‘Well, what do you want, Magda? What do...?’
‘Quick! March!’
He entered the cottage, but fell over the threshold. The vodka was now beginning to go to his head. He started singing, and looked round the cottage for Franek, even saying ‘Morgen, Kerl,’ although Franek was not there. After that he laughed loudly, staggered, shouted ‘Hurrah!’ and fell full length on the bed. In the evening he awoke sober and rested, and welcomed Franek, then, having got some pence out of Magda, he took his triumphant way to the inn. The glory of his deeds had already preceded him to Pognębin, since more than one of the soldiers from other divisions of the same regiment, having returned earlier, had related how he had distinguished himself at Gravelotte and Sedan. So now when the rumour spread that the conqueror was at the inn, all his old comrades hastened there to welcome him.
No one would have recognized our friend Bartek, as he now sat at the table. He, formerly so meek, was to be seen striking his fist on the table, puffing himself out and gobbling like a turkey-cock.
‘Do you remember, you fellows, that time I did for the French, what Steinmetz said?’
‘How could we forget?’
‘People used to talk about the French, and be frightened of them, but they are a poor lot — was? They run like hares into the lettuce, and run away like hares too. They don’t drink beer either, nothing but strong wine.’
‘That’s it!’
‘When we burnt a town they would wring their hands immediately and cry “Pitié, pitié,” as if they meant they would give us a drink if we would only leave them alone. But we paid no attention to them.’
‘Then can one understand their gibberish?’ enquired a young farmer’s lad.
‘You wouldn’t understand, because you are stupid, but I understand. “Doné di pę!” Do you understand?’
‘But what did you do?’
‘Do you know about Paris? We had one battle after another there, but we won them all. They have no good commanders. People say so too. “The ground enclosed by the hedge is good,” they say, “but it has been badly managed.” Their officers are bad managers, and their generals are bad managers, but on our side they are good.’
Maciej Kierz, the wise old innkeeper of Pognębin, began to shake his head.
‘Well, the Germans have been victorious in a terrible war; they have been victorious — but I always thought they would be. But the Lord alone knows what will come out of it for us.’
Bartek stared at him.
‘What do you say?’
‘The Germans have never cared to consider us much, anyhow, but, now they will be as stuck up as if there were no God above them. And they will illtreat us still more than they do already.’
‘But that’s not true!’ Bartek said.
Old Kierz was a person of such authority in Pognębin that all the village always thought as he did, and it was sheer audacity to contradict him. But Bartek was a conqueror now, and an authority himself. All the same they gazed at him in astonishment, and even in some indignation.
‘Who are you, to quarrel with Maciej? Who are you — ?’
‘What’s Maciej to me? It isn’t to such as he that I have talked, you see! Why, you fellows, I talked, didn’t I, to Steinmetz — was? But let Maciej fancy what he likes. We shall be better off now.’
Maciej looked at the conqueror for a moment.
‘You Blockhead!’ he said.
Bartek struck his fist on the table, making all the glasses and pint-pots start up.
‘Still, der Kerl da! Heu! Stroh!’
‘Silence, no row! Ask the Priest or the Count, Blockhead.’
‘Was the Priest in the war? Or was the Count there? But I was there. It’s not true, boys. They’ll know now how to respect us. Who won the battle? We won it, I won it. Now they’ll give us anything we ask for. If I had wanted to become a land-owner in France, I should have stayed there. The Government knows very well who gave the French the best beating. And our regiment was the best. They said so in the military despatches. So now the Poles will get the upper hand; — do you see?’
Kierz waved his hand, stood up, and went out. Bartek had carried off the victory in the field of politics also. The young men remaining with him, regarded him as a perfect marvel. He continued:
‘As if they wouldn’t give me anything I want! If I don’t get it, I should like to know who would! Old Kierz is a scoundrel, do you see? The Government commands you to fight, so you must fight. Who will illtreat me? The Germans? Is it likely?’
Here he again displayed his crosses and medals.
‘And for whom did I beat the French? Not for the Germans, surely? I am a better man now than a German, for there’s not one German as strong. Bring us some beer! I have talked to Steinmetz, and I have talked to Podbielski. Bring us some beer!’
