The Path of Life Part 11

They dashed their hands before their eyes and stood still: a golden snake twisted round a tree and all the wood was bright with fire and there came a droning and a rumbling and a banging as of stones together and a hundred thousand branches burst asunder. s.h.i.+vering, not daring to look up, they crossed themselves again and all three crept under the branches, deep down in a ditch. Trientje tied her pinafore over the little one's face and they sat there huddled together, shuddering and peeping through their fingers and saying loud Our Fathers.

"You must not look, Lowietje: the lightning would strike you blind."

The trees wrung their heavy boughs and everything squeaked and rustled terribly. The water rained and poured from the leafy vault on Trientje's straw hat, on Lowietje's bare head and right through his little torn s.h.i.+rt. And clap and clap of thunder fell; the sky opened and belched fire like a hot oven. The children sat nestling into each other's arms--Poentje down under the other two--and only when it had kept still for long did they all, trembling and terrified, dare to put out their heads.

"I wish we were home now!" sighed Lowietje.

Once more the sky was all on fire and rumbling and breaking and crackling till the earth quaked and shook.

"O G.o.d, O G.o.d, help us get out of the wood and home to mother!" whined Trientje.

When they opened their eyes again, they saw below them, in the bottom, a huge beech with a bough struck off and the white splinters bare, with leaves awkwardly twisted right round: it stood there like a fellow with one arm off.

The rain now fell steadily in straight stripes; the noise grew fainter and the sky broke open.

Soaked through with the wet, the children came creeping out of the ditch and now, holding their breaths, stood looking at that tree which was so awesomely cleft and at that crippled bough which hung swinging over s.p.a.ce. The thunder still rumbled, but it was very far away, like heavy waggons rattling over hard stones. Lowietje caught his little brother up on his back and they made straight for the opening of the drove, where they saw a clear sky. They must get out of the wood, away from those trees where such fearful things happened and where it cracked so and where it was so dark.

Outside, the heaven hung full of gold-edged clouds and the sun drove its bright darts through the sky. The rain fell in lovely gleaming drops and all looked so new, so fresh and so strangely glad as after a fit of weeping, when the glistening tears hang in laughing eyes. 'Twas all so peaceful here and 'twas far behind them that the trees were twisted and bent. Here and there flew birds; and the cuckoo sat calling in a cornfield. Lowietje's s.h.i.+rt was glued to his skin; his trousers hung heavily from his limbs and his hair fell in dripping tresses, sticking along his cheeks. The white spots on Trientje's pinafore were run through with the black; and wet cornstalks whipped her little thin skirt. Poentje splashed with his naked little feet in the puddles and asked for mother.

"We're almost home, child," said Trientje, to soothe him.

They went through the wet gra.s.s and fragrant cornfields along the slippery footpaths to a big road.

Look, there, behind the turning, came mother: she had a sack-cloth over her head and two umbrellas under her arm; she looked angry and ugly.

"We shall get a beating," sighed Lowietje.

VII. A PIPE OR NO PIPE

He dropped his wheel-barrow, strode from between the shafts and went and looked into the great window of the tobacco-shop. His eyes were all full, as far as they could carry: an abundance and a splendour to dream about.

He came a step nearer and rested his two elbows on the stone window-sill, to see more comfortably.

Two stacks of motley cigar-boxes stood on either side and ran together at the top into a rounded arch, from which hung long, long pipes, cinnamon-wood pipes, as thick as your arm, with green strings to them and huge, big bowls, artfully carved into the heads of the King, of hideous n.i.g.g.e.rs, or of pretty girls with beads for eyes.

On thick, transparent gla.s.s slips lay whole files of meerschaum pipes, furnished with clear curved-amber mouthpieces: fishes' heads, lobster-claws holding an eggsh.e.l.l, horses' heads, cows' hoofs; rich cigar-holders of meerschaum, all over silver stars and gold bands. Heaps and heaps and lots and lots of every kind, as far as he could see; and all this was multiplied in two enormous mirrors, in which, yonder, far back among all this smoking-gear, he saw his own face staring at him out of his great, astonished eyes.

He sighed. It was all so beautiful, so rich! And now if mother had only got work!

He went over it once more. Down below, in little plush-lined trays, lay the small pipes, the boys' stuff. They lay scattered higgledy-piggledy, whole handfuls of them, crooked and straight, brown and black. His eyes thieved round voluptuously in those trays and they read with eager curiosity the neatly-written figures which informed the world how much each pipe cost.

Here, they were crooked, comical little things of black cocus-wood; there, they were motley, speckled round bowls, like birds' eggs, with white stems; but they cost too much. And yet they were so charitably beautiful! Now his eyes remained hankering after a splendid varnished bowl. It was almost tucked out of sight, but it glittered so temptingly and had a lovely brown ring at the edge, shading downwards to a pale gold-yellow: there was a little cup for the oil to sweat into and a fat cinnamon stem, with a horn mouthpiece. He examined it on every side and would have liked to turn it over with his eyes. Inside the bowl stood, in black figures:

"1 _fr_. 50."

