Just Sixteen. Read online

  A CHILD OF THE SEA FOLK.

  The great storm of 1430 had done its worst. For days the tempest hadraged on land and sea, and when at last the sun struggled through theclouds, broken now and flying in angry masses before the strong seawind, his beams revealed a scene of desolation.

  All along the coast of Friesland the dikes were down, and the salt waterwashing over what but a few days before had been vegetable-gardens andfertile fields. The farm-houses on the higher ground stood each on itsown little island as it were, with shallow waves breaking against thewalls of barns and stoned sheepfolds lower down on the slopes. Alreadybusy hands were at work repairing the dykes. Men in boats were wading upto their knees in mud and water, men, swimming their horses across thedeeper pools, were carrying materials and urging on the work, but manydays must pass before the damage could be made good; and meanwhile, howwere people to manage for food and firing, with the peat-stacks underwater, and the cabbages and potatoes spoiled by the wet?

  "There is just this one thing," said Metje Huyt to her sisterJacqueline. "Little Karen shall have her cup of warm milk to-night ifeverybody else goes without supper; on that I am determined."

  "That will be good, but how canst thou manage it?" asked Jacqueline, agentle, placid girl of sixteen, with a rosy face and a plait of thick,fair hair hanging down to her waist. Metje was a year younger, but sheruled her elder sister with a rod of iron by virtue of her superioractivity and vivacity of mind.

  "I shall manage it in this way,--I shall milk the Electoral Princess."

  "But she is drowned," objected Jacqueline, opening wide a pair ofsurprised blue eyes.

  "Drowned? Not at all. She is on that little hump of land over therewhich looks like an island, but is really Neighbor Livard's highclover-patch. I mean to row out and milk her, and thou shalt go withme."

  "Art thou sure that it is the Electoral Princess, and not any othercow?" asked Jacqueline.

  "Sure? Have I not a pair of eyes in my head? Sure? Don't I know thetwist of our own cow's horns? Oh, Jacque, Jacque,--what were thy bluesaucers given thee for? Thee never seemest to use them to purpose.However, come along. Karen must not want for her milk any longer. Themother was making some gruel-water for her when I came away, and Karendid not like it, and was crying."

  Some wading was necessary to reach the row-boat, which fortunately hadbeen dragged up to the great barn for repairs before the storm began,and so had escaped the fate which had befallen most of the other boatsin the neighborhood,--of being swept out to sea in the reflux of thefirst furious tide. The barn was surrounded by water now, but it wasnowhere more than two or three inches deep. And pulling off their woodenshoes, the sisters splashed through it with merry laughter. Like mostFriesland maidens, they were expert with the oar, and, though the waveswere still rough, they made their way without trouble to the wet greenslope where the Electoral Princess was grazing, raising her head fromtime to time to utter a long melancholy moo of protest at the long delayof her milkers. Very glad was she to see the girls, and she rubbed herhead contentedly against Jacqueline's shoulder while Metje, with gentle,skilful fingers, filled the pail with foaming milk.

  "Now stay quietly and go on eating Friend Livard's clover, since nobetter may be," she said, patting the cow's red side. "The water isgoing down, the dikes are rebuilding, presently we will come and takethee back to the home field. Meanwhile each day Jacque and I will rowout and milk thee; so be a good cow and stay contentedly where thouart."

  "What can that be?" Jacqueline asked after the sisters had proceeded ashort distance on their homeward way.

  "What?"

  "That thing over there;" and she pointed toward a distant pool somequarter of a mile from them and still nearer to the sea. "It lookslike--like--oh! Metje, do you think it can be some one who has beendrowned?"

  "No,--for it moves,--it lifts its arm," said Metje, shading her eyesfrom the level rays of the sun, and looking steadily seaward.

  "It is a girl! She is caught by the tide in the pool. Row, Jacqueline,row! the tide turns in half an hour, and then she will be drownedindeed. The water was very deep out there last night when the flood wasfull; I heard Voorst say so."

  The heavy boat flew forward, for the sisters bent to the oars with alltheir strength. Jacqueline turned her head from time to time, to judgeof their direction and the distance.

  "It's no neighbor," she answered as they drew nearer. "It's no one Iever saw before. Metje, it is the strangest-looking maiden you ever saw.Her hair is long,--so long, and her face is wild to look upon. I amafraid."

  "Never mind her hair. We must save her, however long it is," gaspedMetje, breathless from the energy of her exertions. "Steady, now,Jacque, here we are; hold the boat by the reeds. Girl! I say, girl, doyou hear me? We are come to help you."

