An Old Heart Goes A-Journeying (17 page)

“Look here,” said Hütefritz earnestly, “listen, Evi, it’s for you to decide now. We’ll all see to that, Rosemarie. But before you go into Schlieker’s house we must first be quite certain that Otsche’s inside it. Otherwise there’s no sense in what you suggest.”

“But where else could he be?” asked Hübner.

“How do I know? Very likely Schlieker went straight from here to his people at Biestow, and Otsche has followed him. No, I’m going to nose around a bit first,
and when we’re quite sure Otsche’s inside, then you can go, Rosemarie. What about it, Evi?”

“All right,” she said doubtfully, “if you aren’t more than half an hour.”

“But if there’s any nosing around to be done,” said Rosemarie, “I’m going to do it.”

“Rubbish!” said Hütefritz scornfully. “Anyone could spot that red dress of yours five miles away.”

“I’m the smallest,” chirped Albert Strohmeier. “And I can run the fastest—I’ll go.”

“It was my idea,” insisted Hütefritz. “I’ll go.”

“No,” said Rosemarie decisively. “Strohmeier shall go. If the Schliekers see him, they’ll just think he’s being inquisitive. But if they catch sight of you, Fritz, they’ll know that I’m somewhere around.”

“He’s sure to make a mess of it,” growled Hütefritz peevishly.

“You must crawl on your fingertips like a Red Indian, Albert, so that Schlieker won’t spot your tracks.”

“Fathead!” said Strohmeier contemptuously. “As if he’d look for trails! No, I’ll go in my socks. Bare feet squelch and boots creak.”

They all looked at him. The atmosphere had changed, Otsche’s captivity and Rosemarie’s heroism were forgotten. . . .

“Good luck, Albert!” they cried.

“So long,” he replied and dived into the bushes.

“You fool! Where are you going?” shouted Hütefritz in a fury.

“Don’t you understand?” said Rosemarie eagerly. “He’s quite right, he’s not going by the path. He’s going
down to the lake, and then along the shore to the garden—Hullo, what’s that?”

There was a rustle in the bushes at the edge of the sand pit, and with a yelp of joy Bello leapt at Rosemarie.

“Bello!” she cried. “The Professor must have let him out. There, there, old fellow. Quiet now, quiet. Lie down, lie down, sir.”

The dog crouched at her feet and looked up at her.

“He’s got as far as the garden,” said Hübner.

“He’ll be out of sight now,” said Hütefritz, “we must just wait.”

They waited.

Minutes passed, minutes that seemed endless.

“Where can he be now?” murmured one.

“He ought to have been here long ago.”

“Perhaps Schlieker’s caught him.”

“If he doesn’t come back soon, I shall go after him,” said Hütefritz grimly.

“You stay where you are!” commanded Rosemarie. “If anyone goes, I shall.”

“There he is!” cried Witt. “By the lake!”

“So he is!”

“Well, Albert!” said Rosemarie expectantly.

“Is he there?” asked Hütefritz eagerly.

“Who—Schlieker?” asked Albert Strohmeier, fully conscious of his temporary importance. “Let me put on my boots first. My feet are frozen, and my socks are in rags. Mother will raise Cain when she sees them.”

“Is he there?” bellowed Hütefritz.

“Who?” asked Strohmeier, triumphantly eying his oppressor. “Yes, Herr Paul Schlieker is at home.”

“Fathead!” roared Hütefritz.

“Albert!” said Rosemarie. “Albert Strohmeier, is Otsche in that house?”

“He certainly is!” said Strohmeier, with a large smile. “He’s shut up in the little cellar under your room, Rosemarie. . . .”

“There!” said Rosemarie.

“Poor boy!” wailed Evi. “I’ll tell Father right away, if you don’t go at once, Rosemarie. . . .”

“I’ll go now. . . .” said Rosemarie decisively.

“Poor boy?” asked Strohmeier, grinning all over his little freckled countenance. “Poor Schliekers, you mean! Do you think Otsche’s taking it lying down? He’s roaring and swearing and making such a row that Schlieker’s stuffing straw in the air holes so they can’t hear it in the village.”

“He must be rescued,” said Rosemarie. “I’ll go along now.”

“Stop!” cried Strohmeier, gripping her. “Wait a moment. You’ll see something in a minute.”

“I
must
go,” cried Rosemarie, eying Evi’s pale distracted face. “I got him into this, and I must get him out again.”

“Wait, Rosemarie,” said Strohmeier mysteriously. “I saw something.”

“Well?” said Rosemarie eagerly.

“Well . . .” whispered Strohmeier. “Paul is putting on his blue jacket with the horn buttons.”

For a moment there was a deep and thoughtful silence.

“Then,” said Rosemarie decisively, “he’s going into town.”

“Perhaps he’s going to the police.”

“Oh, poor Otsche!” wailed Evi.

“Silly,” said Strohmeier contemptuously. “If Paul goes in to town the old woman will have to see to the cattle. And as soon as she’s inside the cowshed, we’ll lock the door and get Otsche out of the cellar.”

“Hurrah!” they all shouted.

“And Schlieker can go to blazes!”

“Let’s hope he’ll start soon.”

“Well, if he’s got his blue jacket on already . . .”

“But it’s getting dark.”

This time they had not long to wait. Schlieker came out of the front door wheeling his bicycle.

“There he is—off to Kriwitz.”

“I’ll run after him,” said Hütefritz. “I must get back to my cows anyway. If he doesn’t go to Kriwitz, I’ll send a message.”

And he started off at once just as Paul Schlieker disappeared behind the first house in the village.

