No. 44, The Mysterious Stranger Read online

  The apartments occupied by the Steins were beyond this room to the east, on the same front; those occupied by Frau Regen and Marget were on the same front also, but to the west, beyond the kitchen. The rooms of the rest of the herd were on the same floor, but on the other side of the principal great interior court—away over in the north front, which rose high in air above precipice and river.

  The printing-shop was remote, and hidden in an upper section of a round tower. Visitors were not wanted there; and if they had tried to hunt their way to it without a guide they would have concluded to give it up and call another time before they got through.

  One cold day, when the noon meal was about finished, a most forlorn looking youth, apparently sixteen or seventeen years old, appeared in the door, and stopped there, timid and humble, venturing no further. His clothes were coarse and old, ragged, and lightly powdered with snow, and for shoes he had nothing but some old serge remnants wrapped about his feet and ancles and tied with strings. The war of talk stopped at once and all eyes were turned upon the apparition; those of the master, and Marget, and Gustav Fischer, and Barty Langbein, in pity and kindness, those of Frau Stein and the rest in varying shades of contempt and hostility.

  “What do you want here?” said the Frau, sharply.

  The youth seemed to wince under that. He did not raise his head, but with eyes still bent upon the floor and shyly fumbling his ruin of a cap which he had removed from his head, answered meekly—

  “I am friendless, gracious lady, and am so—so hungry!”

  “So hungry, are you?”—mimicking him. “Who invited you? How did you get in? Take yourself out of this!”

  She half rose, as if minded to help him out with her hands. Marget started to rise at the same moment, with her plate in her hands and an appeal on her lips: “May I, madam?”

  “No! Sit down!” commanded the Frau. The master, his face all pity, had opened his lips—no doubt to say the kind word—but he closed them now, discouraged. Old Katrina emerged from the kitchen, and stood towering in the door. She took in the situation, and just as the boy was turning sorrowfully away, she hailed him:

  “Come back, child, there’s room in my kitchen, and plenty to eat, too!”

  “Shut your mouth you hussy, and mind your own affairs and keep to your own place!” screamed the Frau, rising and turning toward Katrina, who, seeing that the boy was afraid to move, was coming to fetch him. Katrina, answering no word, came striding on. “Command her, Heinrich Stein! will you allow your own wife to be defied by a servant?”

  The master said “It isn’t the first time,” and did not seem ungratified.

  Katrina came on, undisturbed; she swung unheeding past her mistress, took the boy by the hand, and led him back to her fortress, saying, as she crossed its threshold,

  “If any of you wants this boy, you come and get him, that’s all!”

  Apparently no one wanted him at that expense, so no one followed. The talk opened up briskly, straightway. Frau Stein wanted the boy turned out as soon as might be; she was willing he should be fed, if he was so hungry as he had said he was, which was probably a lie, for he had the look of a liar, she said, but shelter he could have none, for in her opinion he had the look of a murderer and a thief; and she asked Maria if it wasn’t so. Maria confirmed it, and then the Frau asked for the general table’s judgment. Opinions came freely: negatives from the master and from Marget and Fischer, affirmatives from the rest; and then war broke out. Presently, as one could easily see, the master was beginning to lose patience. He was likely to assert himself when that sign appeared. He suddenly broke in upon the wrangle, and said,

  “Stop! This is a great to-do about nothing. The boy is not necessarily bad because he is unfortunate. And if he is bad, what of it? A bad person can be as hungry as a good one, and hunger is always respectable. And so is weariness. The boy is worn and tired, any one can see it. If he wants rest and shelter, that is no crime; let him say it and have it, be he bad or good—there’s room enough.”

  That settled it. Frau Stein was opening her mouth to try and unsettle it again when Katrina brought the boy in and stood him before the master and said, encouragingly,

  “Don’t be afraid, the master’s a just man. Master, he’s a plenty good enough boy, for all he looks such a singed cat. He’s out of luck, there’s nothing else the matter with him. Look at his face, look at his eye. He’s not a beggar for love of it. He wants work.”

  “Work!” scoffed Frau Stein; “that tramp?” And “work!” sneered this and that and the other one. But the master looked interested, and not unpleased. He said,

  “Work, is it? What kind of work are you willing to do, lad?”