  The girl, for a girl it was who half-sat, half-floated in the pool,raised herself out of the water as one alive, and stared at the sisterswithout speaking. She was indeed a wild and strange-looking creature,quite different from any one that they had ever seen before.

  "Well, are you not going to get into the boat?" cried Metje; "are youdeaf, maiden, that you do not answer me? You'll be drowned presently,though you swam like forty fishes, for the tide will be coming in likefury through yon breach in the dike. Here, let me help you; give me yourhand."

  The strange girl did not reply, but she seemed to understand a part, atleast, of what was said to her. She moaned, her face contracted as ifwith pain, and, raising herself still farther from the water with aneffort, she indicated by signs that she was caught in the mud at thebottom of the pool and could not set herself free.

  This was a serious situation, for, as Metje well knew, the mud was deepand adhesive. She sat a moment in thought; then she took her oar, forcedthe boat still nearer, and, directing Jacqueline to throw her weight onthe farther edge to avoid an upset, she grasped the cold hands which thestranger held out, and, exerting her full strength, drew her from themud and over the side of the boat. It rocked fearfully under herweight, the milk splashed from the pail, but the danger was over in halfa minute, and the rescued girl, exhausted and half-dead, lay safely onthe bottom.

  "Dear me, she will freeze," cried Jacqueline hastily; for the poor thingthey had saved was without clothing, save for the long hair which hungabout her like a mantle. "Here, Metje, I can spare my cloak to wrapround her limbs, and she must put on thy jacket. We will row the harderto keep ourselves warm."

  Rowing hard was indeed needful, for, summer as it was, the wind, as thesun sank, blew in icy gusts from the Zetland Zee, whirling the saillesswindmills rapidly round, and sending showers of salt spray over thewalls of the sheepfolds and other outlying enclosures. The sisters werethoroughly chilled before they had pulled the boat up to a place ofsafety and helped the half-drowned stranger across the wet slope ofgrass to the house door.

  Their mother was looking out for them.

  "Where hast thou been, children?" she asked. "Ach!" with a look ofsatisfaction as Metje slipped the handle of the milk-pail between herfingers. "That is well! Little Karen was wearying for her supper. Butwho hast thou here?" looking curiously at the odd figure whom herdaughters were supporting.

  "Oh, mother, it is a poor thing that we saved from drowning in that poolover there," explained Metje, pointing seaward. "She is a stranger, fromfar away it must be, for she understands not our speech, and answersnothing when we ask her questions."

  "Dear me! what should bring a stranger here at this stormy time? Butwhoever she is, she must needs be warmed and fed." And the good Vrowhurried them all indoors, where a carefully economized fire of peats wasburning. The main stock of peats was under water still, and it behoovedthem to be careful of what remained, the father had said.

  "We shall have to lend her some clothes," said Metje in an embarrassedtone. "Hers must have been lost in the water somehow."

  "Perhaps she went in to bathe, and the tide carried them away,"suggested Jacqueline.

  "Bathe! In a tempest such as there has not bee
n in my time! Bathe! Thouart crazed, child! It is singular, most singular. I don't like it!"muttered the puzzled mother. "Well, what needs be must be. Go and fetchthy old stuff petticoat, Metje, and one of my homespun shifts, andthere's that old red jacket of Jacqueline's, she must have that, Isuppose. Make haste, before the father comes in."

  It was easier to fetch the clothes than to persuade the strange girl toput them on. She moaned, she resisted, she was as awkward and ill atease as though she had never worn anything of the sort before. Now thatthey scanned her more closely there seemed something very unusual abouther make. Her arms hung down,--like flippers, Metje whispered to hersister. She stumbled when she tried to walk alone; it seemed as thoughher feet, which looked only half developed, could scarcely support herweight.

  For all that, when she was dressed, with her long hair dried, braided,and bound with a scarlet ribbon, there was something appealing andattractive in the poor child's face. She seemed to like the fire, andcowered close to it. When milk was offered her, she drank with avidity;but she would not touch the slice of black bread which Metje brought,and instead caught up a raw shell-fish from a pail full which Voorsthad scooped out of the pool of sea-water which covered what had been thecabbage-bed, and ate it greedily. The mother looked grave as she watchedher, and was troubled in her mind.

  "She seems scarce human," she whispered to Metje, drawing her to adistant corner; though indeed they might have spoken aloud with no fearof being understood by the stranger, who evidently knew no Dutch. "Sheis like no maiden that ever I saw."

  "Perhaps she is English," suggested Metje, who had never seen any onefrom England, but had vaguely heard that it was an odd country quitedifferent from Friesland.

