The Silver Skates Page 4

  “Mother knows it,” said Gretel, sobbing.

  Chapter 6

  Sunbeams

  Dame Brinker was startled at her children’s emotion – glad, too, for it proved how loving and true they were.

  Beautiful ladies in princely homes often smile suddenly and sweetly, gladdening the very air around them, but I doubt if their smile be more welcome in God’s sight than that which sprang forth to cheer the roughly clad boy and girl in the humble cottage. Dame Brinker felt that she had been selfish. Blushing and brightening, she hastily wiped her eyes, and looked upon them as only a mother can.

  “Hoity-toity, pretty talk we’re having, and St Nicholas’s Eve almost here! What wonder the yarn pricks my fingers! Come, Gretel, take this cent, and while Hans is trading for the skates you can buy a waffle in the marketplace.”

  “Let me stay home with you, Mother,” said Gretel, looking up with eyes that sparkled through their tears. “Hans will buy me the cake.”

  “As you will, child. And, Hans – wait a moment. Three turns of the needle will finish this toe, and then you may have as good a pair of hose as ever were knitted (owning the yarn is a grain too sharp) to sell to the hosier on the Herengracht.* That will give us three quarter-guilders if you make good trade, and as it’s right hungry weather, you may buy four waffles. We’ll keep the Feast of St Nicholas after all.”

  Gretel clapped her hands. “That will be fine! Annie Bouman told me what grand times they will have in the big houses tonight. But we will be merry too. Hans will have beautiful new skates – and then there’ll be the waffles! Oh-h! Don’t break them, brother Hans. Wrap them well, and button them under your jacket very carefully.”

  “Certainly,” replied Hans, quite gruff with pleasure and importance.

  “Oh, Mother,” cried Gretel in high glee, “soon you will be busied with Father, and now you are only knitting. Do tell us all about St Nicholas!”

  Dame Brinker laughed to see Hans hang up his hat and prepare to listen. “Nonsense, children,” she said, “I have told it to you often.”

  “Tell us again! Oh, do tell us again!” cried Gretel, throwing herself upon the wonderful wooden bench that her brother had made on their mother’s last birthday. Hans, not wishing to appear childish, and yet quite willing to hear the story, stood carelessly swinging his skates against the fireplace.

  “Well, children, you shall hear it, but we must never waste the daylight again in this way. Pick up your ball, Gretel, and let your sock grow as I talk. Opening your ears needn’t shut your fingers. St Nicholas, you must know, is a wonderful saint. He keeps his eye open for the good of sailors, but he cares most of all for boys and girls. Well, once upon a time, when he was living on the earth, a merchant of Asia sent his three sons to a great city called Athens, to get learning.”

  “Is Athens in Holland, Mother?” asked Gretel.

  “I don’t know, child. Probably it is.”

  “Oh no, Mother,” said Hans respectfully. “I had that in my geography lessons long ago. Athens is in Greece.”

  “Well,” resumed their mother, “what matter? Greece may belong to the king, for aught we know. Anyhow, this rich merchant sent his sons to Athens. While they were on their way, they stopped one night at a shabby inn, meaning to take up their journey in the morning. Well, they had very fine clothes – velvet and silk, it may be, such as rich folks’ children all over the world think nothing of wearing – and their belts, likewise, were full of money. What did the wicked landlord do, but contrive a plan to kill the children and take their money and all their beautiful clothes himself. So that night, when all the world was asleep, he got up and killed the three young gentlemen.”

  Gretel clasped her hands and shuddered, but Hans tried to look as if killing and murder were everyday matters to him.

  “That was not the worst of it,” continued Dame Brinker, knitting slowly, and trying to keep count of her stitches as she talked. “That was not near the worst of it. The dreadful landlord went and cut up the young gentlemen’s bodies into little pieces, and threw them into a great tub of brine, intending to sell them for pickled pork!”

  “Oh!” cried Gretel, horror-stricken, though she had often heard the story before. Hans still continued unmoved, and seemed to think that pickling was the best that could be done under the circumstances.

