Hauke

“ He felt in his pockets and pressed a newly coined mark-piece into her hand. "Take that and drink this glass yourself, Trien'; then we shall be friends again!"
"You're right, Hauke!" returned the old woman obeying him. "You're right; it is better for an old woman like me than for you!"
"How are you getting on with your ducks?" he called after her as she was going away with her basket; but she only shook her head without turning round and clapped her old hands in the air. "It's no good, Hauke; there are too [Pg 259] many rats in your ditches; God have mercy on me! ”

“ Christianity! A child is still better; if that can't be had, a dog probably does instead!"
"Be silent with your heathenish doctrines!" Hauke shouted at him; "it would fill it up better if you were thrown in!"
"Oh ho!" The shout rang out from a dozen throats and the dikegrave found himself surrounded by wrathful faces and clenched fists; he saw that these were indeed no friends; the thought of his dike came over him with a shock; what should he do if they should all throw down their shovels now? ”

“ And when Hauke came up to his chair he took his hand in both his podgy ones and said: "Well, well, my boy, don't grieve too much, for we must all die and your father was not one of the worst! But, come, Elke, bring the roast in; we need to strengthen ourselves! There is a lot of work ahead of us, Hauke! The autumn inspection is coming on; the dike and sluice accounts are piled as high as the house; then there's the recent damage to the dike on the western koog—I don't know which way to turn my head; but yours, thank God, is a good bit younger; you are a good lad, Hauke!" ”

“ But it was said at a public house table and it did not stop there; soon it went the rounds on the uplands as well as down on the marshes; thus it came to Hauke's ears too. And again all the malicious faces passed before his inward eye and when he thought of the laughter at the tavern table it sounded more mocking than it had been in reality. "The dogs!" he shouted and looked wrathfully to one side as if he would have had them thrashed.
At that Elke laid her hand on his arm: "Never mind them! They would all like to be what you are!" ”

“ Hauke's tall, lean figure stepped out of the crowd; the gray eyes in his long Friesian face were fixed on the hogshead; his hand, which hung at his side, held the ball.
"The bird's too big for you, eh?" came the grating voice of Ole Peters close to his ear, "shall we exchange it for a gray pot?"
Hauke turned and looked at him steadily. "I'm throwing for the marsh," he said. "Where do you belong?"
"To the marsh too, I imagine; but you are throwing for Elke Volkerts, eh?"
"Stand aside!" shouted Hauke and took his position again. But Ole pressed forward with his head still nearer to him. ”

“ Hauke tossed sleeplessly about on his pillow. "What is the matter?" asked Elke, kept awake by worry about her husband; "if there is anything on your mind tell it to me; we have always done that."
"It is not of any consequence, Elke," he replied; "there are some repairs to be made to the dike, to the sluices; you know that I always have to think such things out in my mind at night." He said nothing further; he wanted to keep himself free to act as he chose. ”

“ I say," shouted Hauke again; "Bring me the dog! Our work shall not be stained by any outrage!"
But not a hand moved; only a few shovels of sticky clay still flew down beside the howling animal. Thereupon he put spurs to his horse, so that it shrieked aloud and dashed down the dike, and all stood back before him. "The dog!" he shouted; "I want the dog!"
A hand slapped him gently on the shoulder as if it were the hand of old Jewe Manners; but when he looked round it was only a friend of the old man's. "Take care, dikegrave!" he whispered to Hauke. "You have no friends among these men ”

“ The dikemaster Hauke Haien sped on his white horse to the dike. The small path seemed to have no bottom, for measureless rain had fallen; nevertheless, the wet, sucking clay did not appear to hold back the hoofs of the animal, for it acted as if it felt the solid ground of summer beneath it. As in a wild chase the clouds wandered in the sky; below lay the marshes like an indistinct desert filled with restless shadows. A muffled roaring rose from the water behind the dike, more and more horrible, as if it had to drown all other sounds. "Get up, horse!" ”

