The Lightstep

by John Dickinson

  It was an elderly man – a Jew, from the beard and long locks. His eyes were open. His face, yellow in the lamp-light, was drawn in pain. His mouth moved, gasping. His right hand was groping for his left shoulder, where the dark cloth of his cloak was beginning to soak with blood. Wéry looked up into Heiss's horrified face.

  'I challenged him,' Heiss gasped. 'He didn't stand.'

  A wealthy Jew, on his way back to the ghetto before the gates locked for the night. And a mob had run up out of the darkness and shouted at him. Of course he had retreated. And . . .

  'Eeeee – eeee,' the man whined. One hand clutched at the air near his wounded shoulder. His eyes were screwed up and his nose was a sharp yellow peak jutting up from his face against the shadows behind.

  Wéry's knees were wet. He looked down at the dark pool that was growing around him, and already becoming sticky as it grew. His trousers were stained, irreparably.

  'You – idiot!' he exclaimed.

  Others had run up and were looking down at the wounded man. Von Uhnen was among them.

  'There's a surgeon down by the New Bridge,' someone said.

  'Help me lift him,' said Wéry.

  They hung back. Lift a wounded man, and a Jew at that?

  Wéry cursed them in French, as he struggled to get the man's bloody arm over his shoulder. The man cried out.

  'Help me!'

  It was Uhnen who stepped forward. Heiss had disappeared somewhere, eyes dazed and pistol dangling. The lantern swung in Wéry's eyes.

  'Get out of my way,' he snarled, furious with all of them.

  Saboteurs indeed!

  'And run ahead,' he added. 'Rouse up that damned doctor, and get the bottle out of his lips!'

  The wounded man shrieked.

  'Now my man,' said Uhnen beside him. 'Don't you worry. We'll have you down to the doctor, and he'll set you right . . .'

  Other hands were helping now, lifting the head, a trailing foot, anything they could touch or raise. It still seemed to Wéry that he had two thirds of the weight. His grip was not good, but because of the crowd around him he could not stop and adjust himself. He was hobbling down a foreign quayside, carrying a wounded Jew, with the son of an aristocrat on the other side and a crowd of war-scared murderers around him.

  'You know,' gasped Uhnen with false cheerfulness. 'I went – through four years of campaign – never touched a wounded man. Always left the lads to do it. Sorry – about that, now.'

  'You may yet get your fill of it,' grunted Wéry.

  War, war. It was fear of the war that had sent them all running down the alleys after a rumour. They had gone charging off, like green troops into a forest. No wonder someone had got shot! And if he'd had the pistol, he might have fired too.

  The lantern was waiting for them at a door downstream from the New Bridge. The doctor stood in his shirtsleeves in the hallway.

  There was a scrum as the bearers rearranged themselves to carry the victim in. Relieved of the burden, Wéry sank exhausted to the cobbles. Von Uhnen felt unsteadily for the doorway, and disappeared inside. From within came the voices of children, one excited by the bustle, the other complaining her supper had been interrupted. Probably they had cleared the dining room table and dropped the wounded man straight onto it.

  He should think about doctors. They would be needed, if the city were defended. How many were there? Half of them would want to leave if they thought a siege was coming. So there would have to be orders for the gate guards. That would be the very first thing.

  Where should they set up the hospitals?

  He was climbing wearily to his feet when he heard a further disturbance, this time from the New Bridge. More voices, another crowd. For a moment he wondered if they had been drawn by the shooting on the quays. But this hubbub was different. It had a lively and strangely festive sound. As he listened, a cheer broke out. Part of the crowd was crossing the New Bridge. Others, lanterns in hand, were coming down the quayside towards him. Faces appeared at windows. Questions were called.

  'It's peace!' someone in the crowd answered.

  'Peace!' cried a man near Wéry. 'Hurrah!'

  'Peace?' asked Wéry urgently. He seized one of the loudest shouters by the arm. 'What's happened? Tell me what's happened!'