“Get along—all of you!” cried Rosemarie. “We’ll hide behind the yard wall. But Bello—Oh dear, is that you, Philip?—what a fright you gave me! Have you left the Professor all by himself? Quick—can’t tell you all about it now.”

Three minutes later they were crouching behind the farmyard wall. Rosemarie was peering through one gate hinge and Strohmeier through the other. The yard lay silent and deserted in the gathering darkness. Then a door slammed and they heard a clink of metal.

“The milk pails,” whispered Rosemarie.

Albert Strohmeier nodded.

Mali Schlieker emerged from the house carrying two milk pails. She stood two paces away from the children
on the other side of the wall, and seemed to be listening. Rosemarie pressed the dog’s head close to her side, and looked at him imploringly, her heart throbbing.

But Mali went on unsuspecting, across to the stables; a bolt rattled.

“Now!” whispered Rosemarie excitedly.

Slowly and with infinite caution Strohmeier raised the latch of the yard gate. They peered through the gap, the other children thronging at their backs.

“The stable door is open,” whispered Albert.

“That’s so she can see,” explained Rosemarie, and to the others: “Now you stay here—remember, you’re not to move! Albert and I will go alone. Philip, hold Bello. Shoes off, Albert!”

They kicked off their shoes and crept in single file first along the wall and then along the stable. Before them yawned the stable doorway, black and still.

Albert stopped. “Wait till she starts milking,” he whispered. “She can’t get out so quick from under the cow.”

They stood flattened against the wall, only a foot or two from the doorway on the opposite side from the door. Albert would have to slip across the gap and shut the door from the other side. From inside the stable came a faint rustle of straw.

Suddenly a dog at the gate of the yard yelped, then all was silent.

If Frau Schlieker came at that moment she could not fail to see them.

For Albert Strohmeier it was only an escapade: if it failed, he could run back to his home and his parents. But Rosemarie’s very destiny was at stake. That woman in the stable was viler than any witch in a fairy tale
and Rosemarie was at her mercy. She felt helpless, she knew she could never run away, Mali had bewitched her. Her limbs trembled, her lips quivered.

“O God,” she prayed, “don’t let her hear, please let her go on milking. I can’t bear it any more!”

She waited, breathless—then came the silvery tinkle of the milk jet spurting into the pail.

“Now!” whispered Albert.

His little gray shadow slipped across the opening, the door swung to with a crash, the bolt rattled home, and Rosemarie, still trembling, dropped the linchpin into place.

A scream from within as the woman flung herself against the door, yelling: “Let me come out, you little brute!”

“The door’s all right,” whispered Albert, “but hurry!”

While Mali Schlieker dashed the milk stools against the door and shrieked, while the cows bellowed and the horses stamped, they ran into the house, through the dark kitchen and the dark nursery into Rosemarie’s room.

“Otsche!” cried Rosemarie.

“You beast!” came the reply.

“Otsche, Otsche, you silly boy, it’s me, Rosemarie. And Albert Strohmeier.

“Wait, I’ll have the door up in a minute—he’s tied it down. Have you got your knife? Hurry! Just a moment, Otsche. Did you have a very bad time? We must hurry, he might come back. There!—now climb up. Oh, he’s taken away the ladder! Here, take my hand, and Albert’s. So!

“Oh, Otsche!” she cried, and flung her arms round her ancient enemy. “Thank God, we’ve rescued you. Did he knock you about very much?”

“I’d like to have seen him try!” said Otsche Gau haughtily. “I told Schlieker what I thought of him. They’re both of them hopping mad.”

“Come on!” urged Albert. “Don’t let’s hang around here. . . .”

“You might at least take your underclothes,” said Otsche, unperturbed. “I should be sorry to have let myself in for all this for nothing. I dare say
you
can find them in the dark,
I
don’t know where you keep your beastly drawers and things.”

“Otsche,” piped a new and shrill little voice, “run home quick. Paul Schlieker’s gone to see Father!”

“Christa!” cried Otsche.

“Christa Gau!” cried Albert Strohmeier and Rosemarie.

“Paul Schlieker’s with Father now. Run, Otsche!”

And Otsche ran, as though his life depended on it.

From the stable window Mali Schlieker shrieked:

“Paul—let me out! P-a-u-1! The boy’s got away!”

Otsche ran and ran.

In which Gau shows himself a stern father, and Schlieker as something worse than a crook

I
F ANYONE FROM
U
NSADEL
and the district, including the town of Kriwitz, had learnt of Otsche Gau’s mysterious theft of underclothes—had the case come before Gottschalk, the Parish Clerk, or the Tamms, or Constable Peter Gneis, or even Schulz the magistrate, they would all have wagged their heads in utter mystification.

But the Schliekers guessed in five minutes what was up. As for the little wretch himself, they cuffed him and they shook him, but they could not make him tell; indeed, after he had recovered from the first shock, he became so abusive that they had to shut him in the beet-cellar until they could decide what to do.

In point of fact they did not need his evidence; the Schliekers were quite able to make sense, and good sense, out of what had happened without any help from Otsche Gau.

Item: yesterday, in broad daylight, a raid had been made on the babies in the Schliekers’ care.

Item: Marie had bolted, and though Schlieker knew no details, it was perfectly clear that she had been lured away.

Item: Schlieker had been quietly arrested, but his arrest was generally known.

Item: exactly two and three-quarter years ago the Schliekers had maneuvered Rosemarie Thürke away from the Gaus.

The conclusion was clear: the Gaus thought that their luck with Rosemarie Thürke was in again, and that the Schliekers had lost the game.