The White Dominican Read Online Free PDF Page A

in coloured beads.
    “Herr Dovecote, if it’s at all possible, do you think you could leave it dark tonight? Please don’t think”, he went on, when he saw how surprised I was, although I felt too timid to ask him his reasons, “that I want to lead you astray and make you neglect your duty, but my wife’s reputation is at stake, if people should find out the job I’ve taken on. And my daughter’s future as an actress would be ruined for ever. What’s going to be done here tonight must be hidden from human sight!” I took an involuntary step backwards, so horrified was I by the old man’s tone and the way his features were distorted with fear. “No, no, please don’t run away, Herr Dovecote. It isn’t anything wrong. Though if it comes out, I shall have to throw myself in the river! You see, the fact of the matter is, I’ve had an order from a customer in the city that’s not quite, well, respectable – the order that is – and we’re going to load it on the cart and send it off tonight, when everyone’s asleep. Yes, that’s about the long and the short of it.”
    I gave a sigh of relief. Even if I had no idea what it was all about, I was at least sure it was something completely harmless.
    “Would you like me to help you with the loading, Herr Mutschelknaus?” I offered.
    The old carpenter was so delighted he almost embraced me. “But won’t the Baron hear of it?” he asked the next moment, his old fears returning. “And are you allowed to come out that late? You’re so young?”
    “My foster-father will know nothing at all about it”, I assured him.

    At midnight I heard someone softly calling my name from the street below.
    I slipped down the stairs and saw a cart standing in the shadows. Pieces of cloth had been wrapped round the horses’ hooves so that they would not be heard as they trotted along. The carter was standing beside the shaft and grinned every time Herr Mutschelknaus came out of his shop lugging a basket full of large, round, brown-painted wooden rings with lids attached, each with a knob in the middle.
    I hurried over to help him load them, and in half an hour the cart was filled to the brim and swaying over the wooden bridge before it was lost in the darkness.
    With a deep sigh of relief, the old man drew me into his workshop, in spite of my reluctance. What little light that came from the tiny petroleum lamp hanging from the ceiling seemed to be absorbed by the white disc of the freshly planed table, on which stood a jug of weak beer and two glasses of which one, of beautifully cut crystal, was obviously intended for me. The rest of the room stretched away into darkness. Only gradually, as my eyes became accustomed to the light, could I distinguish the various objects. A steel shaft ran from wall to wall. During the day it was driven from outside by a water-wheel; now several hens were sleeping on it. Over the lathe, leather drive-belts hung down like gallows nooses, and in the corner stood a wooden statue of Saint Sebastian, pierced with arrows. Each arrow had its roosting hen. By the head-end of a wretched trestle, which presumably served the old man as a bed, was an open coffin in which a few rabbits shifted in their sleep from time to time.
    The only decoration in the room was a picture in a golden frame surrounded by a laurel wreath. It represented a young woman in a theatrical pose, with eyes closed and mouth half-open; the figure was naked apart from a fig leaf, but white as snow, as if it were a model who had been painted over with plaster of Paris.
    Herr Mutschelknaus blushed when he saw me stop in front of the picture, and he immediately began to reel off an explanation, “It’s my lady wife, at the time when she bestowed her hand upon me. You see, she was”, he cleared his throat, “a marble nymph. Ah, yes, Aloysia – that is, Aglaia; of course, Aglaia. It was, you see, my lady wife’s misfortune, as a tiny baby, to be christened with the rather common name of