  The mother shook her head: "She is not English. I have seen one Englishthat time that thy father and I went to Haarlem about thy grand-uncle'sinheritance. It was a woman, and she was not at all like this girl.Metje, but that thou wouldst laugh, and Father Pettrie might reprove mefor vain imaginations, I should guess her to be one of those mermaidensof whom our forefathers have told us. There are such creatures,--mymother's great-aunt saw one with her own eyes, and wrote it down, andmy mother kept the paper. Often have I read it over. It was off theTexel."

  "Could she really be that? Why, it would be better--more interesting, Imean--than to have her an Englishwoman," cried Metje. "We would teachher to spin, to knit. She should go with us to church and learn the Ave.Would it not be a good and holy work, mother, to save the soul of a poorwild thing from the waves where they know not how to pray?"

  "Perhaps," replied the Vrow, doubtfully. She could not quite accustomherself to her own suggestion, yet could not quite dismiss it from hermind.

  The father and Voorst now came in, and supper, delayed till after itsusual time by the pressing needs of the stranger, must be got ready inhaste.

  Metje fell to slicing the black loaf, Jacqueline stirred the porridge,while the mother herself presided over the pot of cabbage-soup which hadbeen stewing over the fire since early morning. Voorst, meanwhile,having nothing to do but to wait, sat and looked furtively at thestrange girl. She did not seem to notice him, but remained motionless inthe chimney-corner, only now and then giving a startled sudden glanceabout the room, like some wild creature caught in a trap. Voorst thoughthe had never seen anything so plaintive as her large, frightened eyes,or so wonderful as the thick plait of hair which, as she sat, lay on theground, and was of the strangest pale color, like flax on which agreenish reflection is accidentally thrown. It was no more like Metje'sruddy locks, or the warm fairness of Jacqueline's braids, than moonlightis like dairy butter, he said to himself.

  Supper ready, Metje took the girl's hand and led her to the table. Shesubmitted to be placed on a wooden stool, and looked curiously at thebowl of steaming broth which was set before her; but she made no attemptto eat it, and seemed not to know the use of her spoon. Metje tried toshow her how to hold it, but she only moaned restlessly, and, as soon asthe family moved after the father had pronounced the Latin grace whichFather Pettrie taught all his flock to employ, she slipped from her seatand stumbled awkwardly across the floor toward the fire, which seemed tohave a fascination for her.

  "Poor thing! she seems unlearnt in Christian ways," said Goodman Huyt;but later, when his wife confided to him her notion as to thestranger's uncanny origin, he looked perplexed, crossed himself, andsaid he would speak to the priest in the morning. It was no time forfetching heathen folk into homes, he remarked, still less those who weremore fish than folk; as for mermaids, if such things there might be,they were no better in his opinion than dolphins or mackerel, and he didnot care to countenance them.

  Father Pettrie was duly consulted. He scouted the mermaid theory, and,as the Vrow had foreboded, gave her a reprimand for putting such ideasinto the mind of her family.

  The girl was evidently a foreigner from some far distant country, hesaid, a Turk it might be, or a daughter of that people, descended fromIshmael, who held rule in the land of the Holy Sepulchre. All the moreit became a duty to teach her Christian ways and bring her into the truefold; and he bade Goodman Huyt to keep her till such time as her friendsshould be found, to treat her kindly, and make sure that she was broughtregularly to church and taught religion and her duty.

  There was no need of this admonition as to kindness. Vrow Huyt couldhardly have used a stray dog less than tenderly. And for Jacqueline andMetje, they looked upon the girl as their own special property, and wereonly in danger of spoiling her with over-indulgence. "Ebba," they calledher, as they knew no name by which to address her, and in course of timeshe learned to recognize it as hers and to answer to it,--answer bylooks and signs, that is, for she never learned to speak, or to makeother sound than inarticulate moans and murmurs, except a wild sort oflaughter, and now and then, when pleased and contented, a low hummingnoise like an undeveloped song. From these the family could guess at hermood, from her expressive looks and gestures they made shift tounderstand her wishes, and she, in turn, comprehended their meaning halfby observation, half by instinct; but closer communication was notpossible, and the lack of a common speech was a barrier between themwhich neither she nor they could overcome.