They slowly prepared for their carouse.
Bartek began to sing:
Drink, drink, drink, As long as in my pocket Still the pennies chink!
Suddenly he took a handful of pence from his pocket.
‘Beer! I am a gentleman now. — Won’t you? I tell you in France we were not so flush of money; — there was little we didn’t burn, and few people we didn’t put a shot into! — God doesn’t know which — of the French — .’
A tippler’s moods are subject to rapid changes. Bartek unexpectedly raked together the money from the table, and began to exclaim sadly:
‘Lord, have mercy on the sins of my soul!’
Then, propping both elbows on the table, and hiding his head in his hands, he was silent.
‘What’s the matter?’ inquired one of the drinkers.
‘Why was I to blame for them?’ Bartek murmured sadly. ‘It was their own look-out. I was sorry for them, for they were both in my hands. Lord! have mercy! One was as the ruddy dawn! next day he was as white as cheese. And even after that I still — Vodka!’
A moment of gloomy silence followed. The men looked at one another in astonishment.
‘What is he saying?’ one asked.
‘He is settling something with his conscience.’
‘A man must drink in spite of that war.’
He filled up his glass of vodka once or twice, then he spat, and his good humour unexpectedly returned.
‘Have you ever stood talking to Steinmetz? But I have! Hurrah! — Drink! Who pays? I do!’
‘You may pay, you drunkard,’ sounded Magda’s voice, ‘but I will repay you! Never fear!’
Bartek looked at his wife with glassy eyes.
‘Have you talked to Steinmetz? Who are you?’
Instead of replying to him, Magda turned to the interested listeners, and began to exclaim:
‘Oh, you men, you wretched men, do you see the disgrace and misery I am in? He came back, and I was glad to welcome him as a good man, but he came back drunk. He has forgotten God, and he has forgotten Polish. He went to sleep, he woke up sober, and now he’s drinking again, and paying for it with my money, which I had earned by my own work. And where have you taken that money from? Isn’t it what I have earned by all my trouble and slavery? I tell you men, he’s no longer a Catholic, he’s not a man any more, he’s bewitched by the Germans, he jabbers German, and is just waiting to do harm to people. He’s possessed....’
Here the woman burst into tears; then, raising her voice an octave higher:— ‘He was stupid, but he was good. But now, what have they done to him? I looked out for him in the evening, I looked out for him in the morning, and I have lived to see him. There is no peace and no mercy anywhere. Great God! Merciful God! — If you had only left it alone, — if you had only remained German altogether!’
Her last words ended in such a wail, it was almost like a cadence. But Bartek merely said:
‘Be quiet, or I shall do for you!’
‘Strike me, hit my head, hit me now, kill me, murder me!’ the woman screamed, and stretching her neck forward, she turned to the man.
‘And you fellows, watch!—’
Bu
t the men were beginning to disperse. The inn was soon deserted, and only Bartek and his wife, with her neck stretched forward, remained.
‘Why do you stretch out your neck like a goose?’ murmured Bartek. ‘Go home.’
‘Hit me!’ repeated Magda.
‘Well, I shan’t hit,’ replied Bartek, putting his hands into his pockets. Here the innkeeper, wishing to put an end to the quarrel, turned out one of the lights. The room became dark and silent. After a while Magda’s shrill voice sounded through the darkness:
‘Hit me!’
‘I shan’t hit,’ replied Bartek’s triumphant voice.
Two figures were to be seen going by moonlight from the inn to the cottage. One of them, walking in front, was sobbing loudly; that was Magda; after her, hanging his head and following humbly enough, went the victor of Gravelotte and Sedan.