  “He’s willing to do any kind, sir,” interrupted Katrina, eagerly, “and he don’t want any pay.”

  “What, no pay?”

  “No sir, nothing but food to eat and shelter for his head, poor lad.”

  “Not even clothes?”

  “He shan’t go naked, sir, if you’ll keep him, my wage is bail for that.”

  There was an affectionate light in the boy’s eye as he glanced gratefully up at his majestic new friend—a light which the master noted.

  “Do you think you could do rough work—rough, hard drudgery?”

  “Yes, sir, I could, if you will try me; I am strong.”

  “Carry fire-logs up these long stairways?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And scrub, like the maids; and build fires in the rooms; and carry up water to the chambers; and split wood; and help in the laundry and the kitchen; and take care of the dog?”

  “Yes, sir, all those things, if you will let me try.”

  “All for food and shelter? Well, I don’t see how a body is going to refu—”

  “Heinrich Stein, wait! If you think you are going to nest this vermin in this place without ever so much as a by-your-leave to me, I can tell you you are very much mis—”

  “Be quiet!” said the husband, sternly. “Now, then, you have all expressed your opinions about this boy, but there is one vote which you have not counted. I value that one above some of the others—above any of the others, in fact. On that vote by itself I would give him a trial. That is my decision. You can discuss some other subject, now—this one is finished. Take him along, Katrina, and give him a room and let him get some rest.”

  Katrina stiffened with pride and satisfaction in her triumph. The boy’s eyes looked his gratitude, and he said,

  “I would like to go to work now, if I may, sir.”

  Before an answer could come, Frau Stein interrupted:

  “I want to know. Whose vote was it that wasn’t counted? I’m not hard of hearing, and I don’t know of any.”

  “The dog’s.”

  Everybody showed surprise. But there it was: the dog hadn’t made a motion when the boy came in. Nobody but the master had noticed it, but it was the fact. It was the first time that that demon had ever treated a stranger with civil indifference. He was chained in the corner, and had a bone between his paws and was gnawing it; and not even growling, which was not his usual way. Frau Stein’s eyes beamed with a vicious pleasure, and she called out,

  “You want work, do you? Well, there it is, cut out for you. Take the dog out and give him an airing!”

  Even some of the hardest hearts there felt the cruelty of it, and their horror showed in their faces when the boy stepped innocently forward to obey.

  “Stop!” shouted the master, and Katrina, flushing with anger, sprang after the youth and halted him.

  “Shame!” she said; and the master turned his indignation loose and gave his wife a dressing down that astonished her. Then he said to the stranger,

  “You are free to rest, lad, if you like, but if you would rather work, Katrina will see what she can find for you. What is your name?”

  The boy answered, quietly,

  “Number 44, New Series 864,962.”

  Everybody’s eyes came open in a stare. Of course. The master thoug
ht perhaps he hadn’t heard aright; so he asked again, and the boy answered the same as before,

  “Number 44, New Series 864,962.”

  “What a hell of a name!” ejaculated Hans Katzenyammer, piously.

  “Jail-number, likely,” suggested Moses Haas, searchingly examining the boy with his rat eyes, and unconsciously twisting and stroking his silky and scanty moustache with his fingers, a way he had when his cogitations were concentrated upon a thing.

  “It’s a strange name,” said the master, with a barely noticeable touch of suspicion in his tone, “where did you get it?”

  “I don’t know, sir,” said No. 44, tranquilly, “I’ve, always had it.”

  The master forbore to pursue the matter further, probably fearing that the ice was thin, but Maria Vogel chirped up and asked,

  “Have you ever been in jail?”

  The master burst in with—

  “There, that’s enough of that! You needn’t answer, my boy, unless you want to.” He paused—hopeful, maybe—but 44 did not seize the opportunity to testify for himself. He stood still and said nothing. Satirical smiles flitted here and there, down the table, and the master looked annoyed and disappointed, though he tried to conceal it. “Take him along, Katrina.” He said it as kindly as he could, but there was just a trifle of a chill in his manner, and it delighted those creatures.