  Gradually "Dumb Ebba," as the neighbors called her, was taught some ofthe thrifty household arts in which Dame Huyt excelled. She learned tospin, and though less expertly, to knit, and could be trusted to stirwhatever was set upon the fire to cook, and not let it burn or boilover. When the family went to mass, she went too, limping along withpainful slowness on her badly-formed feet, and she bowed her head andknelt with the rest, but how much or how little she understood theycould not tell. Except on Sundays she never left the house. Her firstattempts at doing so were checked by Metje, who could not dismiss fromher memory what her mother had said, and was afraid to let her charge somuch as look toward the tempting blue waves which shone in the distance;and after a while Ebba seemed to realize that she was, so to speak, akindly treated captive, and resigned herself to captivity. Little Karenwas the only creature whom she played with; sometimes when busied withthe child she was noticed to smile, but for every one else her faceremained pitifully sad, and she never lost the look of a wild,imprisoned thing.

  So two years passed, and still Dumb Ebba remained, unclaimed by friendsor kindred, one of the friendly Huyt household. The dikes were longsince rebuilt, the Electoral Princess had come back to her ownpasture-ground and fed there contentedly in company with two of her owncalves, but the poor sea-stray whom Metje had pulled into the boat thatstormy night remained speechless, inscrutable, a mystery and aperplexity to her adopted family.

  But now a fresh interest arose to rival Ebba's claims on theirattention. A wooer came for pretty Jacqueline. It was young Hans Polder,son of a thrifty miller in the neighborhood, and himself owner of one ofthe best windmills in that part of Friesland. Jacqueline was not hard towin, the wedding-day was set, and she, Metje, and the mother were busyfrom morning till night in making ready the store of household linenwhich was the marriage p
ortion of all well-to-do brides. Ebba's serviceswith the wheel were also put into requisition; and part of her spinning,woven into towels, which, after a fancy of Metje's, had a pattern oflittle fish all over them, were known for generations as "the Mermaid'stowels." But this is running far in advance of my story.

  Amid this press of occupation Ebba was necessarily left to herself morethan formerly, and some dormant sense of loneliness, perhaps, made herturn to Voorst as a friend. He had taken a fancy to her at thefirst,--the sort of fancy which a manly youth sometimes takes to ahelpless child,--and had always treated her kindly. Now she grew tofeel for him a degree of attachment which she showed for no one else. Inthe evening, when tired after the day's fishing he sat half asleep bythe fire, she would crouch on the floor beside him, watching his everymovement, and perfectly content if, on waking, he threw her a word orpatted her hair carelessly. She sometimes neglected to fill the father'sglass or fetch his pipe, but never Voorst's; and she heard his footstepscoming up from the dike long before any one else in the house couldcatch the slightest footfall.

  The strict watch which the family had at first kept over their singularinmate had gradually relaxed, and Ebba was suffered to go in and out ather will. She rarely ventured beyond the house enclosure, however, butwas fond of sitting on the low wall of the sheep-fold and looking off atthe sea, which, now that the flood had subsided, was at a long distancefrom the house. And at such moments her eyes looked larger, wilder, andmore wistful than ever.

  As the time for the wedding drew near, Voorst fell into the way ofabsenting himself a good deal from home. There were errands to be done,he said, but as these "errands" always took him over to the littleisland of Urk, where lived a certain pretty Olla Tronk, who wasJacqueline's great friend and her chosen bridesmaiden, the sistersnaturally teased him a good deal about them. Ebba did not, of course,understand these jokings, but she seemed to feel instinctively thatsomething was in the air. She grew restless, the old unhappy moan cameback to her lips; only when Voorst was at home did she seem morecontented.

  Three days before the marriage, Olla arrived to help in the lastpreparations. She was one of the handsomest girls in the neighborhood,and besides her beauty was an heiress; for her father, whose only childshe was, owned large tracts of pasture on the mainland, as well as thegreater part of the island of Urk, where he had a valuable dairy. Thefamily crowded to the door to welcome Olla. She came in with Voorst, whohad rowed over to Urk for her,--tall, blooming, with flaxen tresseshanging below her waist, and a pair of dancing hazel eyes fringed withlong lashes. Voorst was almost as good looking in his way,--they made avery handsome couple.

  "And this must be the stranger maiden of whom Voorst has so often toldme," said Olla after the first greetings had been exchanged. She smiledat Ebba, and tried to take her hand, but the elfish creature frowned,retreated, and, when Olla persisted, snatched her hand away with anangry gesture and put it behind her back.

  "Why does she dislike me so?" asked Olla, discomfited and grieved, forshe had meant to be kind.

  "Oh, she doesn't dislike thee, she couldn't!" cried peace-lovingJacqueline.

