Simplicissimus (48 page)
At the spa there was also a rich Swiss gentleman who had not only all his money stolen but also his wife’s jewellery, consisting of gold, silver, pearls and precious stones. Since it is as hard to lose such things as it is to acquire them, the said Swiss was willing to use any means to recover them. He sent for the celebrated necromancer who lived at the sign of the Goatskin and whose familiar spirit so plagued the thief that he returned the stolen goods to their rightful owner, for which the sorcerer was paid ten rix-dollars.
I would very much liked to have met this sorcerer and talked with him, but couldn’t do so without damage to my reputation, or so I imagined, for at that time I thought no end of myself. So I told my servant to go and drink with him that evening, since I had heard he was very fond of his wine, to see if I might get to know him in that way, for I had heard strange stories about him which I could not believe unless I heard them from his own lips. I disguised myself as a peddler selling ointments and sat down at his table to see if he could guess, or a demon would tell him, who I was. But I did not get the least sign that he did, he just kept drinking all the time and took me for the person my clothes suggested; he did drink several toasts to me, but he showed more respect for my servant than for me. He told him in confidence that if the thief had thrown even the smallest part of what he had stolen from the Swiss gentleman into running water, thus giving the devil his share, it would have been impossible either to name the thief or to recover the goods.
I listened to this nonsense and was astonished that the arch-deceiver would get the poor man in his claws for such a trifle. I guessed that this was part of the pact he had made with the devil and I could well imagine that this kind of trick would not help the thief if a different necromancer, who did not have that clause in his pact, were brought in to clear up the theft. I therefore told my servant, who could pick a pocket better than any Slav fingersmith, to get him blind drunk, then steal his ten rix-dollars and throw a few coppers from it into the Rench, which the man did. Next morning the necromancer, when he discovered his money was missing, went to some bushes on the banks of the Rench, doubtless to confer with his familiar about it, but was so maltreated that he came back with his face all back and blue and covered in scratches. When I saw this I felt so sorry for the poor soul that I sent his money back to him with a message to say that now he saw what an evil, double-dealing type the devil was he would presumably quit his service and turn back to God. But little good did this friendly exhortation do me. From that time on nothing went right. Soon afterwards my two fine horses fell sick and died through witchcraft. But what else could I expect? I lived a life of hedonistic pleasure and never commended my goods to God’s care. What was there to stop this sorcerer taking his revenge on me?
The longer I stayed at the spa the better I liked it. Not only did the number of visitors increase daily, but I found both the place itself and the way of life very pleasant. I associated with the liveliest of those staying there and started to learn the art of polite conversation and courteous address, which I had not much bothered with until then. As my servants called me Captain, it was assumed I belonged to the nobility, since a mere soldier of fortune would be unlikely to achieve such a rank at such an early age. So the rich fops became not only acquaintances but close friends and I was kept busy with all kinds of amusement, gambling, eating and drinking, which devoured many a bright ducat without me noticing, or even caring since my moneybags were still heavy with what I had inherited from Oliver.
Herzbruder’s condition, however, gradually deteriorated until the doctors gave him up (though not before they had bled him white, both literally and financially) and he paid his debt to nature. He confirmed his last will and testament, making me heir to whatever he was due to receive from his late father’s estate. In return I gave him a magnificent funeral and sent his servants on their way with some money and their mourning clothes.
His death grieved me very much, especially as he had been poisoned. I could do nothing to change it, but it changed me. I shunned company and sought out solitude to pursue my melancholy thoughts. I would find somewhere in the bushes to hide and reflect not only on the friend I had lost, but on the fact that I would never find another like him as long as I lived. At the same time I made all sorts of plans about how I would organise my life in future, but came to no firm conclusion. Hardly had I decided I wanted to go back to the wars than I was telling myself the least peasant in that district was better off than a colonel, for no foraging parties came to that mountainous area. Nor could I imagine what business an army would have to go there to ruin the countryside. All the farmhouses were as well kept as in peacetime and all the stalls full of cattle, even though down in the plains there was not a cat or dog left in the villages.