  “Yes, he pickled them, and one might think that would have been the last of the young gentlemen. But no. That night, St Nicholas had a wonderful vision, and in it he saw the landlord cutting up the merchant’s children. There was no need of his hurrying, you know, for he was a saint, but in the morning he went to the inn and charged the landlord with the murder. Then the wicked landlord confessed it from beginning to end, and fell down on his knees, begging forgiveness. He felt so sorry for what he had done that he asked the saint to bring the young masters to life.”

  “And did the saint do it?” asked Gretel, delighted, well knowing what the answer would be.

  “Of course he did. The pickled pieces flew together in an instant, and out jumped the young gentlemen from the brine tub. They cast themselves at the feet of St Nicholas, and he gave them his blessing, and— oh! mercy on us, Hans, it will be dark before you get back if you don’t start this minute!”

  By this time Dame Brinker was almost out of breath and quite out of commas. She could not remember when she had seen the children idle away an hour of daylight in this manner, and the thought of such luxury quite appalled her. By way of compensation she now flew about the room in extreme haste, tossing a block of peat upon the fire, blowing invisible dust from the table and handing the finished hose to Hans, all in an instant.

  “Come, Hans,” she said, as her boy lingered by the door, “what keeps thee?”

  Hans kissed his mother’s cheek, rosy and fresh yet, in spite of all her troubles. “My mother is the best in the world, and I would be right glad to have a pair of skates, but” – and as he buttoned his jacket, he looked, in a troubled way, towards the strange figure crouching by the hearthstone – “if my money would bring a meester* from Amsterdam to see Father, something might yet be done.”

  “A meester would not come, Hans, for twice that money, and it would do no good if he did. Ah! how many guilders I once spent for that, but dear, good Father would not waken. It is God’s will. Go, Hans, and buy the skates.”

  Hans started with a heavy heart, but since the heart was young, and in a boy’s bosom, it set him whistling in less than five minutes. His mother had said “thee” to him, and that was quite enough to make even a dark day sunny. Hollanders do not address each other, in affectionate intercourse, as the French and Germans do. But Dame Brinker had embroidered for a Heidelberg family in her girlhood, and she had carried its “thee” and “thou” into her rude home, to be used in moments of extreme love and tenderness.*

  Therefore, “What keeps thee, Hans?” sang an echo song beneath the boy’s whistling, and made him feel that his errand was blessed.

  Chapter 7

  Hans Has His Way

  Broek, with its quiet, spotless streets, its frozen rivulets, its yellow-brick pavements and bright wooden houses, was nearby. It was a village where neatness and show were in full blossom, but the inhabitants seemed to be either asleep or dead.

  Not a footprint marred the sanded paths, where pebbles and sea shells lay in fanciful designs. Every window shutter was closed as tightly as though air and sunshine were poison, and the massive front doors were never opened except on the occasion of a wedding, christening or a funeral.

  Serene clouds of tobacco smoke were floating through hidden apartments, and children, who otherwise might have awakened the place, were studying in out-of-the-way corners, or skating upon the neighbouring canal. A few peacocks and wolves stood in the gardens, but they had never enjoyed the luxury of flesh and blood. They were cut out in growing box, and seemed guarding the grounds with a sort of green ferocity
. Certain lively automata – ducks, women and sportsmen – were stowed away in summer houses, waiting for the springtime, when they could be wound up and rival their owners in animation; and the shining, tiled roofs, mosaic courtyards and polished house trimmings flashed up a silent homage to the sky, where never a speck of dust could dwell.

  Hans glanced towards the village as he shook his silver kwartjes, and wondered whether it were really true, as he had often heard, that some of the people of Broek were so rich that they used kitchen utensils of solid gold.

  He had seen Mevrouw van Stoop’s sweet cheeses in the market, and he knew that the lofty dame earned many a bright silver guilder in selling them. But did she set the cream to rise in golden pans? Did she use a golden skimmer? When her cows were in winter quarters, were their tails really tied up with ribbons?

  These thoughts ran through his mind as he turned his face towards Amsterdam, not five miles away, on the other side of the frozen Y.* The ice upon the canal was perfect, but his wooden runners, so soon to be cast aside, squeaked a dismal farewell as he scraped and skimmed along.