“ Thus keeping to himself and loving best to live only with the wind and water and the images that solitude brings, Hauke grew up to be a tall, lean fellow. He had been confirmed for more than a year when things began to change with him, and that was owing to the old white Angora tom-cat which had been brought home from a Spanish sea voyage to old Trien' Jans by her son, who later perished on the flats. ”

“ Hauke laughed: "That won't catch us!" and lifted the child up to his saddle in front of him. Elke remained out on the mound for a while and, shading her eyes with her hand, watched the two trotting out on the road and over to the dike; Trien' Jans sat on the stone and mumbled something incomprehensible with her faded lips.
The child lay without moving in her father's arm; and it seemed as if, oppressed by the thundery air, she were breathing with difficulty. He bent his head to her: "Well, Wienke?" he asked. ”

“ Like as a fearefull Partridge, that is fled
4 From the sharpe Hauke, which her attached neare,
And fals to ground, to seeke for succour theare,
6 Whereas the hungry Spaniels she does spy,
With greedy iawes her readie for to teare; ”

“ Only many years later, after God Almighty had laid the burden of an half-witted child upon him, he took the girl out on the dike with him at the same time of day and of the year and the same thing is said to have happened again out on the shallows. But he told her not to be afraid, those creatures were only herons and crows that looked so big and dreadful in the fog as they caught fish in the open cracks.
"God knows, Sir!" the schoolmaster interrupted himself; "there are all kinds of things in the world that may confuse an honest Christian's heart; but Hauke was neither a fool nor a dunce." ”

“ And Hauke smiled; but she went on to another question: "And the tremendous expense! Have you thought of that?"
"Indeed I have, Elke; we shall gain in land much more than the expense of building the dike, and then too the cost of maintaining the old dike will be much less; we shall work ourselves and we have more than eighty teams in the parish and no lack of young hands. At least you will not have made me dikegrave for nothing, Elke; I will show them that I am one." ”

“ A year after the winter festival Ole Peters had left the dikegrave's service and married Vollina Harders; Hauke had been right; the old man had retired and instead of his fat daughter his brisk son-in-law now rode the yellow mare [Pg 264] to the fens and on his way back, it was said, always up the side of the dike. Hauke was now head man and a younger fellow had taken his former place. At first the dikegrave had not wanted to advance him. "He's better as second man," he had growled, "I need him here with my books!" But Elke had said, "Then Hauke would leave, Father!" ”

“ Elke shook her head. "She raises ducks, you know, and sells them; but last spring after you killed her Angora, the rats got at the ducks in the back of the duckhouse. Now she wants to build another one at the front of the house."
"Oh!" said Hauke and gave a low whistle, drawing his breath in through his teeth, "That is why she has dragged all that clay and stone down from the upland. But if she does that she will build on the road on the inside of the dike; has she got a permit?" ”

“ Hauke Haien was among the latter. At first he had decided not to try, although he knew that his arms were well trained in throwing. He feared that Ole Peters, [Pg 254] who held a post of honor in the game, would succeed in having him rejected and he hoped to spare himself such a defeat. But Elke had changed his mind at the eleventh hour. "He wouldn't dare to, Hauke," she said; "he is the son of a day laborer; your father has a horse and cow of his own and is the wisest man in the village as well." ”

“ Then the whole crowd streamed back and Elke and Hauke were separated and swept along by the crowd towards the tavern on the road that turned up by the dikegrave's mound towards the uplands. But here they both escaped and while Elke went up to her room Hauke stood at the back, in front of the stable door and watched the dark mass of people wandering up to the tavern, where a room was ready for the dancers. Night gradually fell over the open country ”

“ It was Elke's godfather, Jewe Manners, who still held office as commissioner at Hauke's request. "Dikegrave Hauke Haien," he said, "you are putting us to a great deal of trouble and expense and I wish you had waited for that till God had called me home; but—you are right, no one with reason can fail to see that. We ought to thank God every day that, in spite of our laziness, he has preserved that valuable piece of foreland from storm and water for us ”