CHAPTER VII
Bartek went home so tipsy that for some days he was unfit for work. This was most unfortunate for all his household affairs, which were in need of a strong man to look after them. Magda did her best. She worked from morning till night, and the neighbours helped her as well as they could, but even so she could not make both ends meet, and the household was being ruined little by little. Then there were a few small debts to the German Colonist, Just, who, having at a favourable moment bought some thirteen acres of waste land at Pognębin, now had the best property in the whole village. He had ready money besides, which he lent out at sufficiently high interest. He lent it chiefly to the owner of the property, Count Jarzyński, who bore the nickname of the ‘Golden Prince,’ but who was obliged to keep up his house in a style of befitting splendour for that very reason. Just, however, also lent to peasants. For six months Magda had owed him some twenty thalers, part of which she had borrowed for her housekeeping, and part to send to Bartek during the war. Yet that need not have mattered. God had granted a good harvest, and it would have been possible to repay the debt out of the incoming crop, provided that the hands and the labour were forthcoming. Unluckily Bartek could not work. Magda did not quite believe this, and went to the priest for help, thinking he might rouse her husband; but this was really impossible. When at all tired, Bartek grew short of breath and his wounds pained him. So he sat in front of the cottage all day long, smoking his clay pipe with the figure of Bismarck in white uniform and a Cuirassier’s helmet, and gazed at the world with the drowsy eyes of a man still feeling the effects of bodily fatigue. He pondered a little on the war, a little on his victories, on Magda, — a little on everything, a little on nothing.
One day, as he sat thus, he heard Franek crying in the distance on his way home from school. He was howling till the echoes rang.
Bartek pulled his pipe out of his mouth.
‘Why, Franek, what’s the matter with you?’
‘What’s the matter?’ repeated Franek, sobbing.
‘Why are you crying?’
‘Why shouldn’t I cry, when I have had my ears boxed?’
‘Who boxed your ears?’
‘Who? Why, Herr Boege!’
Herr Boege filled the post of schoolmaster at Pognębin.
‘And has he a right to box your ears?’
‘I suppose so, as he did it.’
Magda, who had been hoeing in the garden, came through the hedge, and, with the hoe in her hand, went up to the child.
‘What are you saying?’ she asked.
‘What am I saying — ? If that Boege didn’t call me a Polish pig, and give me a box on the ears, and say that just as they have beaten the French now, so they will trample us underfoot, for they are the strongest. And I had done nothing to him, but he had asked me who is the greatest person in the world, and I had said it was the Holy Father, but he boxed my ears, and I began to cry, and he called me a Polish pig, and said that just as they have beaten the French....’
Franek was beginning it all over again,— ‘and he said, and I said,’ — but Magda covered his mouth with her hand, and she herself, turning to Bartek, exclaimed: —
‘Do you hear? Do you hear? Go to the French war, then let a German beat your child like a dog! — Curse him! Go to the war, and let this Swabian kill your child! — You have your reward!... May....’
Here Magda, moved by her own eloquence, also began to cry to Franek’s accompaniment. Bartek stared open-mouthed with astonishment, and could not bring out a single word, or comprehend in the least what had happened. How was this? And what of his victories? — He sat on in silence for some moments, then suddenly something leaped into his eyes, and the blood rushed to his face. With ignorant people astonishment, like terror, often turns to rage. Bartek sprang up suddenly, and jerked out through his clenched teeth: —
‘I will talk to him!’
And he went out. It was not far to go; the school lay close to the church. Herr Boege was just standing in front of the verandah, surrounded by a herd of young pigs, to which he was throwing pieces of bread.
He was a tall man, about fifty years of age, still as vigorous as an oak. He was not particularly stout, but his face was very fat, and he had a pair of very protruding eyes which expressed courage and energy.
Bartek went up to him very quickly.
‘German, why have you been beating my child? Was?’ he asked.
Herr Boege took a few steps backwards, measured him with a glance without a shade of fear, and said phlegmatically: —
‘Begone, Polish prize-fighter!’
‘Why have you been beating my child?’ repeated Bartek.
‘I will beat you too, you low Polish scoundrel! I will show you who is master here. Go to the devil, go to the law, — begone!’
Bartek, having seized the schoolmaster by the shoulder, began to shake him roughly, crying in a hoarse voice: —
‘Do you know who I am? Do you know who did for the French? Do you know who talked to Steinmetz? Why do you beat my child, you cursed Swabian dog?’
