by George Sand
“Right away, sir,” I said, extremely mortified to stand accused of treachery in front of a wretch of his sort. In the depths of my heart I was also feeling a great deal of bitterness against whichever of the two Amalias who was showing me such injustice or ungratefulness.
“There’s no need to rush,” the new adjutant replied. “You seem to enjoy gazing at the moon. Take your time. It doesn’t cost anything, nor does it do anyone harm.”
I foolishly availed myself of another moment of the rascal’s condescension. I couldn’t tear myself away just like that from the lovely sight of which I might be deprived forever after. Moreover, despite myself, Mayer struck me as a miserable lackey too honored to await my orders. Taking advantage of my scorn, he made so bold as to try and make conversation.
“Do you know, Signora, that you sing devilishly well? I’ve never heard better in Italy, where I nonetheless frequented the best theaters and inspected the finest artists. Where did you make your début? How long have you been touring the country? Have you done a lot of traveling?”
And as I pretended not to hear his questions, he went on undeterred, “Do you occasionally travel on foot, dressed like a man?”
The question gave me a start, and I quickly said no. But he added, “Come on! You don’t want to admit it, but I don’t forget a single thing, and now I remember an amusing adventure that you can’t have forgotten either.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Monsieur,” I replied, leaving the battlements of the tower to go back to my cell.
“Hold on a second!” said Mayer. “I’ve got your key in my pocket, and you can’t go back like that unless I take you. So, lovely child, allow me a word or two.”
“Not a single word more, Monsieur. I want to go back to my room, and I’m sorry I ever left it.”
“Well, well, don’t you put on fine airs! As if one didn’t know a little something about your adventures! So you thought I was stupid enough not to recognize you tramping through the Bohemian Forest with a little dark-haired fellow who wasn’t too bad looking. What kind of a fool do you take me for? I wanted to grab the lad for the army of the Prussian king, but the lass would not have been for him. That’s for sure! Even though people say he took a liking to you, and that it’s for trying to brag about it that you wound up here! So there we are! Fortune has its whims, and there’s no use grumbling. You’ve taken quite a tumble, but listen to me, don’t act proud and just take what comes your way. I’m only a minor fortress officer, but here I’m more powerful than a king that nobody knows or fears because his commands come from too high up and too far away to be obeyed. As you can see, I’ve got the power to evade orders and make things easier for you here. Don’t be ungrateful, and you’ll see that an adjutant’s protection at Spandau is as good as a king’s in Berlin. Do you understand? Don’t run away, scream, or do anything foolish. That would only make for scandal without doing a bit of good; I’ll say what I like, and nobody will believe you. Come on, I don’t mean to scare you. I’m naturally sweet and compassionate. But think it over; and when I see you again, remember that your fate is in my hands; I can toss you into a dungeon or provide you with all kinds of entertainment, starve you to death without any questions being asked or let you escape without anyone suspecting me. Think it over, I tell you, I’ll give you some time. . . .” And as I made no reply, aghast that I had no way to shield myself from the outrage of such pretensions and the cruel humiliation of hearing them said aloud, the odious man added, no doubt thinking that I was hesitating, “And why not make up your mind right now? Do you need twenty-four hours to see the only reasonable decision, to reply to the love of a gentleman, still young, and rich enough to set you up abroad in a prettier dwelling than this hideous fortress?”
With these words the vile recruiter drew near, apparently intending, in his clumsy, impudent way, to bar my passage and take my hands. I ran toward the battlements of the tower, very determined to throw myself into the moat rather than to let myself be defiled by the most trivial caress. But just then a strange sight struck my eyes, and I hurriedly drew the adjutant’s attention to that object so as to divert it from me. This was my salvation, but alas! it nearly cost the life of someone who may be worthier than I!
On the high rampart that stands on the other side of the moat, opposite the esplanade, a seemingly gigantic figure was running or rather flitting along the parapet with prodigious speed and skill. There is a tower at each end of the rampart, and when the phantom reached that point, it sprang up on the tower roof, which was at the same height as the balustrade, scampered like a cat up this steep cone and seemed to vanish into thin air.