  'The French Count, sir. He went to the Chapter House while they were meeting. He forced his way in through the doors. And he walked up to His Highness on his throne, and went on his knees. And they all thought he would beg to stay, sir. But he begged that we should not fight for him. He said he would leave the city, because he would not see blood spilled in a place that had been so good to him!'

  'His Highness wept, they say, and so did the Count . . .'

  'Hurrah!'

  'Damn me,' said a voice at his elbow. 'I would never have thought d'Erles had it in him.'

  It was Uhnen, emerged from the doctor's house. He was carrying his purse in his hand, and had not stopped to lace it up.

  'A surprise, certainly,' said Wéry hollowly.

  'I suppose we will have to blow up the walls after all.'

  'I suppose we will.'

  And they would not loophole churches, dig up streets, set up makeshift hospitals or commandeer doctors – not this time. The Prince had surrendered.

  At one or two places around the city, the bells of churches had begun to ring.

  Wéry felt a great sense of weariness opening inside him. He did not want to think about the future. If he thought about it he might find there was nothing there. War that became peace in a burst of lanterns and cheering. What was real? Was any of it real? He did not know any more.

  'I've settled here,' said Uhnen, finally putting his purse away. He sounded completely sober.

  'The city justice next?'

  'Not yet. It may be possible to buy off the man he's wounded. But I think we'll leave that to Heiss. He can send his factor to the Jewish elders in the morning.'

  And so Heiss would be relieved of his sins. A sordid little act, to clear a man of his conscience. Wéry sighed.

  'Very well. Let's get along to the barracks, write your story down, and then we can be finished with that, too.'

  'What story?'

  'What you were telling me in the coach.'

  Von Uhnen hesitated.

  'Forget about that,' he said. 'It was nothing.'

  Wéry knew he should not be put off. But . . . he barely cared. He had not come to Erzberg to write grubby little reports on families he knew. In fact, he was no longer sure what he had come here for.

  'Let's go back anyway,' he said. 'There are still those bottles we were going to share between us.'

  'No. No thank you. I've finished for tonight.'

  'Have you? I might have both then.'

  PART IV:

  THE HOUSE OF THE

  GREEN JUDGE

  November 1797–January 1798

  XVIII

  The Plundered Land

  On a mild November day Maria saw the Rhine. It was a great, wide, grey river, flowing steadily northwards at a pace little faster than a man might walk. It seemed to move very gently, past flat fields of grass and plough land, past the gentle slopes freckled with trees and dotted with villages, past the purple, cloudlike shapes of the distant hills. It was a silent weight of water, untroubled by all the tilling and felling, the trading and bickering and blows of the humanity along its banks. Half the history of Christendom had been written on its shores, and it did not care.

  On the far side, in a tumble of roofs and spires, was the city of Mainz, once seat of the most exalted Archbishop and Prince-Elector of the Empire, and Primate of all Germany. The six towered, red sandstone cathedral rose above the buildings of the upper town. The eastern towers were broken, and burned by fire. Other churches and buildings were also ruined. The quays of the waterfront were longer than those of Erzberg, but no more busy. And lines of huge, brown earthworks were visible where the old walls reached the river. Their great shapes dwarfed the buildings, even the cathedral. Altoge
ther the place looked, Maria thought, like a crowd of sad and battered children huddling inside a giant's overcoat. She said so to Anna, who sighed.

  'When I was last here they had not built those things,' she said. 'And the roofs were all whole. And all the south side of the city was a wonderful garden. Really it is such a shame that war should spoil so many things.'

  The coach halted. More earthworks, with great, angled bastions, blocked the way ahead of them. There were soldiers on the gates, wearing the white uniforms of the Empire. Maria looked at them curiously, wondering if they were from some Hapsburg dominion like Austria or Bohemia or Croatia, for she knew that the Emperor had a garrison of his own troops in the town. But they spoke with the accents of the Rhine, and when they saw the seals of Erzberg on the passes they saluted without hesitation. Presumably they were troops of the long-fled Elector of Mainz; suffered to perform the gate-duties while the Emperor's own soldiers lurked within.

  And where was the Elector now? Gone – vanished away to safer territories at the first coming of war. And the revolutionaries of Mainz, who had flourished briefly under the French occupation, were gone too. And all that was left were the soldiers, and the people of the town, the ruins, and the vast fortifications.