I was listening to the most delightful birdsong and thinking that the nightingale with its charming strains must compel all other birds to stay silent and listen, either out of shame or in order to steal some of its beautiful notes, when a quite different kind of beauty approached the bank on the other side of the river. She was only wearing the dress of a peasant girl, but her loveliness moved me more than any lady in all her splendour. She took a basket off her head in which she was carrying some fresh butter wrapped in muslin to sell at the spa. She put the butter into the water to cool so that it would not melt in the great heat and while she was waiting she sat down on the grass, threw off her veil and hat and wiped the sweat from her brow, giving me plenty of time to observe her and feast my prying eyes on her. It seemed to me I had never seen a more beautiful person in my life. Her body was perfectly proportioned and without blemish, her hands and arms white as snow, her complexion fresh and charming, her black eyes full of fire and passionate looks. As she was putting the butter back in her basket I shouted over, ‘Pretty maid! You’ve cooled your butter in the water with your fair hands but your bright eyes have set my heart on fire.’ The moment she heard and saw me she ran off without a word, as if she had a pack of hounds at her heels, leaving me behind with all the foolish thoughts that plague an over-imaginative lover.
But my desire to bask in the warm rays of that sun again would not leave me in peace in my chosen solitude. All of a sudden the song of the nightingale meant no more to me than the howling of wolves. So off I trotted back to the spa, sending my boy on ahead to intercept the butter-seller and haggle with her until I arrived. He did his bit, and so did I, but I met with a stony, chilly reception such as I would never thought to have found in a peasant girl. The sole effect of this was to make me even more smitten, though having been through the same school myself, I knew very well that she would not let herself be so easily won over.
What I needed was either a sworn enemy or a good friend: an enemy to take my mind off these foolish thoughts of love or a friend to advise me and persuade me to forget this nonsense. Unfortunately all I had was my money, which dazzled me, my blind desires, which led me astray because I gave them free rein, and my recklessness, which ruined me and brought disaster. Fool that I was, I should have seen that the clothes we were both wearing were an omen that no good could come of the affair. Since I had just lost Herzbruder and the girl her parents, the first time we saw each other we were both dressed in mourning; what joy could come from the love between us? However, I was as blind and irrational as young Cupid and determined to make a fool of myself and, since it was the only way I could satisfy my animal lusts, I decided to marry her. ‘You’re only a farmer’s son’, I told myself, ‘and you’ll never own a castle as long as you live. This corner of the country is a fine place and compared with other areas has managed to remain flourishing and prosperous throughout these dreadful wars. Moreover, you’ve enough money to buy the best farm in the district. You’re going to marry this honest country girl and acquire a peaceful estate among the country folk. Where could you find a livelier residence than close to the spa, where the departures and arrivals mean you see a new world every six weeks and can visualise how the earth changes from one age to the next.’
These were a few of the thousand thoughts that went through my mind until I finally asked the object of my desires to marry me and got her, not without difficulty, to say yes.
I was in seventh heaven and made splendid preparations for my wedding. I not only bought up the farm where my bride had been born, but started a fine new building there, as if I intended to keep court rather than house. Even before the ceremony had taken place I had bought over thirty head of cattle, because that was the number that could be fed on the farm all year round. In short, everything was of the best, even the expensive furnishings my folly persuaded me to get. However, I was soon laughing on the other side of my face. I thought I was sailing for the Virgin Isles and found myself entering the harbour of Mangalore, at which I realised, far too late, the reason why my bride was so unwilling to take me. What made it hardest of all to bear was that I could not complain about it to anyone without making myself a laughing-stock. I could see that there was a certain justice about it, but that did not make me any more willing to put up with it, nor to mend my ways. Since I had been deceived, I decided to deceive the deceiver and went grazing wherever I could find pasture, the result being that I spent more time in good company at the spa than at home. I left my household duties to take care of themselves and for her part my wife was just as slovenly. I had an ox slaughtered for home use and she salted it in several baskets; when she was to prepare a sucking-pig for me she tried to pluck it like a fowl; she roasted crayfish on a griddle and trout on the spit. From these few examples you can easily tell how she looked after me in general. She was fond of a bottle of wine, too, and enjoyed having company to share it, all of which was a portent of disaster to come.
