Chapter 3

But he came back. And when Daniel’s mind and body were both completely broken down and he was obliged to remain in bed, his visits became regular. He sat next to Benda, for Benda had taken to calling on Daniel now every day and staying with him until late at night. But Daniel grew quieter and quieter. Sometimes he would make no reply at all to Benda’s remarks or questions.

The Goose Man came in behind Dr. Dingolfinger and stood on tiptoes, as curious as curious could be, and looked over his arm when he wrote out his prescriptions. The Goose Man was a little fellow: he hardly reached up to the doctor’s hips.

He hopped around Agnes when she cooked the soup and expressed his sympathy for her; she looked so pale. Though only thirteen years old, there was the worried look of a mature woman in her face; she would cast her eyes around the room as if trying to catch a glance of human love in the eyes of another person; her looks were timid and stealthy. “Some one should be caring for her too,” said the Goose Man, shaking his head, “some one should be making a good, warm soup for her.”

Though it would be unfair to say that the Goose Man was offensively concerned, he seemed to be interested in everything that was going on in the house. When the officials of the fire department came to cross-question Daniel about the fire, he became angry and gruff, and did not wish to let them in. “Give the poor man some rest, some peace, after all these years of suffering,” he implored, “give him time to collect himself and to meditate on what has taken place.” And in fact the members of the fire department left as soon as possible; they did not stay long.

The Goose Man was always in a cheerful humour, always ready for a good joke. At times he would whistle softly, and smooth out the wrinkles in his doublet. There was a certain amount of rustic shyness about him, but his affability, his good manners, and his child-like cheerfulness removed any unpleasant impression this rusticity might otherwise have made. He generally spoke the dialect of Nuremberg, though when with Daniel he never spoke anything but the most correct and chosen High German. His natural, acquired culture and the wealth of his vocabulary were really amazing.

Ten times a day at least he would scamper into the room where little Gottfried was sleeping and express his admiration for the pretty child. “How you are to be envied to have such a living creature crawling and sprawling around in your home!” he said to Daniel. And in course of time Daniel actually came to have a new affection for the child.

As soon as the Goose Man felt perfectly at home in Daniel’s house, he took to bringing his two geese along with him. He would place them very circumspectly in a corner of the room. One evening he was sitting playing with them, when the bell rang. Andreas Döderlein stormed in, and demanded that some one tell him where his daughter was.

“Upon my word and honour! An old acquaintance of mine!” said the Goose Man, laughing and blinking. “I see him nowadays in the café much more frequently than is good for his health.”

“I must urgently request you to control yourself,” said Benda, turning to Andreas Döderlein, and pointed to the bed in which Daniel was lying.

“My daughter is not a bad woman. Let people overburdened with credulity believe that she is bad,” cried Döderlein, with the expression and in the tone and gesture of the royal Lear, and shook his Olympian locks. “The fact is that violence has been practised on her; she has been driven into ruin! Men have stolen the sweet love of my dearly beloved daughter through the use of vile tricks and artifices. Where is she, the unfortunate, betrayed child? With what is she clothing her nakedness, and how is she finding food and shelter—shelter in a world of wicked men?”

A strange thing happened: the Goose Man took the gigantic arm of the Olympian, put his mouth to his beefy ear, and, with a sad and reproachful look on his face, whispered something to him. Döderlein turned red and then pale, looked down at the floor, and went away with heavy, rumbling step but silent lips. The Goose Man folded his arms across his breast, and looked at Döderlein thoughtfully.

“He is said to have taken to drinking,” remarked Benda, “is said to be living a wild, dissipated life. It seems incredible to me. The Döderleins are generally content to stroll in lust along the banks of the slimy sea of vice and let other people fall in. The Döderleins are born in false ermine, and they die in false ermine.”

“And yet he is a human being,” said the Goose Man, so that only Daniel could hear him.

Daniel sighed.