  The coach lurched onwards, over the bridge, over the great, slow water. The bridge was built on boats that floated on the stream. Anna said this was so that the central spans could be removed and towed to the bank in the coldest weather, to prevent them from being smashed by the great floes of ice that would come drifting down the river. Maria's window looked downstream. On one side was the bank they were leaving, where the order of the Empire with all its intricate hierarchies still held. On the other was the fortress city, and beyond it the territory held by the French army. That land – she could see it clearly, fields, woods, hills and the city – seemed no different to the eastern bank. And yet there the hierarchies had been swept away. What did the territories of Mainz, Trier, Palatine, Cologne and all the rest mean now? What would become of all those years of history and self-understanding? Surely it was wrong that they should be erased, as though some monstrous teacher had wiped a slate clean! And yet the great, grey river rolled north between the two shores, and cared only for its search for the sea.

  Their journey ended at an inn, in a crowded street where beggar-children yammered at the coach-steps and tall, surly men waded through them to lift down the baggage. The Adelsheim footmen cried out sharply that the luggage must be kept in sight. They had been armed with pistols for the journey, for fear of bandits or French marauders. One of them drew his and brandished it in the air.

  'The poor people!' said Anna wearily, as she, Maria and the maids struggled out of the crowd into the haven of the inn.

  But the innkeeper was anxious to please, and bowed, waving them into a low-ceilinged front room where tables were set. There was a fire here, and sitting before it 'was a lean gentleman in a wig, reading a newspaper. He looked up as they came in.

  'Well, well!' he cried softly. 'Cousin Poppenstahl, at last!'

  'Ludi!' shrieked Anna. She rushed forward to embrace him. He had barely time to rise from his seat before she flung her arms about him and jumped to kiss his cheek. Maria had never seen her so excited. And she felt that, whatever her own reasons for this adventure to the Rhine, it had been right to bring the two cousins back together. Watching as the pair parted, she thought there were even tears in Anna's eyes.

  'Oh Ludi – let me look at you! You are so grey and your cheeks sunk – you have not been ill?'

  'I?' said the gentleman mildly. 'No, I do not believe I have. Forgive me if I am not so young as I was six years ago.'

  'Oh Ludi – no, you must forgive me. I am sure it has been a hard time for you. But we have brought you wines and sweetmeats and . . .'

  'A wonderful range of cures for all ills indeed. But we should not talk of it here. Let your fellows see it is all safely stowed. And if we can whisk it past my French guests tomorrow, why, there will be a dinner party at my house in the evening and we shall all grow young again together.' His eyes went to Maria, and he bowed.

  'Oh – Maria,' said Anna, remembering her etiquette at last. 'This is my cousin, Ludwig Jürich. Ludwig, this is the Lady Maria von Adelsheim, whose mother is so good as to let me be governess to her family.'

  'Lady Maria,' said the man. 'A humble gentleman of the Rhine salutes you. And my house is yours, and all entertainment that I may offer you will be yours for as long as you are pleased to be with us.'

  His speech, as he bent over her hand, was a model of polite deference, as a country gentleman should offer to a lady of superior rank. But then he straightened and looked down at her gravely. His eyes were very deep. For a moment she felt very young, and perhaps a little foolish, like a child with a guilty secret to hide. Many thoughts dashed into her head at once. One of them was that a gentleman should not stare at a lady of rank so. Another was that he was wondering why someone like her should have come to these distressed places. And yet another was that he had already guessed everything that she was thinking.

  What was it he knew, that was so important in Erzberg?

  'Sir,' she heard her own voice say 'Your cousin is, in truth, more of an aunt to me than she is a governess. Therefore I beg that you treat me as one of your family too.'

  'We shall be glad. And also I must offer my deepest condolences to you on the loss of your brother. I did know him, a little, and was grieved to hear that he was killed. I am sorry, too, that it has been so long before I have had the opportunity to say this to his sister.'

