The Quest. Frederik van Eeden

catch. If one of those young ladies is pleased, it is because she is dressed more beautifully, or attracts more attention than the others. And the pleasure of the men chiefly consists in those bare arms and necks. Behind all those laughing eyes and friendly lips lurks something quite different. Even those apparently obsequious servants are far from being respectful. If it suddenly became clear what each one really thought, the party would soon break up."

      And as Pluizer pointed it out to him, Johannes plainly saw the affectation in faces and gestures; and the vanity, envy, and weariness which peeped from behind the smiling masks, or suddenly appeared as soon as they were laid aside.

      "Well," said Pluizer, "they must do as they think best. Such people must amuse themselves, and this is the only way they know."

      Johannes felt that some one was standing behind him, and he looked round. It was the well-known, tall figure. The pale face was whimsically lighted by the glare, so that the eyes formed large, dark depressions. He murmured softly to himself, and pointed with a finger into the lighted palace.

      "Look!" said Pluizer. "He is making another selection."

      Johannes looked where the finger pointed. He saw the old lady, even as she was speaking, shut her eyes and put her hand to her head, and the beautiful young girl stay her slow step, and stare before her with a slight shiver.

      "When?" asked Pluizer of Death.

      "That is my affair," said the latter.

      "I should like to show Johannes this same company still another time," said Pluizer, with a wink and a grin. "May I?"

      "To-night?" asked Death.

      "Why not?" said Pluizer. "In that place is neither hour nor time. What now is has always been, and what is to be, already is."

      "I cannot go with you," said Death. "I have too much to do; but speak the name that we both know, and you can find the way without me."

      They went on – some distance – through the lonely streets, where the gas-lights flickered in the night wind, and the dark, cold water rippled along the sides of the canal. The soft music grew fainter and fainter, and then died away in the great calm that rested upon the city.

      Suddenly there rang out from on high, with full metallic reverberation, a loud and festive melody.

      It dropped straight down from the tall tower upon the sleeping town – into the sad, overshadowed spirit of Little Johannes. Surprised, he looked up. The melody of the clock continued, in calm clear tones which jubilantly rose, and sharply broke the deathly stillness. Those blithe notes – that festal song – seemed strange to him in the midst of still sleep and dark sorrow.

      "That is the clock," said Pluizer. "It is always just as jolly – year in, year out. Every hour, it sings the selfsame song, with the same vim and gusto. In the night time, it sounds jollier than it does in the daytime; as if the clock were glad it has no need of sleep – that it can always sing just as happily when thousands are weeping and suffering. But it sings most merrily whenever any one is dead."

      Still again the joyful sound rang out.

      "One day, Johannes," continued Pluizer, "in a quiet room behind such a window as that, a feeble light will be burning – a dim and flickering light – making the shadows waver on the wall. There will be no sound in the room save now and then a soft, suppressed sob. A bed will be standing there, with white curtains, and long shadows in the folds. In that bed something will be lying – white and still. That will have been Little Johannes. Then joyously will that selfsame song break out and loudly and lustily enter the room to celebrate the hour of his decease."

      Separated by long intervals, twelve heavy strokes resounded through the air. Johannes felt at once as if he were in a dream; he no longer walked, but floated a little way above the street, his hand in Pluizer's. The houses and lamp-posts sped by in rapid flight. The houses stood less close together now. They formed broken rows, with dark mysterious gaps between, where the gas-lamps lighted pits and pools, rubbish and rafters, in a capricious way. At last came a large gateway with heavy columns and a high railing. As quick as a wink they were over it, and down upon some damp grass, near a big heap of sand. Johannes fancied he was in a garden, for he heard around them the rustling of trees.

      "Now pay attention, Johannes, and then insist, if you can, that I am not able to do more than Windekind."

      Then Pluizer called aloud a short and doleful name which made Johannes shudder. From all sides, the sound re-echoed in the darkness, and the wind bore it up whistling and whirling until it died away in the upper air.

      Then Johannes noticed that the grass-blades reached above his head, and that the small pebble which until now lay at his feet was in front of his face.

      Near him, Pluizer – just as small as himself – grasped the stone with both hands, and, exerting all his strength, turned it over. Confused cries of shrill, high-pitched little voices rose up from the cleared ground.

      "Hey! Who is doing that? What does that mean? Blockhead!" shouted the voices.

      Johannes saw black objects running hurriedly past one another. He recognized the brisk black tumble-bug, the shining brown earwig with his fine pinchers, big humpbacked ants, and snake-like millipedes.

      In the middle of them a long earth-worm pulled himself, quick as lightning, back into his hole.

      Pluizer tore impatiently through the raving, scolding crowd up to the worm-hole.

      "Hey, there! you long, naked lout! Come to daylight with your pointed red nose," he cried.

      "What do you want?" asked the worm, out of the depths.

      "You must come out because I want to go in. Do you hear? You bald dirt-eater!"

      The worm stretched his pointed head cautiously out of the opening, felt all around with it a number of times, and then slowly dragged his bare, ringed body farther toward the surface.

      Pluizer looked round at the other creatures that were crowding about him in their curiosity.

      "One of you go before us to light the way. No, Black-beetle, you are too big; and you, with the thousand feet – you would make me dizzy. Hey, there, Earwig, I fancy your looks! Come along, and carry the light in your pincers. Bundle away, Black-beetle, and look around for a will-o'-the-wisp, or bring a torch of rottenwood."

      The creatures, awed by his commanding voice, obeyed him.

      Then they went down into the worm-hole – the earwig in front with the shining wood, then Pluizer, then Johannes. It was a very dark and narrow passage. Johannes saw the grains of sand dimly lighted by the faint bluish flicker of the torch. They looked as large as stones – half polished, and rubbed to a smooth, firm wall by the body of the worm, who now followed, full of curiosity. Johannes saw behind him its pointed head – now thrust quickly out in front, and then waiting for the long part behind to pull up to it.

      They went in silence a long way down. When the path became too steep for Johannes, Pluizer helped him. It seemed as if there never would be an end; ever new sand-grains, and still the earwig crept on, turning and bending with the winding of the passage. At last the way widened and the walls fell apart. The sand-grains were black and wet, forming a vault above, where the water trickled in glistening streaks, and through which the roots of trees were stretched like stiffened serpents.

      Suddenly, a perpendicular wall – high and black – rose up before Johannes' sight, cutting off everything in front of him. The earwig turned round.

      "Hey, ho! Now it is a question of getting behind that. The worm knows all about it; he is at home here."

      "Come, show us the way!" said Pluizer.

      The worm slowly pulled its articulate body up to the black wall, and touched and tested it. Johannes saw that it was of wood. Here and there it was decayed into brownish powder. In one of these places the worm bored through, and with three push-and-pulls the long, supple body slipped within.

      "Now you!" said Pluizer, and he shoved Johannes into the little round opening. For an instant, the latter thought he should be stifled in the soft, moist mold; then he felt his head free, and with some trouble he worked his way completely through. A large