  Katrina marched out with 44.

  Out of a wise respect for the temper the master was in, there was no outspoken comment, but a low buzz skimmed along down the table, whose burden was, “That silence was a confession—the chap’s a Jail-Bird.”

  It was a bad start for 44. Everybody recognized it. Marget was troubled, and asked Gustav Fischer if he believed the boy was what these people were calling him. Fischer replied, with regret in his tone,

  “Well, you know, Fräulein, he could have denied it, and he didn’t do it.”

  “Yes, I know, but think what a good face he has. And pure, too; and beautiful.”

  “True, quite true. And it’s astonishing. But there it is, you see—he didn’t deny it. In fact he didn’t even seem greatly interested in the matter.”

  “I know it. It is unaccountable. What do you make out of it?”

  “The fact that he didn’t see the gravity of the situation marks him for a fool. But it isn’t the face of a fool. That he could be silent at such a time is constructive evidence that he is a Jail-Bird—with that face! which is impossible. I can’t solve you that riddle, Fräulein—it’s beyond my depth.”

  Forty-Four entered, straining under a heavy load of logs, which he dumped into a great locker and went briskly out again. He was quickly back with a similar load; and another, and still another.

  “There,” said the master, rising and starting away, “that will do; you are not required to kill yourself.”

  “One more—just one more,” said the boy, as if asking a favor.

  “Very well, but let that be the last,” said the master, as if granting one; and he left the room.

  Forty-Four brought the final load, then stood, apparently waiting for orders. None coming, he asked for them. It was Frau Stein’s chance. She gave him a joyfully malicious glance out of her yellow eyes, and snapped out—

  “Take the dog for an airing!”

  Outraged, friend and foe alike rose at her! They surged forward to save the boy, but they were too late; he was already on his knees loosing the chain, his face and the dog’s almost in contact. And now the people surged back to save themselves; but the boy rose and went, with the chain in his hand, and the dog trotted after him happy and content.

  Chapter 4

  Did it make a stir? Oh, on your life! For nearly two minutes the herd were speechless; and if I may judge by myself, they quaked, and felt pale; then they all broke out at once, and discussed it with animation and most of them said what an astonishing thing it was—and unbelievable, too, if they hadn’t seen it with their own eyes. With Marget and Fischer and Barty the note was admiration. With Frau Stein, Maria, Katzenyammer and Binks it was wonder, but wonder mixed with maledictions—maledictions upon the devil that possessed the Jail-Bird—they averring that no stranger unprotected by a familiar spirit could touch that dog and come away but in fragments; and so, in their opinion the house was in a much more serious plight, now, than it was before when it only had a thief in it. Then there were three silent ones: Ernest and Moses indicated by their cynical manner and mocking smiles that they had but a small opinion of the exploit, it wasn’t a matter to make such a fuss about; the other silent one—the magician—was so massively silent, so weightily silent, that it presently attracted attention. Then a light began to dawn upon some of the tribe; they turned reverent and marveling eyes upon the great man, and Maria Vogel said with the happy exultation of a discoverer—

  “There he stands, and let him deny it if he can! He put power upon that boy with his magic. I just suspected it, and now I know it! Ah, you are caught, you can’t escape—own up, you wonder of the ages!”

  The magician smiled a simpering smile, a detected and convicted smile, and several cried out—

  “There, he is caught—he’s trying to deny it, and he can’t! Come, be fair, be good, confess!” and Frau Stein and Maria took hold of his great sleeves, peering worshipingly up in his face and tried to detain him; but he gently disengaged himself and fled from the room, apparently vastly embarrassed. So that settled the matter. It was such a manifest confession that not a doubter was left, every individual was convinced; and the praises that that man got would have gone far to satisfy a god. He was great before, he was held in awe before, but that was as nothing to the towering repute to which he had soared now. Frau Stein was in the clouds. She said that this was the most astonishing exhibition of magic power Europe had ever seen, and that the person who could doubt, after this, that he could work any miracle he wanted to would justly take rank as a fool. They all agreed that that was so, none denying it or doubting; and Frau Stein, taking her departure with the other ladies, declared that hereafter the magician should occupy her end of the table and she would move to a humbler place at his right, where she belonged.

