The Black Spider (6 page)

Then the woman from Lindau mocked and scolded them, saying that this was nothing but vain imagining and that the men were behaving with the weakness of a woman in child-bed; they would bring no beech-trees to Bärhegen, whether they toiled and wept or sat down and cried. It would be their own fault if the knight let them feel his wanton malice; but for the sake of the women and children the matter would have to be handled differently. Then a long black hand came suddenly over the woman’s shoulder, and a piercing voice called, ‘Yes, she’s right!’ And in their midst stood the green huntsman with his grinning face, and the red feather tossed on his hat. Immediately terror drove the men away from the spot; they scattered up the slope like chaff in a whirlwind.

Christine, the woman from Lindau, was the only one who could not flee; she was learning what it means to talk about the devil and then be confronted by him in person. She stood as if transfixed by magic, compelled to stare at the red feather on his cap and to watch how the little red beard moved merrily up and down in the black face. The green huntsman gave a piercing laugh as the men disappeared, but he put on an amorous expression towards Christine and took her hand with a polite gesture. Christine wanted to withdraw it, but she could no longer escape the green huntsman; it seemed to her as if flesh were spluttering between red-hot tongs. And he began to speak fine words, and as he spoke his little red beard gleamed and moved lustfully up and down. He had not seen such a handsome little woman for a long time, he said, and it made his heart glad within his breast; what is more, he liked them bold, and in particular he liked those women best who could stay behind when the menfolk ran away. As he went on speaking in this way, the green huntsman appeared to Christine to became ever less terrifying. You could talk with a man like that, all the same, she thought, and she didn’t see why she should run away, she had seen far uglier men than him before now. The thought came to her more and more that something could be done with a man like that, and if you knew how to talk to him in the right way, he would surely do you a favor, or in any case you could cheat him, just as you could cheat any other men. The green huntsman went on to say that he really did not know why people were so frightened by him, his intentions were so good towards everybody, and if people were so rude towards him, they mustn’t be surprised if he did not always do to people what they most wanted. Then Christine took heart and told him that after all he did frighten people so much that it was terrible. Why had he demanded an unbaptized child, he surely could have spoken of other payment, that would seem so suspect to people, after all a child was a human being, and no Christian would go so far as to give away a child that was unbaptized. ‘That is my payment, to which I am accustomed, and I shan’t do the work for any other, and in any case why should any notice be taken of such a child that nobody as yet knows? It is when they are so young that you can give them away most easily, after all you have had neither pleasure nor trouble from them as yet. But the younger I can have them, the better, for the earlier I can bring up a child in my own way, the further I can mold it; but for that I don’t need any christening, and won’t have it either.’ Then indeed Christine saw that he would content himself with no other reward; however, the thought took root in her ever more firmly that this one would be unique if he could not be deceived!

Therefore she said that if someone wanted to earn something he would have to content himself with the reward which could be given to him; but at the moment they had no unbaptized child in any of their houses, nor would there be one in a month’s time, and the beech-trees had to be delivered within this period. Then the green huntsman squirmed with politeness as he said, ‘I am not demanding the child in advance. As soon as it is promised that the first child to be born will be handed over to me unbaptized, I shall be satisfied.’ Christine was indeed very pleased at this. She knew that there would be no newborn child in the domain of her lords for some time to come. Noe once the green huntsman had kept his promise and the beech-trees were planted, it would not be necessary to give him anything in return, either a child or anything else; they would have masses read both as defense and offense, and would boldly scoff at the green huntsman, or so Christine thought.

She therefore expressed her gratitude for the good offer and said this needed thinking over and she would like to speak to the menfolk about it. ‘Yes,’ said the green huntsman, ‘but there is nothing more to think about or to talk over. I made an appointment with you for today, and now I want to know your answer; I’ve got a lot to do still at a good many places, and I don’t exist simply on account of you people. You must accept or refuse; afterwards I don’t want to hear anything more about the whole business.’