“What the devil is that?” shouted the adjutant, forgetting his role as a ladies’ man for the worries of a jailer. “I’ll be damned, a prisoner on the lam! And the sentry’s asleep, by the flesh of God! Sentry!” he cried in a stentorian voice, “on your guard! Sound the alarm! Sound the alarm!” And running toward a notch in the battlements where an alarm bell was hanging, he began clanging it with a vigor worthy of such a remarkable professor of infernal music. I’ve never heard anything gloomier than this bell shattering the noble stillness of the night with its ferocious clamor. It was the savage cry of violence and brutality troubling the harmony of free-breathing wave and wind. In one instant the whole prison was in turmoil. I heard the ominous racket of sentries grabbing their guns, snapping back the firing pins and randomly taking aim at the first thing that came into view. A red glare washed over the esplanade, eclipsing the lovely azurean-blue rays of moonlight; it was Herr Schwartz lighting a lantern. Signals rang back and forth from one rampart to another, followed by plaintive, weaker echoes. The alarm cannon soon added its terrifying, solemn note to this demonic symphony. Heavy steps resounded on the flagstones. I couldn’t see a thing, but I heard every sound, and my heart was gripped with terror. Mayer had raced off, but I didn’t dream of rejoicing about being rid of him. I bitterly reproached myself for having pointed out to him, without understanding what was going on, the escape of some poor prisoner. Frozen with terror, I awaited the end of the adventure, shuddering at every shot, anxiously listening for the screams of the wounded fugitive that would announce his disaster.
This went on for over an hour and, thank heaven, the fugitive was neither seen nor wounded. Just to make sure, I had joined the Schwartzes on the esplanade. They were so worried and upset themselves that it didn’t occur to them to wonder at seeing me outside of my cell in the middle of the night. It may also be that they had been in league with Mayer about letting me out that night. After running around like a madman and making sure that none of his captives was missing, Schwartz began to calm down a bit. Yet he and his wife were racked with consternation, as if a man’s deliverance were for them a public and private calamity, an enormous offense against heavenly justice. The other jailers, the soldiers passing to and fro exchanged with them words filled with the same despair, the same terror. In their eyes an attempted escape was obviously the blackest of crimes. Good God! how dreadful I found them, these mercenaries devoted to the barbarous occupation of depriving their fellow creatures of the sacred right of liberty! Yet suddenly it seemed that supreme equity had resolved to inflict exemplary punishment on my two jailers. Frau Schwartz who had gone into her den for a moment came back out screaming. “Gottlieb! Gottlieb!” she choked. “Stop! Don’t shoot, don’t kill my son, it’s him, it’s him for sure!”
Amid their frenzy I understood from Frau and Herr Schwartz’s tangle of words that Gottlieb was not in his bed nor anywhere else in their lodgings, that he had probably, without anyone’s noticing, resumed his old habit of running around up on the roof in his sleep. Gottlieb was a sleepwalker!
As soon as this news had spread throughout the citadel, things began to calm down. Each jailer had had time to make his rounds and to see that no prisoner had disappeared. People resumed their duties without a worry. The officers were delighted by the way things had turned out; the soldiers laughed at their alarm; Fra
u Schwartz, who was beside herself, was tearing all over the place, and her husband was mournfully inspecting the moat, fearing that the uproar of the cannon and guns had startled poor Gottlieb out of his sleep and made him fall in the course of his perilous chase. I followed along behind Herr Schwartz. Perhaps it would have been a good time for me to attempt an escape since people seemed distracted and doors were standing open. Yet I did not dwell on the thought, focused on finding the poor invalid who had shown me such affection.
Yet when Herr Schwartz, who never totally loses his head, saw that it was dawn, he begged me to return to my room since it was entirely against his orders to let me wander around at all hours. He took me back to lock me in. Yet the first thing that struck my eye as I crossed the threshold was Gottlieb, peacefully asleep in my armchair. Fortunately he had taken refuge there before the alarm had reached every corner of the fortress, or else he had been sleeping so soundly and running so nimbly that he had escaped every danger. I advised his father not to wake him abruptly and promised to watch over him until Frau Schwartz was told the good news.
When I was alone with Gottlieb, I gently laid my hand on his shoulder. Speaking very softly, I tried questioning him, for I had heard that sleepwalkers can connect with friendly souls and give them lucid replies. My experiment worked wonderfully well.
“Gottlieb,” I asked, “so where have you been tonight?”
“Tonight? It’s already night? I thought I saw the morning sun up on the roof.”
“So you’ve been on the roof?”
“For sure. The robin, that good little angel, came calling at my window; I flew off with him, and up we went up, up and away into the sky, right near the stars, and almost to where the angels dwell. As we were leaving, we saw Beelzebub running over the roofs and the parapets trying to catch us. But he can’t fly because God has condemned him to a long penance, and he watches angels and birds fly without being able to get them.”
“And yet, after running around in the clouds, you came back down here?”
“The robin said to me, ‘Let’s go see my sister who is ill,’ and I came back with him to come see you in your cell.”
“You were able to enter my cell, Gottlieb?”
“For sure, several times I’ve come to watch over you since you’ve been ill. The robin steals the keys from under my mother’s pillow, and try as he might, Beelzebub can’t wake her up once the angel has put her to sleep by flitting invisibly around her head.”