Herr Boege’s protruding eyes glared no less than Bartek’s, but Boege was a strong man, and he resolved to free himself from his assailant by a single blow. This blow descended with a loud smack on the face of the victor of Gravelotte and Sedan.
At that the man forgot everything. Boege’s head was shaken from side to side with a swift motion recalling a pendulum, but with this difference that the shaking was alarmingly rapid. The formidable vanquisher of Turcos and Zouaves awoke in Bartek once more. Boege’s twelve year old son, Oscar, a lad as strong as his father, ran in vain to his assistance. A short, but terrible struggle took place, in which the son fell to the ground, and the father felt himself lifted up into the air. Bartek, raising his hand, held him there, he himself scarcely knew how. Unluckily the tub of dishwater, which Herr Boege had been assiduously mixing for the pigs, stood near. Into this tub Herr Boege now capsized, and a moment later his feet were to be seen projecting from it, and kicking violently. His wife darted out of the house: —
‘Help, to the rescue!’
The German colonists rushed from the houses near to their neighbour’s assistance. Some of them fell on Bartek and began to belabour him with sticks and stones. In the general confusion which followed it was difficult to distinguish Bartek from his adversaries: some thirteen bodies were to be seen rolling round in a single mass, and struggling convulsively.
Suddenly, however, from out of this fighting mass Bartek burst forth like fury, making towards the hedge with all his might.
The Germans ran after him, but an alarming crack was heard in the hedge at the same moment, and Bartek’s iron hands brandished a stout stick.
He returned raging and furious, holding the stick in the air: they all fled.
Bartek went after them, but luckily did not overtake anyone. Thus his rage cooled, and he began to retreat homewards. Ah! if only it had been the French he had been facing! His retreat would then have made immortal history.
As it was, he was being attacked by about a dozen people who, when they had reassembled, set on him afresh. Bartek retired slowly, like a wild
boar pursued by dogs. He turned round now and then and stood still: then his pursuers stood still too. The stick had earned their complete respect.
They threw stones at him, nevertheless, one of which wounded Bartek in the forehead. The blood poured into his eyes, and he felt himself growing faint. He swayed once or twice, let go the stick, and fell down.
‘Hurrah!’ cried the Germans.
But by the time they reached him, Bartek had got up again: then they held back. This wounded wolf was still dangerous. Besides, he was now not far from the first cottage, and some labourers could be seen in the distance hurrying to the battlefield at full speed. The Germans retired to their houses.
‘What has happened?’ enquired the newcomers.
‘I have been trying my hand a bit on the Germans,’ Bartek answered. And he fainted.
CHAPTER VIII
It proved a serious affair. The German newspapers published flaming articles on the persecutions to which the peaceful German population was subjected at the hands of the barbarian and ignorant masses, who were roused by socialist agitation and religious fanaticism. Boege became a hero. He, the quiet, gentle schoolmaster, spreading the light of learning on the far borders of the Empire; he, the true missionary of culture amid barbarians, had fallen a first victim to the riot. It was fortunate that there were a hundred million Germans to stand up for him, who would never allow.... And so on.
Bartek did not know what a storm was brewing over his head. On the contrary, he was in good spirits; he was certain that he would win at the trial. For Boege had beaten his child, and had dealt him the first blow, and it had afterwards been he who had been attacked from behind! Surely he had a right to defend himself. They had also thrown a stone at his head, — actually thrown it at him, who had been mentioned in the daily despatches, who had won the battle of Gravelotte, had talked to Steinmetz himself, and received so many medals. It is true it never entered his head that the Germans did not know all this when they wronged him so greatly, any more than it occurred to him that Boege could substantiate his threat to Pognębin that the Germans would now trample it underfoot in the same way in which they, the Pognębinites, had so thoroughly beaten the French whenever they had had an opportunity. But as for himself, he was certain that public opinion and the Government would be in his favour. They would certainly know who he was, and what he had done during the war. If he was not a different man to what he thought him, Steinmetz would espouse his cause. Since Bartek was the poorer through the war, and his house in debt, they were, anyhow, not doing him justice.
Complete Works of Henryk Sienkiewicz Page 664