Christine wanted to prevaricate about the matter, for she was reluctant to take it upon herself; indeed she would have liked to be coaxing, in order to be able to postpone the issue, but the green huntsman was in no humour for this and did not waver; ‘Now or never!’ he said. But as soon as the agreement about one single child was made, he would be willing to bring every night up onto Bärhegen as many beech-trees as were delivered to him before midnight at the Kilchstalden down below; it was there that he would receive them. ‘Now, pretty lady, don’t hesitate!’ the green huntsman said, and patted Christine on the cheek with irresistible charm. At that her heart did begin to beat hard, and she would have preferred to push the men forwards into this, so that she could have made out afterwards that it was their fault. But time pressed, there was no man there to be the scapegoat, and she clung to the belief that she was more cunning than the green huntsman and would have an idea that would enable her to get the better of him. So Christine said that she for her part was willing to agree, but if the menfolk later were unwilling, she could do nothing about that, and he was not to take it out of her. The green huntsman said that he would be well satisfied with her promise to do what she could. At this point, however, Christine did shudder, both with body and soul; now, she thought, would come the terrible moment when she would have to sign the agreement with the green huntsman in her own blood. But the green huntsman made it easier, saying that he never demanded signatures from pretty women and that he would be satisfied with a kiss. At this he pursed up his mouth towards Christine’s face, and Christine could not escape; once more she was as if transfixed by magic, stiff and rigid. Then the pointed mouth touched Christine’s face, and she felt as if some sharp-pointed steel fire were piercing marrow and bone, body and soul; and a yellow flash of lightning struck between them and showed Christine the green huntsman’s devilish face gleefully distorted, and thunder rolled above them as if the heavens had split apart.

The green man had disappeared, and Christine stood as if petrified, as if her feet had become rooted deep down into the ground in that terrible moment. At last she regained the use of her limbs, but there was a whistling and roaring in her mind as if mighty waters were pouring their floods over towering high rocks down into a black abyss. Just as one does not hear one’s own voice for the thundering of the waters, so Christine was not capable of knowing her own thoughts in the uproar that was thundering through her mind. Instinctively she fled up to the hill, and ever more fiercely did she feel a burning on her cheek where the green huntsman’s mouth had touched her; she rubbed and washed, but the burning did not decrease.

The night became wild. Up in the air and in the ravines there was a fierce uproar as if the spirits of the night wee holding a marriage feast in the black clouds and the winds were playing wild music for their horrible dances, as if the flashes of lightning were the wedding torches and the thunder the nuptial blessing. No one had ever previously experienced such a night at this time of year.

In the dark valley there was movement around one large house, and many people pressed around its sheltering roof. During a storm it usually happens that fear for his own hearth and home will drive the countryman under his own roof, where he can watch anxiously as long as the thunderstorm is in the sky above, guarding and protecting his own house. But now the common tribulation was greater than fear of the storm. The affliction brought them together in this house, which those whom the storm was driving from the Münneberg had to pass by as well as those who had taken flight from Bärhegen. Forgetting the terror of the night because of their own misery, they could be heard complaining and grumbling about their misfortune. In addition to all their misfortunes there had now come the violence of nature. Horses and oxen had become frightened and benumbed, had wrecked the carts, had hurled themselves over precipices, and many a creature groaned in deep pain from serious injuries, while others cried out loud as their shattered limbs reset and bound up.

Those who had seen the green huntsman also took flight in their terrible fear and joined in the misery of the others; here they told tremblingly of the repeated appearance of the figure. Trembling, the crowd listened to what the men told, pressed forward from the wide, dark space nearer to the fire around which the men were seated, and when the wind blew through the rafters or the thunder rolled over the house-top the crowd cried out and thought that the green huntsman was breaking through the roof to show himself in their midst. But when he did not come, when the terror of him subsided, when the old misery remained and the lamentations of the sufferers became louder, there gradually rose up those thoughts which are so prone to threaten a man’s soul when he is in trouble. They began to calculate how much more worth they all were than one single unbaptized child; they increasingly forgot that guilt with regard to one soul weighs a thousand times more heavily than the rescuing of thousands upon thousands of human lives.