“So who taught you to know angels and demons so well?”
“My master,” replied the sleepwalker with a childish smile full of naïve enthusiasm.
“And who is your master?” I asked.
“First, God, and then . . . the sublime shoemaker.”
“And what’s the name of this sublime shoemaker?”
“Oh, it’s a great name! But one mustn’t say it, you understand? It’s a name my mother doesn’t know. She doesn’t know that I’ve got two books in the hole in the fireplace. One that I don’t read, and another that I’ve been devouring for four years, that is my heavenly bread, my spiritual life, the book of truth, the salvation and light of the soul.”
“And who wrote this book?”
“He did, the shoemaker of Gorlitz, Jacob Boehme!”
Then we were interrupted by the arrival of Frau Schwartz. It wasn’t easy to prevent her from rushing up and throwing her arms around her son! The woman adores her offspring: may her sins be forgiven! She tried to talk to him, but Gottlieb didn’t hear her. I alone was able to get him to return to his bed where he went on peacefully sleeping, I was assured this morning. He hadn’t noticed a single thing, even though today his strange malady and last night’s alarm are all the talk of Spandau.
So here I am back in my cell after a few hours of half liberty that were very painful, very agitated. I have no desire to go out again at such a price. Yet perhaps I could have escaped! . . . Now that I feel myself under the thumb of a scoundrel and threatened by dangers worse than death, worse than eternal suffering, this will be my only focus. From now on I’m going to give it serious thought, and who knows? Maybe I’ll succeed! It is said that a persevering will triumphs over every obstacle. O my God, protect me!
May 5th.—Since these last events my life has been fairly quiet. I have come to count my days of rest as days of happiness and to give thanks to God as in prosperous times one gives him thanks for years that go by without calamity. It’s clear that one must know hardship to leave behind the apathetic ingratitude where people usually live their lives. Today I reproach myself for having let so many lovely days of my carefree youth slip away without sensing how precious they were, without blessing Providence for them. Back then I didn’t tell myself often enough that I didn’t deserve them, and that’s no doubt why I somewhat deserve the troubles that overwhelm me now.
I haven’t seen that odious recruiter again. He frightens me more than he did on the banks of the Moldau, when I took him quite simply for an ogre, a child-eater. Now I see in him an even more abominable and dangerous persecutor. When I consider the wretched man’s revolting pretensions, the authority he wields around me, the ease with which he could slip into my cell at night, with the Schwartzes, greedy, servile beasts that they are, perhaps unwilling to lift a finger in my defense, I could die of shame and despair. . . . I see the pitiless bars that would prevent me from jumping out the window. I can’t get my hands on any poison, I don’t even have a weapon to open my chest. . . . Yet I’ve got a few reasons for hope and confidence that I relish calling to mind, for I don’t want to let fear debilitate me. First of all, Schwartz doesn’t like the adjutant who, from what I’ve been able to understand, gets first crack at exploiting the wants and needs of the prisoners by selling them a breath of air, a ray of sun, a morsel of bread above and beyond the ration, and other bounties of the prison regime, all to the great detriment of Schwartz, who’d like to have a monopoly on that trade. Then, the Schwartzes, especially the wife, are getting friendly because of Gottlieb’s feelings for me and the salutary influence they say I have on his mind. If I were threatened, they might not come to my rescue, but as soon as things became serious, I could have them take my complaints to the fortress commander, who seemed gentle and humane the one time I saw him. . . . Besides, Gottlieb will do me this favor right away and, without explaining anything, I’ve made arrangements with him. He’s all prepared to deliver a letter that is already written. But I’m hesitant to call for help before there’s real trouble; for my enemy, if he were to stop tormenting me, could brush off as a joke a declaration that I would have been a ridiculous prude to take seriously. At any rate, I’m sleeping with one eye open and training my muscles for a fist fight, if need be. I’m lifting my furniture, stiffening my arms against the iron bars of my window and toughening up my hands by beating on the walls. Anyone watching these exercises of mine would think me crazy or desperate. Yet I’m doing all this in the most somber, cold-blooded manner, and I’ve discovered that I’m much stronger physically than I had thought. In the security of ordinary life we don’t test our ability to defend ourselves, we don’t know what we’re capable of. Knowing how strong I am, I feel myself gaining courage, and my confidence in God grows with my efforts to help him protect me. I often remember the lovely verses that Porpora said he had read on the walls of a dungeon of the Inquisition in Venice:
Di che mi fido, mi guarda Iddio;
Di che non mi fido, me guarderò io.2
More fortunate than the hapless being who wrote out that grim invocation, I at least can trust unreservedly in the purity and devotion of this poor fanatic Gottlieb. He hasn’t had any more sleepwalking episodes; besides, his mother is keeping a close eye on him. During the day he comes to my room to talk. I haven’t wanted to go down on the esplanade since I ran into Mayer there.
Gottlieb has explained me his religious beliefs. I found them to be very beautiful, though often strange, and I wanted to read that theology of his by Boehme, since he is clearly a discipl
e, in order to see what notions of his own devising he has added to the inspired dreams of the illustrious shoemaker. He lent me the precious volume, and I plunged in at my own risk. Now I understand how the book has unhinged this simple mind; Gottlieb takes literally the symbols of a mystic who was himself a bit crazy. I don’t pride myself on fully understanding and explaining them, but I think I see there a ray of lofty religious intuition and the fount of generous poetry. What struck me the most was his theory about the devil: “In the battle with Lucifer, God did not destroy him. O man, in your blindness, you do not see the reason why. It is because God was contending with God. It was the struggle of one part of God against the other.” I remember Albert explaining nearly the same way the transitory reign of the principle of evil over the earth, with the chaplain at Riesenburg listening in horror to this tenet and calling it Manichaeism. Albert maintained that our Christianity was a Manichaeism more complete, more superstitious than his own, since it consecrated the principle of evil as something eternal, whereas his system acknowledged the rehabilitation of evil, in other words, its conversion and reconciliation. Evil, according to Albert, was merely error, and one day the light of God would dispel error and put an end to evil. I confess, my friends, even at the risk of appearing very heretical in your eyes, that Satan’s being doomed for all eternity to stirring up evil, loving evil, and closing his eyes to the truth looked like impiety to me as well, and that’s still the case.
In short, I take Jacob Boehme for a millenarian, in other words, a believer in the resurrection of the righteous and their life with Jesus Christ upon a new earth, born of the dissolution of the present one, for a thousand years of unmitigated bliss and consummate wisdom; after which will come the full reunion of these souls with God, plus the rewards of eternity, even more perfect than the millennium. Count Albert explained this symbol, I clearly remember, while telling me the stormy history of his old Bohemia and dear Taborites, imbued with these beliefs that they had revived from early Christianity. Albert took all this less literally and without making any pronouncements about how long the resurrection would last or when it would take place. Yet he had a prophetic sense and vision that society would soon fall apart, having to make way for an era of sublime renovation; and Albert had no doubt that his soul, emerging from the fleeting grasp of death to embark upon a new series of lives here below, would be called to contemplate this providential reward and the days, by turns terrifying and magnificent, that were promised to humanity’s endeavors. This magnanimous faith that seemed monstrous to the upholders of orthodoxy at Riesenburg, that became my own after having first struck me as so new and so strange, is one that belongs to every age and nation. Moreover, despite the efforts of the Roman church to smother it or Rome’s inability to clarify these beliefs and purify them of their literal and superstitious meaning, it’s clear to me that this faith has filled many fervently religious souls with enthusiasm. It is even said that great saints have had this faith. So I’ve become a believer without remorse or fear, certain that an idea espoused by Albert can only be grand. Besides, it appeals to me, diffusing heavenly poetry over my notion of death and the sufferings that will no doubt hasten for me the appointed hour. I like this Jacob Boehme. This disciple who is down in the Schwartzes’ filthy kitchen, engrossed in his sublime dreams and heavenly visions, while his parents concoct their schemes, make their deals and degrade themselves, seems to me so pure and so touching, with his book that he knows by heart without understanding it well, and the shoe that he is making so as to model his life on his master’s, but without being able to finish the job. Disabled in body and mind, but simple, sincere, and living like an angel! Poor Gottlieb, you’re no doubt doomed to break your bones by falling off a high rampart in your imaginary flight through the heavens or to sink under the weight of precocious infirmities! You will have passed over the earth like an unrecognized saint, an angel in exile, without having understood evil, without having known happiness, without even having felt the warmth of the sun that lights the world, since you’ve been so absorbed in contemplating the mystical sun that shines in your mind! No one will have known you, no one will have given you the pity and admiration you deserve! And I, the only one to have found out your secret meditations, I who understand ideal beauty as well and would have had the strength to seek it out and give it reality in the course of my life, I’ll die like you in the flower of my youth, without having done anything, without having lived. In the cracks of the walls sheltering and devouring us, there are miserable little plants that the wind beats down, that the sun never suffuses with color. They wither away without flower or fruit. Yet they seem to come up again and again, but that’s because the wind blows seeds from far away to the same old places, and they try to grow and live off the remains of the previous ones. That’s how captives live their dormant lives, how prisons replenish their populations.