Seed-time and Harvest Part 53

"G.o.d forbid!" said Fritz, "I arranged the machine just as you ordered, I measured the land myself."

"It isn't possible!" cried Habermann, "then my eyes must deceive me.

Where is your measuring-rod?"

"I haven't a measuring-rod," said Fritz, "and don't need one either,"

he added, spitefully, for the great approbation of the young Herr had gone to his head. "I measure everything with my instrument," pointing to his invention which lay at his feet.

"What?" cried Habermann, "what is that?"

"An invention of mine," said Fritz, looking as proud as if he had set up the first steam-engine.

"Ah!" said Habermann, "well, take the trumpery, and measure me ten rods."

Fritz took his invention in hand, and let the thing run. Habermann walked by his side, and asked:

"How much have you?"

"Ten rods," said Fritz.

"And I have nine, and two feet," said the old man.

"It isn't possible," said Fritz, "you must have counted wrong, my instrument is right."

"Five of my steps are a Mecklenburg rod," said the old man hotly, "but because you are a fool you have spoiled the whole field of barley. How can such trumpery measure in the fresh furrow, when it could hardly do upon perfectly even ground. Oh, laziness, laziness! Go in directly, and bring me out a proper measuring-rod!" and he took his knife out of his pocket, and cut Fritz's invention into little pieces, and then went to the machine, and arranged it differently.

Fritz stood there, looking first at him, and then at his invention, which lay about him, in little bits; it is really a hard thing for a man, who wishes to accomplish something in the world, to be so taken down, at his first attempt. He had such benevolent intentions,--of course towards himself first, but also towards all his colleagues, and all the clerks in Mecklenburg,--that that infamous stooping might go out of fas.h.i.+on, and now his good intentions lay in fragments at his feet.

"I must bring the measuring-rod," said he, "there is no help for that; but I would a thousand times rather manage with the gracious Herr, than with old Habermann." And as he went up to the house after the rod, a great bitterness came over him towards Habermann, and he forgot all that he had promised him in a happy hour,--the best rooms in his house, two carriage horses, and a saddle horse,--and as he was speaking, for a moment, with Marie Moller, who had again taken possession of his vacant heart, and learned from her that the young Herr had spoken sharply to Habermann at the window, he comforted himself, and went off with the rod over his shoulder, and a bit of sausage in his hand, saying:

"Well, the old man will not do for us much longer; he is getting too old; he has no capacity for new ideas."

CHAPTER XXVIII.

Seed-time pa.s.sed, and summer came; the young Frau went out but little, and the comfort which the old inspector would have taken from her bright eyes and cheerful disposition he must do without, for she had something dearer, something of more importance to do, even if all this importance lay wrapped up in a bundle of flannels; she knew how precious were the hopes and wishes which she cradled in her arms, and, for the time, all other duties were sacrificed to these.

Over Axel also, came with his fatherhood a vague, undefined feeling, as if it were his sacred duty and obligation to labor for his child; he began to manage his estate with great diligence; instead of superintending matters, in a general way, as he had hitherto done, like a sort of field-marshal, he conducted himself more like a corporal, who concerns himself about all the little details of his corporals.h.i.+p, and he stuck his nose into everything, even into the tar-barrel. He might have done that, and it is very well for a master to be interested in everything, but he should have left the commanding alone, for he didn't understand it.

He took hold of the management in the most unintelligent way, broke up the old man's arrangements, and when he had brought everything into confusion, he went into the house, and scolded the old man: "The old man has not the least _method_! He is too old for me. No, we cannot go on so any longer!" And Krischan Segel said to Diedrich Snasel: "Well, what shall we do now, the Herr says _so_, and the inspector says _so_?"

"Well, neighbor," said Diedrich, "if the Herr says----"

"Yes, but it is all stuff and nonsense."

"Then you need not do it, and if he has said it, it is no matter."

So the harvest ripened, and the blessing of the fields must be gathered into barns, the rye was cut, and had stood three days in sheaves.

"Herr Inspector," called Axel from the window, and as Habermann came up he said, "to-morrow, we will bring in the rye."

"Herr von Rambow, it will not do yet, yesterday and to-day it has been cloudy, and it has not dried; the grain is still soft, and some stems are quite green."

"Well, it will do. How will you bring it in?"

"If it must be brought in, we should begin right behind the village, and go with two gangs, one to drive into the great barn, the other into the barley barn."

"Begin behind the village? With two gangs? Why?"

"The nearer we begin to the village the more we can get in in one day and the weather looks suspicious; and we must bring it in in two gangs, and into two barns, or the people will get in each other's way, and the wagons will interfere."

"Hm!" said Axel, closing the window, "I will think about it." And he thought, and came to the conclusion that he would get in this harvest with Fritz Triddelsitz alone; Habermann should have nothing whatever to do with it, and they would show him that he was the fifth wheel of the coach. They would begin at the other end of the field, and bring it in with one gang. What one gang or two gangs were, he was not quite clear in his own mind, but they were only subordinate matters, probably nothing more than some whim of the old inspector's, and he would have nothing to do with these, he meant to free himself from them entirely.

The next morning, at six o'clock, he was on his feet, and went up in a very friendly way to the old man, who was busy in the yard.

"Dear Herr Habermann, I have considered the matter,--you must not take it unkindly,--but I have decided to get in this harvest, with young Triddelsitz, quite by myself, and to give all the necessary orders in person."

The old man stood before him, confounded and dismayed. At last came, heavily and constrained from his breast, the words: "And I, Herr, am I merely to look on? And do you prefer the help of a stupid apprentice to my help?"

He held his walking-stick in front of him, and looked at the young man with eyes which shone in his old face with as much youthful fire, as if all the energy and activity of his long life were concentrated in them, and said frankly:

"Herr, you were a little boy, when I devoted my whole abilities to your good father,--he thanked me, on his dying bed he thanked me! but you?

You have filled my cup to the brim, with your ingrat.i.tude, and now you wish to disgrace me!"

Then he went off, and Axel called after him:

"Dear Herr Habermann, it is not so intended. I only wanted to try myself." But it was so intended, as he knew very well; he did not want the old man in his way, he looked after him too sharply, and he felt ashamed before him.

The old inspector went to his room, opened his desk, and seated himself before it; but it was long before he could think and begin anything, and meanwhile there was great commotion in the yard. "Triddelsitz!"

"Herr von Rambow!" "Where are you going, Jochen?" "Eh, I don't know, n.o.body has told me." "Fritz Pasel, what are you doing with the plough?" "Eh, what do I know? I was going to plough in the field."

"Blockhead!"--this was Fritz's voice--"we are going to get in the rye."

"It is all the same to me, if I am not to do it, I will not,"--and he tumbled the plough out of the wagon,--"what the inspector tells me, I do."

"Flegel!" called the young Herr. "Fritz Flegel!" repeated Triddelsitz, after him.

"What do you want?" roared a voice from the workshop.

"Where are the harvesting straps?" asked Fritz Triddelsitz. "There, where you stand," said the wheelwright; "and n.o.body has said anything to me about them."

"Well, what shall we do?" asked the day-laborer Nasel. "Lord knows,"

replied Pegel, "n.o.body has told us." "Flegel!" cried Fritz again, "we are going to bring in the rye; the wagons must be greased." "For all me," called Flegel from his shop, "the tar-barrel stands there."

"Herr von Rambow," said Fritz, "where is Habermann? shall I not call the inspector?"

"No," said Axel slowly, turning to go away.