  But Ebba did dislike Olla, though no one understood why. She wouldneither go near nor look at her if she could help it, and when, in theevening, she and Voorst sat on the doorstep talking together in lowtones, Ebba hastened out, placed herself between them, and tried to pushOlla away, uttering pitiful little wailing cries.

  "What does ail her?" asked Jacqueline. Metje made no answer, but shelooked troubled. She felt that there was sorrow ahead for Ebba or forVoorst, and she loved them both.

  The wedding-day dawned clear and cloudless, as a marriage-day should.Jacqueline in her bravery of stiff gilded head-dress with its longscarf-like veil, her snowy bodice, and necklace of many-colored beads,was a dazzling figure. Olla was scarcely less so, and she blushed anddimpled as Voorst led her along in the bridal procession. Ebba walkedbehind them. She, too, had been made fine in a scarlet bodice and agrand cap with wings like that which Metje wore, but she did not seem tocare that she was so well dressed. Her sad eyes followed the forms ofOlla and Voorst, and as she limped painfully along after them, shemoaned continually to herself, a low, inarticulate, wordless murmur likethe sound of the sea.

  Following the marriage-mass came the marriage-feast. Goodman Huyt sat atthe head of the table, the mother at the foot, and, side by side, thenewly-wedded pair. Opposite them sat Voorst and Olla. His expression oftriumphant satisfaction, and her blushes and demurely-contented glances,had not been unobserved by the guests; so no one was very much surprisedwhen, in the midst of the festivity, the father rose, and knocked withhis tankard on the table to insure silence.

  "Neighbors and kinsfolk, one marriage maketh another, saith the oldproverb, and we are like to prove it a true one. I hereby announce that,with consent of parents on both sides, my son Voorst is troth-plightwith Olla the daughter of my old friend Tronk who sits here,"--slappingTronk on the shoulder,--"and I would now ask you to drink with me ahigh-health to the young couple." Suiting the action to the word, hefilled the glass with Hollands, raised it, pronounced the toast, "AHigh-Health to Voorst Huyt and to his bride Olla Tronk," and swallowedthe spirits at a draught.

  Ebba, who against her will had been made to sit at the board among theother guests, had listened to this speech with no understanding of itsmeaning. But as she listened to the laughter and applause which followedit, and saw people slapping Voorst on the back with loud congratulationsand shaking hands with Olla, she raised her head with a flash ofinterest. She watched Voorst rise in his place with Olla by his side,while the rest reseated themselves; she heard him utter a few sentences.What they meant she knew not; but he looked at Olla, and when, afterdraining his glass, he turned, put his arm round Olla's neck, drew herhead close to his own, and their lips met in a kiss, some meaning of theceremony seemed to burst upon her. She started from her seat, for onemoment she stood motionless with dilated eyes and parted lips, then shegave a long wild cry and fled from the house.

  "What is the matter? Who screamed?" asked old Huyt, who had observednothing.

  "It is nothing. The poor dumb child over there," answered his wife.

  Metje looked anxiously at the door. The duties of hospitality held herto her place. "She will come in presently and I will comfort her," shethought to herself.

  But Ebba never "came in" again. When Metje was set free to search, alltrace of her had vanished. As suddenly and mysteriously as she had comeinto their lives she had passed out of them again. No one had seen hergo forth from the door, no trace could be found of her on land or sea.Only an old fisherman, who was drawing his nets that day at a littledistance from the shore, averred that just after high noon he hadnoticed a shape wearing a fluttering garment like that of a woman passslowly over the ridge of the dike just where it made a sudden curve tothe left. He had had the curiosity to row that way after his net wassafely pulled in, for he wanted to see if there was a boat lying there,or what could take any one to so unlikely a spot; but neither boat norwoman could be found, and he half fancied that he must have fallenasleep in broad daylight and dreamed for a moment.

  However that might be, Ebba was gone; nor was anything ever known of heragain. Metje mourned her loss, all the more that Jacqueline's departureleft her with no mate of her own age in the household. Little Karencried for "Ebbe" for a night or two, the Vrow missed her aid in thespinning, but Voorst, absorbed in his happiness, scarcely noted herabsence, and Olla was glad.

  Gradually she grew to be a tradition of the neighborhood, handed downfrom one generation to another even to this day, and nobody ever knewwhence she came or where she went, or whether it was a mortal maiden orone of the children of the strange, solemn sea folk who was cast socuriously upon the hands of the kindly Friesland family and dwelt intheir midst for two speechless years.

  NOTE.--The tradition on which this story is founded, and which is still held as true in some parts of Friesland, is referred to by Parival in his book, "Les Deli
ces de Hollande."