. Their coming together, after so long a separation, seemed like a new wooing and wedding. The question of the purchase of the inn prevented them, however, from fully realizing this, and even threatened to imperil their domestic happiness.

"So you're agreed that we'll be host and hostess of the Chamois?"

inquired Hansei.

"I've told you already that we'd talk it over; and so you think you'll make a good landlord?"

"Not so good a landlord as you will a landlady. That's what everybody says; and the landlady's always the chief point. You'd be the best landlady, for you can earn your bread with your tongue, just as the parson does; and that'll help us to get a penny or two more for our wine and everything else. You've got a way of looking right into people's hearts, and can give and take, and that's the best sign that you're made to be a landlady."

Hansei did not understand how Walpurga could still hesitate. The highest ideal of the young mountaineer is to be an innkeeper; to supply every one with meat and drink, and to live by the profits of it; to give feasts and, at the same time, be the merriest one at them; to receive money while others spend it; to have his house the rendezvous of all, no matter how varied their pursuits and interests; to be the helper and adviser of every one; the man with whom all keep on good terms, who knows all that is going on, all about bargains and prices, and who, like the lord of the manor in the olden time, receives a profit whenever cow, or farm, or house change hands. And besides, what others eat and drink tickles his palate, too, and he doesn't grow thin upon it. And then, like the parson, he would derive profit from baptisms, marriages and funerals; to say nothing of the strangers who would come during the summer and would be obliged to pay tribute to the landlord, because the mountains are so high and the lake so deep, and because he allows them to see it all. Yes, an inn is like a great lake--all the little streams that flow from the different mountain rills concentrate there.

Walpurga stared at her husband in surprise, while she listened to his animated and yet detailed description of the advantages of innkeeping.

She almost felt inclined to favor his plan, and thought to herself: "Perhaps it would be the most sensible thing after all; for I'll never feel quite at home again in the old, narrow ways of life that I once used to lead. I've grown different, and must have something different."

Frankly and sincerely, she again a.s.sured him that she was not opposed to the project, but that it would be well to go about it cautiously.

"And do you know what's best of all?" asked Hansei. "We're to have a post-office here--the judge himself says so--and if it should fail us, you could easily bring it about. You'll give the village a great name.

Indeed, you'll make a town of it, and the houses will be worth twice as much as they now are."

He wanted his wife to go up to the village with him at once, in order to look at the inn; but Walpurga said:

"Let me get a good rest in our old house before we go up there. The inn won't run away. I can't tell you how happy I am to be in our house again. I feel as if I must try every chair. Everything seems so good at home. It's just as if every chair and every table had eyes, and was looking at me and saying: 'Yes, we still know you, and have waited for you'; and now, I beg of you, do let me rest awhile."

"Yes, yes; just stay," replied Hansei, walking up and down the room.

Suddenly, as if called by some one, he went out and split several logs which he had laid aside.

Walpurga came out and looked at him with evident satisfaction.

"Yes," said he, "work will be kept up just as it always was. I shan't be a lazy landlord--rest a.s.sured of that; and I won't take to drinking, either. Are you going up to the village with me?" he inquired at last.

"Yes; but do come in."

Hansei was soon on the road, and was not a little proud to be seen entering the village with his wife. At the fountain near the town hall, there were women and girls with their tubs. As soon as they saw Walpurga, they came up to her and offered their greetings and congratulations.

The children were just leaving school. Walpurga called several of them to her, shook hands with them, and gave them kind messages to their parents. With saddened heart, she would hear of the death of such and such a one. The other children were gathered in groups, and would stand about, staring at her with surprise. Walpurga's being sent for and taken to the palace had been as a fairy-tale to the village children; and now the fairy herself was standing there in broad daylight, and talking just as other people did.

At last Walpurga left them, but the children kept calling out her name, in order to prove that they still knew her.

When she and her husband walked on, the latter pointed toward the town hall. "Look!" said he, "I'll soon be there, too. It's almost certain that they'll elect me as one of the town council. I might even become a burgomaster. But I won't take that, for that would get an innkeeper into lots of trouble."

Walpurga observed that the idea of becoming a host had taken deep root in Hansei. She simply replied: "I find that you've seen a great deal of the world this year, but you must certainly have learned that it's every one's duty to care for his own, and that when one's poor and unfortunate, no one lends a helping hand."

"Certainly; but thank G.o.d! we don't need any one now; quite the contrary."

They were pa.s.sing the house of Grubersepp, the wealthy farmer and, indeed, the richest man in the community. He was a tall, lean man, whose features always wore a sour expression. He was standing on the steps before his house, and Hansei greeted him civilly. Grubersepp, however, turned on his heel and walked off toward the stable. It would not do for a rich farmer like him to welcome a day laborer's child like Walpurga. The whole village might make fools of themselves on her account, but a rich farmer like Grubersepp knows his own importance too well. It would be mighty fine, indeed, if he were known to trouble himself about a creature who used to be glad if he would let her have a pint or two of milk on trust.

Hansei cried out aloud: "Good-day, Grubersepp! my wife's come back again."

Grubersepp acted as if he had not heard him, and went toward the stable.

The joy that Walpurga had experienced while receiving the greetings of the villagers was not enough to compensate her for her pain at the slight thus put upon her. After all, as it was only a silly, narrow-minded farmer displaying his stupid peasant pride. Hadn't the king spoken to her, and had he ever spoken to such a dolt as he? But this did not satisfy her. Grubersepp was the first in the village, and to be slighted by him, or to incur his ill-will, was no trifling matter after all.

"I'll never be hostess to you, you old pitchfork," said Walpurga, looking toward the house; "I'll never pour out a gla.s.s of wine for you and say, 'G.o.d bless you!' with it."

"What are you saying?" said Hansei, as Walpurga uttered these words to herself.

"If we could buy that silly old pitchfork's land, I'd like it much better than the inn," she answered.

"Of course, that would be much finer; but we haven't enough money for that; and, even if we had, Grubersepp wouldn't sell. On the contrary, when a poor man has his eye on a field, he buys it up before he gets a chance at it."

When Hansei and Walpurga arrived at the inn, they found quite a crowd there. A new purchase of wine had just been opened, and, as usual on such occasions, the drinking was at the host's expense.

"Ah! here comes the new landlady," exclaimed several voices.

"Thank you," said Walpurga, "my husband hasn't concluded the bargain yet."