  When crossing the Y, whom should he see skating towards him but the great Dr Boekman, the most famous physician and surgeon in Holland. Hans had never met him before, but he had seen his engraved likeness in many of the shop windows in Amsterdam. It was a face that one could never forget. Thin and lank, though a born Dutchman, with stern blue eyes and queer compressed lips that seemed to say “No smiling permitted”, he certainly was not a very jolly or sociable looking personage, nor one that a well-trained boy would care to accost unbidden.

  But Hans was bidden, and that, too, by a voice he seldom disregarded – his own conscience.

  “Here comes the greatest doctor in the world,” whispered the voice. “God has sent him. You have no right to buy skates when you might, with the same money, purchase such aid for your father!”

  The wooden runners gave an exultant squeak. Hundreds of beautiful skates were gleaming and vanishing in the air above him. He felt the money tingle in his fingers. The old doctor looked fearfully grim and forbidding. Hans’s heart was in his throat, but he found voice enough to cry out, just as he was passing:

  “Mynheer Boekman!”

  The great man halted, and sticking out his thin underlip, looked scowling about him.

  Hans was in for it now.

  “Mynheer,” he panted, drawing close to the fierce-looking doctor, “I knew you could be none other than the famous Boekman. I have to ask a great favour.”

  “Humph!” muttered the doctor, preparing to skate past the intruder. “Get out of the way – I’ve no money – never give to beggars.”

  “I am no beggar, Mynheer,” retorted Hans proudly, at the same time producing his mite of silver with a grand air. “I wish to consult with you about my father. He is a living man, but sits like one dead. He cannot think. His words mean nothing – but he is not sick. He fell on the dykes.”

  “Hey? What?” cried the doctor, beginning to listen.

  Hans told the whole story in an incoherent way, dashing off a tear once or twice as he talked, and finally ending with an earnest:

  “Oh, do see him, Mynheer. His body is well – it is only his mind. I know this money is not enough, but take it, Mynheer, I will earn more – I know I will – oh! I will toil for you all my life, if you will but cure my father!”

  What was the matter with the old doctor? A brightness like sunlight beamed from his face. His eyes were kind and moist; the hand that had lately clutched his cane, as if preparing to strike, was laid gently upon Hans’s shoulder.

  “Put up your money, boy, I do not want it. We will see your father. It is a hopeless case, I fear. How long did you say?”

  “Ten years, Mynheer,” sobbed Hans, radiant with sudden hope.

  “Ah! a bad case, but I shall see him. Let me think. Today I start for Leiden, to return in a week – then you may expect me. Where is it?”

  “A mile south of Broek, Mynheer, near the canal. It is only a poor, broken-down hut. Any of the children thereabout can point it out to your honour,” added Hans, with a heavy sigh. “They are all half afraid of the place. They call it the idiot’s cottage.”

  “That will do,” said the doctor, hurrying on, with a bright backwards nod at Hans. “I shall be there. A hopeless case,” he muttered to himself, “but the boy pleases me. His eye is like my poor Laurens’s. Confound it, shall I never forget that young scoundrel!” and, scowling more darkly than ever, the doctor pursued his silent way.

  Again Hans was skating towards Amsterdam on the squeaking wooden runners, again his fingers tingled against the money in his pocket, again the boyish whistle rose unconsciously to his lips.

  “Shall I hurry home,” he was thinking, “to tell the good news, or shall I get the waffles and the new skates first? Whew! I think I’ll go on!”

  And so Hans bought the skates.

  Chapter 8

  Introducing Jacob Poot

  and His Cousin

  Hans and Gretel had a fine frolic early on that St Nicholas’s Eve. There was a bright moon, and their mother, though she believed herself to be without any hope of her husband’s improvement, had been made so happy at the prospect of the meester’s visit that she had yielded to the children’s entreaties for an hour’s skating before bedtime.

  Hans was delighted with his new skates, and, in his eagerness to show Gretel how perfectly they “worked”, did many things upon the ice that caused the little maid to clasp her hands in solemn admiration. They were not alone, though they seemed quite unheeded by the various groups assembled upon the canal.

  The two van Holps and Carl Schummel were there, testing their fleetness to the utmost. Out of four trials, Peter van Holp had won three times. Consequently Carl, never very amiable, was in anything but a good humour. He had relieved himself by taunting young Schimmelpenninck, who, being smaller than the others, kept meekly near them, without feeling exactly like one of the party, but now a new thought seized Carl, or rather he seized the new thought and made an onset upon his friends.

  “I say, boys, let’s put a stop to those young rag-pickers from the idiot’s cottage joining the race. Hilda must be crazy to think of it. Katrinka Flack and Rychie Korbes are furious at the very idea of racing with the girl, and, for my part, I don’t blame them. As for the boy, if we’ve a spark of manhood in us we will scorn the very idea of—”

  “Certainly we will!” interposed Peter van Holp, purposely mistaking Carl’s meaning. “Who doubts it? No fellow with a spark of manhood in him would refuse to let in two good skaters just because they were poor!”

  Carl wheeled about savagely:

  “Not so fast, master! And I’d thank you not to put words in other people’s mouths. You’d best not try it again.”

  “Ha! Ha!” laughed little Voostenwalbert Schimmelpenninck, delighted at the prospect of a fight, and sure that, if it should come to blows, his favourite – Peter – could beat a dozen excitable fellows like Carl.

  Something in Peter’s eye made Carl glad to turn to a weaker offender. He wheeled furiously upon Voost.

  “What are you shrieking about, you little weasel? You skinny herring, you! You little monkey with a long name for a tail!”

  Half a dozen bystanders and by-skaters set up an applauding shout at this brave witticism, and Carl, feeling that he had fairly vanquished his foes, was restored to partial good humour. He, however, prudently resolved to defer plotting against Hans and Gretel until some time when Peter should not be present.

  Just then his friend, Jacob Poot, was seen approaching. They could not distinguish his features at first, but as he was the stoutest boy in the neighbourhood there could be no mistaking his form.

  “Holla! Here comes Fatty!” exclaimed Carl. “And there’s someone with him – a slender fellow, a stranger.”

  “Ha! Ha! That’s like good bacon!” cri
ed Ludwig. “A streak of lean and a streak of fat.”

  “That’s Jacob’s English cousin,” put in Master Voost, delighted at being able to give the information. “That’s his English cousin, and, oh! he’s got such a funny little name: Ben Dobbs. He’s going to stay with him until after the grand race.”

  All this time the boys had been spinning, turning, “rolling” and doing other feats upon their skates, in a quiet way, as they talked, but now they stood still, bracing themselves against the frosty air as Jacob Poot and his friend drew near.

  “This is my cousin, boys,” said Jacob, rather out of breath, “Benjamin Dobbs. He’s a John Bull, and he’s going to be in the race.”

  All crowded, boy fashion, about the newcomers. Benjamin soon made up his mind that the Hollanders, notwithstanding their queer gibberish, were a fine set of fellows.

  If the truth must be told, Jacob had announced his cousin as “Penchamin Dopps”, and called him a “Shon Pull”, but as I translate every word of the conversation of our young friends, it is no more than fair to mend their little attempts at English. Master Dobbs felt at first decidedly awkward among his cousin’s friends. Though most of them had studied English and French, they were shy about attempting to speak either, and he made very funny blunders when he tried to converse in Dutch. He had learnt that vrouw means wife, and ja, yes; and spoorweg, railway; kanaals, canals; stoomboot, steamboat; ophaalbruggen, drawbridges; buiten plasten, country seats; Mynheer, mister; tweegevegt, duel or two fights; koper, copper; zadel, saddle – but he could not make a sentence out of these, nor use the long list of phrases he had learnt in his Dutch Dialogues. The topics of the latter were fine, but were never alluded to by the boys. Like the poor fellow who had learnt in Ollendorf* to ask in faultless German, “Have you seen my grandmother’s red cow?”, and when he reached Germany discovered that he had no occasion to enquire after that interesting animal, Ben found that his book-Dutch did not avail him as much as he had hoped. He acquired a hearty contempt for Jan van Gorp, a Hollander who wrote a book in Latin to prove that Adam and Eve spoke Dutch, and he smiled a knowing smile when his Uncle Poot assured him that Dutch “had great likeness mit Zinglish, but it vash much petter languish, much petter”.