Gradually these thoughts made themselves heard and began to be mingled as comprehensible words into the groans of pain of the sufferers. People asked more closely about the green huntsman, grumbling that the others had not stood up to him better; he would not have taken anyone off, and the less you feared him, the less he would do to people. They might perhaps have been able to help the whole valley, if they had had their hearts in the right place. Then the men began to excuse themselves. They did not say that dealing with the devil was no joke and that if you lent him an ear you would soon have to give him your whole head; but they spoke of the green huntsman’s terrible appearance, his flaming beard, the fiery feather on his hat like a castle-tower, and the terrible smell of sulfur which they had not cared to put up with. Christine’s husband, however, who was used to his words becoming effective only after they had been confirmed by his wife, said that they should only ask his wife, she could tell them whether anybody could stand up to it; for everybody knew that she was a fearless woman. Then they all looked round for Christine, but nobody saw her. Each one had thought only of saving himself and no one else, and as each of them was now sitting where it was dry, he thought that all the others were too. Only now did it occur to them all that they had not seen Christine again since that terrible moment, and that she had not come into the house. Then her husband began to lament and all the others lamented with him, for it seemed to them all as if only Christine knew how to help. Suddenly the door opened, and Christine stood in their midst; her hair was dripping wet and her cheeks were red, while her eyes were burning more darkly than usual with a sinister fire. She was received with a sympathy to which she was not accustomed, and everybody wanted to tell her what had been thought and expressed and how much they had worried about her. Christine soon saw what this all meant and, hiding her inner fire behind mocking words, she reproached the men for their overhasty flight and for the way none of them had taken any trouble about a poor woman and nobody had looked round to see what the green huntsman was up to with her. Then the storm of curiosity broke out, and everybody wanted first to know what the green huntsman had been doing with her, and those who were at the back stood up as high as they could in order to hear better and to see more closely the woman who had stood so near to the green huntsman. She wasn’t to say anything, Christine said at first; they hadn’t deserved it of her, they had treated her badly in the valley because she was a foreigner, the women had given her a bad name, the men had left her in the lurch everywhere, and if she bad not been better intentioned than them all and if she had not had more courage than the lot of them, there would be no consolation nor way out for them at this very moment. Christine went on talking a long time in this way, reproaching the womenfolk harshly, who had never been willing to believe her that Lake Constance was bigger than the castle pond, and the more she was pressed, the more obstinate she seemed to become, and she insisted that people would put a wrong interpretation on what she had to say, and if all went well, would give her no thanks on that account; but if anything went wrong, it would be her fault and the entire responsibility would be placed upon her shoulders.

When finally the whole gathering was before Christine, begging and imploring her almost on their knees, and when those who were injured cried out loud and persisted in so doing, Christine seemed to relent and began to tell how she had stood firm and come to an agreement with the green huntsman; but she said nothing about the kiss, nor about the way it had burned on her cheek and how her mind had been overwhelmed with the roaring noise. But she related what she had been considering since then in her downcast mind. The most important thing, she said, was that the beech-trees would be taken up to Bärhegen; once they were up there, you could still see what could be done, and the main thing was that up till then as far as she knew no child would be born among them.

Many felt cold shivers down their spines at this account, but they were all pleased to think that they would still be able to see what could be done.

One young woman alone wept so bitterly that you could have washed your hands under her eyes, but she did not say anything. There was, however, one old woman, tall in appearance and with a presence that commanded respect, for her face was one which required obeisance or else compelled flight. She stepped into the middle of the room and said that to act like that would be to forget God, to risk losing what was certain for the sake of something uncertain, and to play with one’s eternal salvation. Whoever had to do with the evil one would never escape from him, and whoever gave him a finger would lose body and soul to him. Nobody could help them from this distress but God; but whoever forsook God in time of trouble, would himself be lost in time of trouble. But on this occasion the old woman’s words were scorned and the young woman was told to be silent, for weeping and moaning would be no use here; another kind of help was needed now, they said.