The Open Road: Adventures II and III. A Story

The Open Road. .BY JOHN HENRY EVANS, OF THE LATTER-DAYj SAINTS UNIVERSITY. Part I. — Being a Few of Brocketts' Early Adventures with Some Account of Him. Adventure II. — In Which a Woman with an Eagle Eye Appears, and the Oblong House on the Hill Standing there in the shadow of that ivy-cluster, young Brock- etts had leisure to take up reminiscently the thread of his strange life, and to follow it back. That was not a difficult task, for somewhere about the fifth year on the other end, the thread broke off abruptly. For the other nine years, only here and there was a knot to mark some signal event, and on each his fingers paused for a moment. As for that dark space where the thread began, he could find nothing definite to contemplate. To be sure, certain faint glimmer- ings, as of a pre-existent state, lingered obscurely in his mind, but he could not make sure that they were not imaginings. All he knew positively was, that there must be a bit of thread somewhere in that darkness, because here in his hand was a longer bit with evidence of the break. But he could not find it, groped he never so carefully. At the very end of the thread — that other end — was a hard knot, representing most likely some important event. But the knot must have been tied at the orphanage. It was at the orphan- age thai he first found himself. How he came to be there, he was wholly at a loss to understand. He did not even know whether his home — if he had ever had any — was at Vinningen or in some other part of the vast German Empire. His name, he knew, was Brocketts. Anyhow, that was what the boys termed him, and he

18 IMPROVEMENT ERA preferred Brocketts for the sole reason that the Sisters called him Louis. What his last name was he did not know, for there never had been occasion for the use of the surname at the orphanage, and he and the Sisters had not been on sufficiently intimate terms to warrant his asking them about it, or their volunteering the in- formation. But there was the knot, all the same. It must have stood for a vision of a boy in soldier's light-blue uniform, with gold stripes down the outside of the legs, beautiful gold-tasseled epaulets on the shoulders, and the most wonderful shiny sword dangling at his side — scabbard, beaded handle, and all- — a vision he had beheld, it might be, when he first came to the oblong House. Afterwards, at school, he found himself in the same seat with this soldier-boy, and on the side, too, where hung the sword, which he actually touched with his hands. Ben was his name — Ben what? Brock- etts never had. learned. And a good fellow he proved, too. Not an orphan, but the son of an officer in the German army who lived a Vinningen and who, like some other boys in the village, was sent to school at the orphanage because it was supposed to be better than the public school. That sword and that cap, and a pair of glorious red-topped boots he wore, were the envy of all the orphan- age, and any boy there would gladly have emptied every omnibus pocket he had and thrown the things down at the little soldier's feet only to have had one of them on . But the little soldier was set dead against it. Only once had he yielded, and that was to Brocketts. "I like you," he had said, "and you can wear my boots, and I'll wear your clogs." And Brocketts had actually walked in them — mincingly, it must be confessed, for they were too small, — and for full ten minutes, two hundred and more eyes staring enviously at him all the time! That was a red-letter day in his life; that, most likely, was what the knot signified. Somewhere near that vision came another thing that wasn't worth the least kink in the thread — something that must be let to lie between this and the next knot, smooth and unobserved. Brocketts hurried over this part or slighted it altogether. But we must not. He was in the presence of the head nun — a woman in a white bonnet and a bib front, whose great size and mottled features

THE OPEN ROAD 19 frightened him unspeakably. When she spoke, you expected the earth to tremble. She took him up stairs into a long room with a hundred little beds in it — there were just a hundred, because he counted them afterwards — ranged along the side walls, feet out. At the head of each cot was a small stand with a tin basin on it; above this hung a tiny mirror, below which on a shelf, were a comb and a brush; and by the side of these hung a towel on a roller. Once, the boys told him, there had been only four wash-bowls and four towels for all, but a plentiful crop of scabs on head and face and body induced the present sanitary method of separate articles for each one. "You will be expected to use these," explained the woman. "No, mum, I won't!" he answered mildly with an effort at conciliation. "But you will!" she snapped, taking him violently by the ear, and not stopping to consider that he had misunderstood. He imagined that he had been conjured not to touch anything. The gong sounded, and he was led downstairs again into another large room, with a long table running up and down the middle, and benches on both sides. The big matron .with the fearsome countenance detained him near the door till all the boys had filed in by twos, the double column dividing at the table end and each boy waiting at his place for the signal to be seated. Brocketts was taken to a vacant place near the lower end, the signal was given, and they all sat noiselessly down. But the table was empty and bare. The dishes and the food were at the head, where also were two women, hooded and bibbed. Pretty soon there entered a jolly-looking fat man, with glistening, bald pate, dressed in priestly garb and trying to look very solemn. He said grace in a loud voice, standing by the table end with both hands upraised, and then backed up to where the large nun stood, talking with her and smiling. With that grace the food was released, as the printers say. One of the Sisters put some soup into a tin dish, and the other, adding a tin spoon, started it on its way down the line to the opposite end of the table. All this business of passing the dishes from hand to hand was not at all clear to Brocketts at first; and so when that dish came to him, he appropriated it to his own use. Instantly a score of eyes glared at him, and a wrathful whisper shot into his ear —

20 IMPROVEMENT ERA "Here, you chump, pass it along!" And a hand on his left, into which the vessel should have gone, grabbed the dish, spilling some of the soup on the table. "You clumsy yap!" exclaimed the same boy in a powerful undertone; "now Fred'll have less than his share, and'll go hungrier than ever." Brocketts did not catch the full significance of this, at the time, but he was to learn. Meanwhile, there was no mistaking the glare of those argus eyes, nor the omnious crook of Fred's little finger. Meanwhile, too, his nearest neighbor lapped up the patch of soup greedily with his fore-finger. The soup dispatched— a poor liquid thin as water and surprisingly meagre in quantity, — some more plates containing a small dab of mixed vegetables, made the rounds and likewise disappeared the way of the soup. Brocketts looked up expectantly — but there was no more. He had eaten his share, and was still hungry. Breakfast and dinner were much the same, except that there was a single slice of brown bread, quite butterless, instead of the vegetables, and a thin liquid resembling coffee in the place of the soup. At recess, as the boys filed downstairs from school, a Sister stood near the landing with a basket in which were hunks of brown bread, without butter, each boy receiving a piece. The orphans rose,at six o'clock, winter and summer, for the Sisters believed devoutly in that worm which every sane boy wishes some early bird would catch, and have done with it. Each one had to make his own bed every morning and keep his toilet articles tidy and clean. Nine years this had gone on for Brocketts, to the best of his reckoning. Every day there had been the same monotonous round of eating, school, and work, work, school, and eating, with a rare minute for play. A change seemed only to emphasize the daily routine. But there were changes. Sometimes, instead of butterless brown bread in the basket, big red-bellied apples dis- ported themselves. This, however, was only once a year, near Christmas time, when some generous-hearted farmer bethought himself of the hungry little people on the hill. The shop-work usually consisted of knitting stockings, winter caps, and jackets. But once, during the war with Prussia, the boys were set to work making lint for wounded soldiers. Small square pieces of linen cloth were given them, which they were to separate

THE OPEN ROAD 21 into individual threads and to arrange, like wheat sheaves, in bundles for use on the battlefield — an irksome task they all found it. And once every year the orphans had all they could eat! Here were the knots on that thread which Brockett's fancy did not lightly touch as he waited behind the church. And there were nine of them distributed at regular intervals from end to end. They stood for Christmas dinners. Of the soup which was thicker, the bread which was buttered, and the vegetable hash which was tripple instead of double, they took their fill, even if they had to ask for a second dish — something which was strictly forbidden on any other occasion. These events should have been given larger knots than any now on the thread — they were looked backward upon and forward to so anxiously. For these occasions were positively the only ones when Brocketts had not risen from the table hungry. He knew what the phrase in the Bible meant, "the worm that dieth not!" Once, in the school room, Fritz got a good rap over the knuckles for hinting, sincerely enough, that its habitation was the stomach. The Sister said that there wasn't any real worm. But every lad there knew better; he had felt it all the time — could feel it gnawing away right then, in fact. They had had an agreement among them — handed down, it seems, from one generation of orphans to another, for even the "oldest inhabitant" there did not remember its origin — that in case of sickness at the stomach no one, under any circumstances whatever, was to absent himself from the table and that he was to receive his rations as if nothing had befallen him, giving them, any or all, to his best chum. There was one knot for this in the thread. And what fine skill those young cubs developed in sniffing a stomach in one another! If, on the grounds, they saw Ludwig, Fritz, Frederick, or Adolphus bending over suddenly, holding his abdomen in the way they all knew so well, there was a sudden acclamation and a running on everybody's part to present his claims to the dinner. "Fritz can't eat today!" one would cry out. Whereupon the accused would say moodily — "Maybe I'll get over it all right!" For no one but a sissy would give up till his case was hopeless. It was a thing to be contemplated with the utmost apprehension,

22 IMPROVEMENT ERA this loss of a meal. How under the canopy was one ever to make it up! "Naw, you won't!" contradicted ninety and nine throats. And one of them would add the irrefutable argument: "I had it that way onct, and I had to give up my dinner. Didn't I, John?" The statement was confirmed not only by John, but by every- body else present. No one boy needed to be singled out like that. As if an event of such magnitude could happen at the orphanage without everybody knowing it! Didn't even Fritz know it? That was always the first step to convince the afflicted that it was impossible for him to recover before dinner. Then followed the task of establishing one's claims to the most intimate friend- ship. This was always hard, because one never knew how success- ful one's reasoning was before all the boys were actually seated at the table. Till then he of the bad stomach rolled disconsolately on the ground, groaning and listening to a ready flow of argument, but keeping meanwhile his own counsel. Desperate siege was laid to him at every point for the inestimable privilege of being his best friend just for this once, you know. Less material pleas failing, tops, marbles, pieces of string, even pocket knives, and I don't know what not, which represented other friendships, were called into requisition. But this was always held to be against the rules, since the supply of these articles was extremely limited, and it appeared like taking undue advantage on account of your wealth. Thus the assault and battery of tjie affections was kept up till the goods were ceremoniously delivered at the table. Once, tradition said, a boy suddenly got well just when every friendly mouth was fixed for an additional spoonful of soup and a bite. That afternoon there was an uproar at recess. What happened none of the Brocketts' generation could tell, it had been so long ago. But no boy ever did this afterwards — at least, to the extent of defrauding his expectant neighbors. All this and more ran through the boy's mind as he stood there waiting for the night fall. These were some of the knots in the thread and some of the smooth distances between. His two attempts at escape Brocketts did not set any value upon, seeing that one of them had brought about a scarred back, and that they both had failed ignominiously of their purpose. But this one — well, it was possibly too early yet to say anything definite about it. When darkness came he would see.

THE OPEN ROAD 23 As for the future, Brocketts had no plans further than to run away. It was all vague to him. He had no knowledge of the big world — how big he had yet to learn. But he would go away, far away from Vinningen, where the Sisters could not find him. He would get along — there were no two ways about that. He was a boy, and he was full of hope. Meantime, he waited for the return of his friend. Adventure III. — Which Tells How Brocketts Bumped into a Big Sea Captain, and what Became of the Affair. Vinningen in those days was the merest village, though it was a good deal larger than many of our American "cities" (God save the mark!). Its rather loose group of houses, mostly stone and ancient as the hills, stood perched, like lonely sentinels, on a high plateau and looking out on a broken country all around. For this part of Germany — the Palatinate on the Rhine, as it is called — is outrageously rough, up hill and down dale. Here and there throughout those hills and hollows were farm houses, far apart, with mills and factories between — the whole country plentifully sprinkled with timber. To get down from the elevation where Vinningen was, you had to go north on the only road leading from it, for every where else were tall, precipitous cliffs. On this road, rounding the western cliffs, as the night fell heavy as a fog, a boy trudged — not in drab any more, though the clogs remained, but in a dark blouse belted at the waist. In an inside pocket were eight marks, the equivalent of about one dollar and eighty-five cents — an unexpected present from his generous- hearted friend. "You'd better take the road to Spires," that friend had advised him. "It's easier to lose yourself in a big town than in the country. That's what I did, and I got along all right." Brocketts had wondered what that experience had been, but the man had said nothing further about it, and he had not asked. "How far is it from here?" the boy had inquired. "Let me see! I don't think it's forty miles. D'you think you can walk fifteen miles a day?" Brocketts thought he could. "Then you can easily make it in three days." And the two had parted with a warm hand clasp — gratitude on the boy's lips and hopeful words on the man's.

24 IMPROVEMENT ERA "You'll get along all right," his friend had shot whisperingly after him. "I believe in you!" How those wooden shoes flew along the dusty turnpike! He could not miss the way, he had been told, since the road lay straight to the capital, and there were no others except small ones breaking off from this. Presently the moon rose over his shoulder, an irregular yellow ball in the clear blue, and a twinkling star chasing merrily after. Joy was in Brocketts' heart — the joy of a new life. What- ever befell him would be preferable to the all-round stagnation of the orphanage. Growth and manhood was what he pined for, which he saw no hope of there. But this that he was going to should be different. He would see to that. It should be full of action and development. He meant to be somebody in the world. What, he did not know yet, but he would keep his eyes and ears open. To him, as to everyone with the dew of youth fresh upon him, the future was red with hope. As for running away from the orphan asylum, he had no twinges of conscience on that score. He belonged to nobody. Nobody had any interest in him. The only reason why the Sisters wished to have him with them was that they got money for his keep. So far as he knew, he had no parents and no relatives. And why should he stay where every moment was a growing disappointment, when nobody but himself was really concerned? Yes; he had done perfectly right in making his escape. If he succeeded, it would be by the strength of his own right arm; if he failed — but he would not fail; he had that in him, he felt, which would earn success. And so thinking, he trudged on. Brocketts made more than fifteen miles a day, for he reached Spires in just two days, and with three marks in his pocket. Twice he had got a ride in a cart for several miles, and he had walked early and late. But he had been free with his food-money, for he knew he could not hope to keep up a good pace on the road unless he ate well. And then, too, he was a boy. His spirits were higher than ever when he reached the capital of Bavaria. Spires, or Speyer as it is often called, was then a town of probably fourteen thousand inhabitants. It is situated at the junction of the Speyerbach and the Rhine. Several German emperors lie buried there, and it has a cathedral now nearly nine hundred years old. But Brocketts neither knew nor cared for

THE OPEN ROAD 26 any of these dull facts. All he saw was that it offered possibilities for a boy in a dark blouse with three marks in his pocket. But those possibilities were far different from what he looked for. He expected to get a place to work somewhere; instead, he found — but I am getting ahead of my story. He had just turned into a side street near the river and was inspecting the signs as he went, hoping to find a place where he might get a meal, when he bumped up against the fair round belly of a rough-looking man on his way out of a tavern. Really, the man had stood still when he saw the boy coming towards him, waiting good-humoredly to receive the bump, as good-humored people will sometimes do. "Well, what the devil do you want?" he asked in a voice that came from so far down there in that rotundity as to get extremely broken on its way up. "Work, sir!" said Brocketts forgetting the immediate interest in the larger. "I'm looking for a job." "Lookin' fer a job, hey?" repeated he of the big stomach, looking at the boy's short figure and square head. "Yes, sir." "And what kin you do?" "Oh, anything — I'm willing to do anything." "Willin' to do anything. And what you want for doin' it?" "Oh, whatever it's worth, sir." "Whatever it's worth, hey? Then I'm your man — come with me." And the man wheeled lumberingly about to lead the way. "I've got to have something to eat first!" protested Brocketts. "I'm awful hungry, sir." "So'm I, and I'm just goin' to dinner. You c'n eat with me. How'll that do, hey?" "All right, sir." Brocketts would save the price of a meal. The two went off together down to the river and on to a mer- chantman. It was a large vessel, one of those which plied up and down the Rhine with merchandise. And this man was the captaini evidently, for he shouted to the cook — "Lunch for two — one big and one little!" Brocketts found himself wondering whether the man meant the lunches or the persons who were to eat the lunches. The fact that he was little— not so little though!— was no sign that he could not eat lots. But there was no time to continue this thought,

26 IMPROVEMENT ERA since meanwhile they were sousing their faces in cool water, combing their hair, and talking. "And what may be your name, son?" asked his friend. "Brocketts, sir," the boy answered briefly. "Brocketts it shall be, then," the man returned. "And you c'n call me Behner, and my boat the "Walrus." I'm an old salt, even if this is fresh water, and I own this here boat, and we're goin' to sail away in two more hours, if them bloaters don't get too full." Sail away! This was more than Brocketts had bargained for. He would have to think it over. Always, he had to think about everything that offered a prospect. If he didn't go, he would pay the man for his dinner and bid him good-bye; and if he went — why, he would go, that was all there was about it. The reasons for going were greater than those for staying, as Brocketts found when he came to consider. Indeed, there was no really good reason why he should remain at Spires; whereas, there were several why he ought to go with the boat. In the first place, if he went, he would not be caught and taken back to the orphan- age— anyway, the probability that he wouldn't, might be increased. Then, he could see the country. Heretofore he had never been out of Vinningen, and a caged bird not only longs for liberty and the open air, but, if we only knew it, goes farther away from the place of former bondage than otherwise it would. There could be no danger on the water greater than on the land. And so the balance was cast on the side of going with Behner in the "Walrus." The "bloaters," eight in number, returned in time and only about half "full." Either the Captain had over-estimated their capacity for beer, or he had under-estimated their powers of resist- ance. Anyhow, back they came, and in no bad way for their work either, considering. And good-humored to the point of imbecility. In no time, the boat, heavy-laden, floated down the beautiful waters of the Rhine. There is nothing to exceed the magic charm of a voyage on a stream like the Rhine, with its varied scenery, its dashing waters here, and its deep, even surface there. In all great rivers there is a suggestion of strength and eternity, but in the Rhine is a hint also of the wonderful possibilities of little things. For, away up yonder in the icy mountains of Switzerland, far above those high valleys where no habitations are, and far above the point where the hardy pine ceases to grow, a few drops of water break themselves loose

THE OPEN ROAD 27 from the ice wall; they trickle down the steeps, gathering force and volume as they fly along, often through the air, but always in essentially the same course; and tiny rush irresistibly through the lower places where men have builded their cities to drown with their noisy wheels of industry the sound of the ever thunderous waters; till, in Germany and Holland, it becomes a thing to be fiercely reckoned with. From the dashing impetuosity of that slender up-stream current, it turns into a majestic width, which makes you think you are afloat on the broad bosom of a romantic lake. All this, even the fact of the river's growth into power, the hungry eyes and ears of Brocketts did not permit to escape him. At every point where he was not at work, he plied the seamen with questions. And then there is the rich material of history that almost every spot in the old stream gives out to even the half-read German youth. Here, a little way from the castle of Klopp, rises the Mouse Tower, where, according to tradition, the hard-hearted Bishop Hatto came to a pitiful death from rats because he refused, one year when his people's crops failed, to take from his own over- flowing granaries some wheat to satisfy their hunger cries, but burned them instead in a barn to which he had inveigled them by false promises. Farther on, past a softly-undulating country, covered with grape vines far as the eye can see, to the steeply- rising mountain where the best grapes are, stands that grand pile, the castle of Rheinstein, from which the knights of the stirrup, who laughed at the king's efforts to get peace for his people, were ordered captured by him and hanged wherever caught. Then there is the Lorelei, a giant rock rising from the river, up which one beautiful moonlight night a young fisherman climbed and was never seen afterward, for the Lorelei had taken him down to her Crystal Palace in the cool, clear depths below, there to possess him forever. I do not vouch for the truth of these, however, since the account is found in the romanticists. At St. Goar is a famous abbey, where, it is said, is a book in which is inscribed the name of Charlemagne and other, but lesser, lights of the eighth century. There is a cathedral at Bonn which is said to owe its origin to St. Helena, the mother of Constantine, and in which two kings were crowned, Philip the Fair and Charles the Fourth of Bohemia. And so, emerging from the majestic circle of the splendid seven mountains.

28 IMPROVEMENT ERA the finest point on the Rhine, Brocketts passed into Cologne. Here the grand old stream grows into sedate manhood, from its impetuous days of boyhood and youth. Then it tossed itself from the high places to the low in a perfectly reckless way, going presently through the luxurious and literally intoxicating vine- yards on the borders of France. Now, however, it settles itself into a busy domesticated condition, content to look after the rye and the wheat, to be interested in the increase in the number of lofty smoking chimneys and clattering railway trains, and to remark with satisfaction the growth of the shipping before the wealthy and busy commercial towns. It was evening when Captain Behner's vessel reached Cologne, passing through the bridge of boats. The high spire of St. Martin's, with its two towers, rose in the midst of the town like a huge giant, the two lights looking for all the world like two eyes sparkling with fire. Nothing disturbed the stillness of the night but the rustling of the waters, the heavy tramp of the horses' hoofs on the bridge, and the sound of a blacksmith's hammer. Aix-la-Chapelle, farther on, fairly bristled, as Brocketts knew, with interesting historical events from the days of Charlemagne to the day when the treaty of peace was signed there, in 1748, which ended a long war between England and France. All along the Rhine the "Walrus" had passed numerous fine old castles round which traditions and fancy have woven their legends of romance and fable, and all along, too, it had gone by costly and magnificent cathedrals, about which cluster traditions affecting the hopes and loves of millions of Christian people. Much of these traditions, however, was lost on Brocketts and his companions on the boat, because of their scant knowledge of this sort of German history. For always a thing which may not excite even a casual thought when you know nothing of its past, becomes a subject of deep interest in the light of history and tra- dition. But our young hero at least viewed with amazement the grand structures and their beautiful settings, as they fell on the right hand or on the left, and appreciated such stories as came to his memory on hearing familiar names. (To be continued)