Once I was walking with some of the fashionable crowd down the valley to attend a gathering at the lower baths when we met an old peasant leading a goat, which he was taking to sell. I felt I had seen him somewhere before, so I asked him where he was coming from with his goat. He doffed his cap and said, ‘I really can’t tell ye, yer honour sir.’
‘You haven’t stolen it?’ I said.
‘Nay’, replied the peasant, ‘I’m bringing it from the wee town down the valley, but I can’t tell yer honour its name in case the goat hears.’
This made the rest of my companions laugh, since the name of the town farther down the river meant ‘Goat-town’. I went pale, which they all presumed was because I was annoyed or embarrassed at the neat way the peasant had sidestepped my question, but it was something quite different I had on my mind. The large wart coming out of the middle of his forehead, like a unicorn’s horn, made me quite sure it was my Da from the Spessart. However, I decided to play the mind-reader a little before I made myself known to him and gave him the pleasure of seeing what a splendid son he had, as he could tell from my fine clothes. ‘You come from the Spessart, don’t you?’ I said to him.
‘Aye, sir’, the peasant replied, at which I said, ‘Weren’t your house and farm plundered and burnt down by troopers about eighteen years ago?’
‘Yes, God help me, so they were’, answered the peasant, ‘but it wasn’t so long ago.’
‘And didn’t you have two children’, I went on, ‘a grown-up daughter and a young boy who looked after your sheep?’
‘The girl was my child, yer honour sir’, my Da replied, ‘but not the boy, though I was bringing him up as my own son.’
That made it clear to me that I wasn’t the son of this crude bumpkin. On the one hand I was pleased to hear it, on the other I was dismayed because it meant I was probably a bastard or foundling, so I asked my Da where he had found the boy and what reason he had to bring him up as his own. ‘Alas’, he said, ‘twas a strange business with him. The war gave him to me and the war took him away again.’
At this point I began to be afraid he might say something about my birth which would reflect dishonourably on me, so I turned the conversation back to the goat, asking him if he had sold it to the innkeeper’s wife for cooking, which I would have found odd as the spa visitors were not in the habit of eating old goat’s flesh. ‘Oh no, yer honour’, he replied, ‘the innkeeper’s wife has enough goats of her own and wouldn’t pay for one. It’s for that countess what’s taking the waters. Doctor Knowall has prescribed some herbs for her, but the goat has to eat them first, then he takes the milk and makes a medicine out of it that the countess has to drink to get well again. People say the countess has nae innards and if this goat can help her it’ll be more than yon doctor and his farm-assister can do atween ’em.’
While he was telling us all this, I thought of a way of speaking to the peasant again and offered to pay one thaler more for the goat than the doctor or countess had offered. The prospect of the smallest profit soon makes people change their minds, and he immediately agreed, but only on condition that he could tell the countess first that I had offered him one thaler more than she had. If she was willing to pay the extra, she would get her goat, if not, he would let me have it. Either way, he would come to see me that evening to tell how things stood.
So off went my Da on his way, and we on ours. However, the gathering had lost its attraction for me, so I slipped away from my companions and went back to find my Da. He still had the goat because the others refused to pay that much for it, which I found surprising in such rich people. It certainly didn’t make me want to imitate them, so I took him to the farm I had recently bought and paid him for the goat. Then I got him half tipsy and asked him where the boy we had been talking about had come from. ‘Well you see, sir’, he said, ‘Mansfeld’s campaigns brought him to me and the Battle of Nördlingen took him way again.’