“ At last the sun had sunk behind the dike and in its place had left a reddish violet glow that flamed up into the sky; now and then black crows flew by and seemed for the moment to be of gold; it was evening. On the fields however the dark crowd of people kept on moving farther and farther away from the black houses in the distance behind them towards the hogshead; an exceptionally good cast might reach it now. It was the marsh party's turn and Hauke was to throw. ”

“ And already his spurs were in the white horse's flanks and the animal was flying with him thither; the gale [Pg 337] came from the broad side, at times the gusts came with such force that they were almost swept down from the dike into the new koog; but horse and rider knew where they were riding. Hauke already perceived that probably a few dozen men were working industriously there together and already he saw distinctly that a gutter was cut right across through the new dike. Violently he reined in his horse. "Stop!" he cried, "stop! What devil's work are you doing here?" ”

“ Frau Elke's eyes also laughed to her husband when he came riding home from the dike on his white horse; "You've grown to be a good horse, after all," she would say and pat the animal's smooth neck. But Hauke, when she held the child, would spring down and let the tiny little thing dance in his arms; and when the white horse fixed its brown eyes on the child he would say perhaps, "Come here, you shall have the honor too!" Then he would put little Wienke—for so she had been christened—on his saddle and lead the horse round in a circle on the mound. Even the old ash-tree sometimes had the honor ”

“ Al the Barons and Gentlemen highly commended and praysed the Hauke, affirminge that a better was not in the worlde, attributing vnto the same sutch prayse, as they thought meete. The king for all the acclamations and shoutes of the troupe, spake not a worde, but stoode musing with himselfe, and did neyther prayse nor blame the Hauke. It was very late in the eueninge, when the Faucon killed the Egle, and therefore the kinge commaunded ech man to depart to the Citty. The next day the king caused a Goldsmith to make an exceeding fayre crowne of golde, apt and meete for the Falcon’s head. ”

“ Hauke did not listen to this speech of encouragement for Elke had come into the room and was clearing away the remains of the food from the table with her light, quick hands, glancing at him furtively with her dark eyes, as she did so. Now his glance too fell upon her. "By God," he said to himself, "she does not look half bad that way either."
The girl had left the room. "You know, Tede," the dikegrave began again, "God has denied me a son."
"Yes, Dikegrave, but do not let that trouble you," answered the other. "For the brains of a family are said to come to an end in the third generation ”

“ For as Hauke came riding up in front of the [Pg 290] house and drew rein under the ash she saw that the poor creature was lame too.
But the young dikegrave sprang laughing from his brown gelding. "Never mind, Elke, it didn't cost much."
"You know that the cheapest thing is usually the dearest," his wise wife answered.
"Not always, Elke; this animal is four years old at the most; look at him more carefully! He has been starved and abused; our oats will do him good and I will take care of him myself so that he shan't be overfed."
During this conversation the animal stood with his head lowered ”

“ All at once he heard the rustle of a gown round the corner of the house and firm little steps went down the footway that led through the fens up onto the uplands. Now, in the dusk, he could see the figure swinging along and he knew that it was Elke; she too was going to the dance in the tavern. The blood rushed up into his throat; should he not run after her and go with her? But Hauke was no hero where women were con [Pg 261] cerned ”

“ Such moccasins often consume, in the fashioning, the idle hours of months. The Indian girl carries them with her everywhere, as her more civilised sister carries an embroidery frame. On dress occasions in the Far North a man's standing with his womenkind can be accurately gauged by the magnificence of his foot-gear.
"The gift of May-may-gwán," explained Haukemah.
"Well, I'll be damned!" said Dick, in English.
"Will my brother be paid in tea or in tobacco?" inquired Sam Bolton.
Haukemah arose.
"Let these remind you always that my heart is good," said he. "I may tell my young men that you go?" ”