"Mother!..."

That was the one he wanted, that was his. She had promised him a pipe if she got work to-day. If only she had brought work with her!

After one last look and one more ... he went on.

He caught up his barrow and pushed it, over the wide road, straight to the station.

There he had to wait.

He loitered round the dreary, deserted yard. The noon sun bit the naked stones; and everything, hiding and shrinking from that glowing sun-fire, seemed dead. The drivers sat slumbering on the boxes of their cabs; the horses stood on three legs, their heads down, crookedwise between the shafts, and now and then they gave a short stamp, to keep off the flies, which were terribly active. A group of loafers lay sleeping on their stomachs in the shade. A slow-moving vehicle drove past and disappeared round the corner. A dog came stepping up lazily and went and lay under the sunflowers near the signal-box, blinking his eyes.

There was nothing more that moved.

At last the train came gliding in very gently, without noise, and it sent a gulp or two of white smoke into the quivering blue sky.

Now the boy stood stretching his neck through the railings, on the look-out for his mother, whom he already saw in his thoughts, coming bent, with a heavily-laden bag of weaving-stuff; and the pipe was in his pocket ... or else nothing, nothing at all!

'Twas a fat gentleman that got out first; then a tall, thin one; then a woman; then another woman; always others; and now, now it was mother. She stuck out her thin leg, groping from the high foot-board to find the ground, and ... she had an empty blue-and-white canvas bag on her shoulder. His lower lip dropped sadly and he turned slowly to his barrow:

"No work yet. G.o.d better it!"

The mother threw her bag on the wheel-barrow and they went on, without speaking.

Straight opposite the tobacco-shop, the boy gave a sidelong glance at the great window, with all those rich things displayed behind it, and he whistled a little tune.

They had still far, very far to go, before they two were at home, in their village. And the sun was burning.

VIII. ON SUNDAYS

In his Sunday best! A red-and-yellow flowered scarf was tied round his sun-burnt neck and the two ends blew over his shoulders; a small brown-felt hat with a curly brim was drawn down upon his head and, from under it, came here and there a wisp of flaxen hair. He wore a small, open jacket, with a short waistcoat, from under which a clean blue s.h.i.+rt bulged out; and his long, much too long trousers fell in wide folds over his big cossack shoes.[9] Under his arm he carried a bundle knotted into a red handkerchief, while with the other hand he twirled a switch.

[9] Hob-nailed shoes fastened with straps.

He was a growing youngster, a well-set-up cowherd, with a brown, freckled face, small, pale-grey eyes, under milk-white eyebrows, and bony knees and elbows: a st.u.r.dy fellow in the making.

'Twas heavenly, grand Sunday weather: it shone with light and life and it was all green, pale, splendid green, against a clear blue sky in the middle of the afternoon.

He stepped on bravely, along the wide drove of elms, twisting his switch, and looked into the free sky with his young, grey-blue eyes. He thought ... of what? Of nothing! Truly, of nothing: what does a cowherd think of? Wait a bit, though; he was thinking: 'twas Sunday! It was Sunday once more, the glad Sunday! And there were so few Sundays in those long, long weeks. And he was going home for a few hours: yes, home; and from there to Stafke's and to Stafke's pigeons.

He was hard-worked at the farm: twenty-nine cow-beasts, which were always hungry and always wanted fattening; furthermore, a whole herd of calves and hogs: 'twas a drudging without end or bottom, from early morning to late at night, until his limbs hung lame.

The farmer was good but strict and could not abide sluggards; he looked for work, hard work; and this the lad was glad to give, but only while looking forward to the everlasting Sunday, in which lay all his happiness and cheer.

He quickened his steps; and the elms pushed by, one by one, and at last, ahead, very far down that dark hedge of stems and leaf.a.ge, came a tiny opening where the trees seemed to touch one another.

Look! There, beside the little village church, stood Farmer Willems'

homestead, with its little slate turret and the great poplars and, beside it, close together and quite hidden in the green, two little cottages.

'Twas there that he was brought up and had grown up; there, in one of those cottages. In the other lived Stafke's father and mother. The children had led the half-wild life of the country there: two little boys together. They had clambered up those mighty trees, weltered in the sand of the drove and coursed like foals in the meadow. The farm was a free domain to them; they were at home in it; they went daily to the little door of the wash-house to fetch their slice of rye-bread-and-b.u.t.ter and, in the morning, an apple or a pear. They had lain and rolled in the hay-loft, like fish in the water; but all that had pa.s.sed so quickly, so very quickly. The parish-priest came; and, for six months, six long months, they had had to go to school and church. Then, on a certain Monday morning, father said: