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Good Government
by
Meantime Eva had come out of the house and took Mat by the arm, as if to save him. But he shook her off almost as roughly as he had done the beadle; while the latter said to Eva, “You may as well wait till I come for you.”
“Come on,” said Mat, casting a look of much meaning on Eva; but she, poor thing, saw nothing now, for the tears were in her eyes. Holding her apron to her face, she went back quickly to the house.
The farmers went to their work, and Mat followed the officers to the squire’s, the children bringing up the rear. When nearly out of hearing, some of the boldest cried, “Soges! Soges!” This was the beadle’s nickname, and always made him furious. He had administered his office while the Black Forest yet formed a part of the possessions of the house of Austria. His devotion to his august master was such that he thought it necessary even to affect the dialect of Vienna; and, instead of pronouncing the German for “I say it,” “I sag’s” or “I han’s g’sa’t,”–as a plain Black Forester would have done,–he said, “I sog’es.” Soges thereby became his title.
The mysterious brown door of the squire’s house removed Mat, Soges, and the ranger from the sight of the multitude. The squire welcomed the prisoner with a round rating for the crime of which he stood accused. Mat remained calm, only beating with one foot the time of a tune he sang in imagination. At last he said, “‘You ‘most done, squire? All that’s nothing to me, for I haven’t set any May-pole: go on talking, though, for I’ve plenty of time to listen.”
The squire waxed very wroth, and would have assaulted Mat bodily had not Soges whispered some more sagacious counsels in his ear. He sank his clenched fist, and ordered Soges to take the criminal to the lock-up for twenty-four hours for a flagrant denial.
“I belong to the village; I am to be found at any time, and I’m not likely to run away about such a trumpery as this: you can’t lock me up,” said Mat, rightly.
“Can’t?” cried the squire, reddening with anger: “we’ll see if we can’t, you—-“
“Save your blackguarding,” said Mat: “I’m going; but it’s an outrage to treat the son of a citizen this way. If my cousin Buchmaier was at home it couldn’t be done.”
On the way to the lock-up they met Eva; but Mat did not even make an attempt to speak to her. Eva could not understand how this happened. She followed Mat with her eyes until he was no longer in sight, and then, bent with shame and trouble, she entered the squire’s dwelling. His wife was Eva’s godmother, and Eva would not go until Mat had been released. But her intercession was of no use this time: the president-judge of the district was shortly expected on his tour of visitation, and the squire wished to conciliate him by a specimen of unrelenting severity.
In conjunction with his faithful prime minister Soges, a report was prepared and Mat transported to Horb early next morning. It was well that Eva’s house lay at the other end of the village, so that she could not see the wretched plight to which a night’s imprisonment had reduced the fine, active fellow who generally appeared so neatly clad. In his anger he tore a bough from every hedge he passed, gnawed it between his teeth, and threw it away again. In the fir-wood he broke a twig and kept it in his mouth. He never spoke a word: the fir-sprig seemed to be the symbol of his silence in regard to the May-pole,–a charm with which he intended to tie his tongue. Arrived at the court-house door, he hastily took it out of his mouth and unconsciously thrust it in his pocket.
No one who has not been in the hands of a German court of justice can form any idea of the misery attending such a perfect loss of the power of self-control: it is as if one’s mind had been forcibly deprived of its body. Pushed from hand to hand, the feet move with apparent freedom of will, and yet do only another’s bidding. Mat felt all this keenly; for he had never been in trouble like this. He felt as if he was a great criminal, and had killed somebody at the very least: his knees seemed to sink under him as he was taken up the long flights of steps which lead to the top of the hill. He was locked up in the old tower which stands so uncomfortably on the hill, like a great stone finger pointing upward as if to say, “Beware!”