  'Sir, you are good. And although it has been long, I feel the loss is still fresh. Therefore any words of condolence are fresh too. Indeed it is in some ways the memory of my brother that has impelled me to come.'

  It was the memory of her brother, and of his friend in the barracks of Erzberg. But she would not say that yet.

  The soldiers on the South Gate were Austrians and there were many more than there had been at the bridgehead. They looked closely at the papers, and asked questions of Cousin Ludwig, who answered patiently. When the coach was allowed to pass, Cousin Ludwig mounted his own horse and rode ahead with his groom. After a few hundred paces they made the coach halt again. Leaning out of her window Maria saw Cousin Ludwig take something from his groom's hand and pin it onto his hat. It was a green cockade. He unbuttoned his coat and flung it back, allowing his green tunic to show. Then he rode ahead on his own, the groom still signing for the coach to wait.

  By a ramshackle set of buildings, a furlong ahead of them, another party of soldiers waited. It was hard to tell the colour of their uniforms. Most of them were wearing greatcoats and blankets, and all were different browns and greys. A wisp of smoke rose from where some of them were cooking in the open.

  Maria looked at them curiously. She knew that any soldiers on the road outside Mainz must be French. She saw Cousin Ludwig ride up to them and dismount. He seemed to show some papers of his own. After a while he and one of the soldiers went inside a hut.

  She waited.

  At long last Cousin Ludwig reappeared, mounted and rode back towards them. He spoke a few words to the coach driver, handed his horse to the groom, and then climbed into the coach, squeezing in to a corner beside the two maids. As the door closed, the team began to walk forward.

  'It would be better to keep back from the windows, I think,' said Cousin Ludwig.

  'Oh dear,' said Anna anxiously. 'Ought we not to draw the curtains too?'

  'No. Let them see that they may see in if they wish to.'

  The coach jolted slowly on its way. Maria sat back as far as she could. She was suddenly very aware of the frail shell of the coach body around her, and aware too of Cousin Ludwig, sitting bolt upright by the coach door with his face all false calm and his fingers drumming lightly on his knee. No one said anything. The rattle of the wheels and the clod of hooves were loud in her ears and seemed to grow louder still. Beyond the window the grassy roadside rolled slowly
backwards. The hummocks and puddles and bushes passed by, repeating and repeating themselves, meaning nothing. Then, for a few seconds, she was looking at something she could recognize: the remains of a formal avenue, all felled and overgrown, running to a ruined pavilion by a weedy pond. They were passing through the gardens of the vanished Elector, now all smashed and half buried by war. The men who had smashed and buried them were waiting for her on the road ahead.

  She was going to them, rolling slowly into their arms with her coachful of hidden sweetmeats, her silks and purses, her friends and herself! Nothing could stop her. Nothing could save her, if she needed saving. Her hand lay on her lap, and she saw that her knuckles were white. And she suddenly felt that she had been sleepwalking for days, dreaming dreams of confidence and courage, and had only woken at last when it was too late, and there was no help, and no turning back.

  How could this have happened to her?

  And then, through the coach window, there was the grey weathered wall of a building, and a man leaning against it. He was bare-headed, moustached and bearded, small and dark-skinned. Maria's heart bounced. She had a powerful impression of something dwarfish, as if the soldier had not marched from France but had crawled out with his fellows from legendary underworlds beneath the Rhine. He was smoking a pipe as he watched the coach pass by. His greatcoat was buttoned to his collar, but in places the buttons were missing. He passed out of sight.

  Now she could see other men, sitting and standing, looking keenly at the windows. One of them seemed to see her. She would have shrunk back, if there had been anywhere to shrink to. A grin was spreading over his face as he was lost from view. A voice called something. It was French, but no French that Maria could understand. Someone laughed. But now the window showed her only grassy hummocks again. And they were still moving forward, deeper and deeper into the occupied Rhineland.

  At last Cousin Ludwig sighed.

  'That was well, then. The officer was a reasonable fellow.'

  'Did you have to bribe him?' asked Anna.

  'Of course. I would have paid him more if he could have escorted us. It would have saved us trouble if we had met any other soldiers. But unfortunately he could not leave his post.'