  All this was gall and vinegar to that jealous reptile Ernest Wasserman, who could not endure to hear anybody praised, and he began to cast about to turn the subject. Just then Fischer opened the way by remarking upon the Jail-Bird’s strength, as shown in the wood-carrying. He said he judged that the Jail-Bird would be an ugly customer in a rough stand-up fight with a youth of his own age.

  “Him!” scoffed Ernest, “I’m of his age, and I’ll bet I’d make him sorry if he was to tackle me!”

  This was Moses’s chance. He said, with mock solicitude,

  “Don’t. Think of your mother. Don’t make trouble with him, he might hurt you badly.”

  “Never you mind worrying about me, Moses Haas. Let him look out for himself if he meddles with me, that’s all.”

  “Oh,” said Moses, apparently relieved, “I was afraid you were going to meddle with him. I see he is not in any danger.” After a pause, “Nor you,” he added carelessly.

  The taunt had the intended effect.

  “Do you think I’m afraid to meddle with him? I’m not afraid of fifty of him. I’ll show him!”

  Forty-Four entered with the dog, and while he was chaining him Ernest began to edge toward the door.

  “Oh,” simpered Moses, “good-bye, ta-ta, I thought you were going to meddle with the Jail-Bird.”

  “What, to-day—and him all tired out and not at his best? I’d be ashamed of myself.”

  “Haw-haw-haw!” guffawed that lumbering ox, Hans Katzenyammer, “hear the noble-hearted poltroon!”

  A whirlwind of derisive laughter and sarcastic remarks followed, and Ernest, stung to the quick, threw discretion to the winds and marched upon the Jail-Bird, and planted himself in front of him, crying out,

  “Square off! Stand up like a man, and defend yourself.”

  “Defend myself?” said the boy, seeming no
t to understand. “From what?”

  “From me—do you hear?”

  “From you? I have not injured you; why should you wish to hurt me?”

  The spectators were disgusted—and disappointed. Ernest’s courage came up with a bound. He said fiercely,

  “Haven’t you any sense? Don’t you know anything? You’ve got to fight me—do you understand that?”

  “But I cannot fight you; I have nothing against you.”

  Ernest, mocking: “Afraid of hurting me, I suppose.”

  The Jail-Bird answered quite simply,

  “No, there is no danger of that. I have nothing to hurt you for, and I shall not hurt you.”

  “Oh, thanks—how kind. Take that!”

  But the blow did not arrive. The stranger caught both of Ernest’s wrists and held them fast. Our apprentice tugged and struggled and perspired and swore, while the men stood around in a ring and laughed, and shouted, and made fun of Ernest and called him all sorts of outrageous pet names; and still the stranger held him in that grip, and did it quite easily and without puffing or blowing, whereas Ernest was gasping like a fish; and at last, when he was worn out and couldn’t struggle any more, he snarled out,

  “I give in—let go!” and 44 let go and said gently, “if you will let me I will stroke your arms for you and get the stiffness and the pain out;” but Ernest said “You go to hell,” and went grumbling away and shaking his head and saying what he would do to the Jail-Bird one of these days, he needn’t think it’s over yet, he’d better look out or he’ll find he’s been fooling with the wrong customer; and so flourished out of the place and left the men jeering and yelling, and the Jail-Bird standing there looking as if it was all a puzzle to him and he couldn’t make it out.

  Chapter 5

  Things were against that poor waif. He had maintained silence when he had had an opportunity to deny that he was a Jail-Bird, and that was bad for him. It got him that name, and he was likely to keep it. The men considered him a milksop because he spared Ernest Wasserman when it was evident that he could have whipped him. Privately my heart bled for the boy, and I wanted to be his friend, and longed to tell him so, but I had not the courage, for I was made as most people are made, and was afraid to follow my own instincts when they ran counter to other people’s. The best of us would rather be popular than right. I found that out a good while ago. Katrina remained the boy’s fearless friend, but she was alone in this. The master used him kindly, and protected him when he saw him ill treated, but further than this it was not in his nature to go except when he was roused, the current being so strong against him.