Clear the Track! A Story of To-day

"Protect the master of Odensburg from his people! I best know how they have been goaded and set against him. If he shows himself now, he is no longer safe among his workmen."

"For Heaven's sake!" cried Cecilia, horrified.

"Fear nothing!" Runeck hastened to assure her. "So long as I stand by his side, no one will come near him. Woe to him who risks it!"

Cecilia had sprung forward: a few minutes before she had believed that she could not pardon her brother's accuser, and now all that supposed hatred was swallowed up in anguish over him, over his life. She flew forward and embraced his arm with both hands.

"Egbert!"

He was in the act of hurrying away, but now stood still as though spellbound.

"Cecilia! Do you call me thus?"

"Do you mean to brave that infuriated mob over there? Oh, you court death!" cried the young widow, beside herself. "Egbert, think of me and my mortal anxiety about you!"

With an impetuous shout of joy, Egbert wanted to draw his beloved to him, but his eye fell upon her mourning garb and upon the grave of his old friend, and he only drew her hand silently to his lips; but a bright ray of happiness lit up his face, as he said softly,

"I will think of it–farewell, Cecilia!" With that he rushed off.

That evening the Odensburg works had been the theater of wild and stormy scenes. The moderation and circumspection with which the officers sought to keep down the angry excitement on the part of the mass of the workmen, and to maintain quiet and order among those dismissed, had been in vain; all was wrecked by the aggressive bearing of that party which Landsfeld secretly guided, and at the head of which stood Fallner here at the works.

To-day the Socialist leader had found it altogether necessary to come himself to Odensburg, a thing that he usually avoided; for he knew this time what was at stake.

Most of the workmen had already come to their senses, more than half of them having determined to resume work on the morrow, and to submit to the conditions of the chief. The effect of this example upon the others was to be foreseen. It was of importance, then, to incite to scenes of violence, cost what it would, in order that reconciliation be made impossible. And in this he had already succeeded.

The works were full of waving, noisy masses of men, who, by way of preliminary, were threatening one another. Fallner and his adherents hurled terms of opprobrium against the opposite party: "Cowards! Traitors! Hounds!" they cried, in a confused medley of invective, and those they attacked were not slow in returning the compliment. They threw it up to their comrades that they had been goaded into insurrection, and that a conclusion had been forced upon them which they had not liked. As yet fists played only a secondary part, but it was felt that a bloody encounter might ensue at any moment, and unchain all the fury of the excited multitude.

In the superintendent's building the officers had to sustain a regular siege. From the now closed workshops and bureaux, the younger ones had taken refuge here with their superiors, who were themselves thoroughly nonplused. The measures taken had proved themselves inefficacious. They were just now consulting as to the wisest thing to do.

CHAPTER XXIV.

A DEED THAT WIPES OUT OLD SCORES

"There is no help for it, we must call in the master," said the director. "He was determined, whether or no, to interfere in case of necessity–I am at my wits' end now."

"For Heaven's sake no!" objected Winning. "He ought not to show himself. He will hardly be in the mood to speak kindly to the people, and if he meets them with asperity, then the worst is to be feared."

"What are those men out there after, anyhow?" cried Dr. Hagenbach, who was likewise present, because he feared that his medical services might be needed. "Whom are they threatening? Herr Dernburg? Us? Or are they quarreling among themselves?"

"I presume they themselves know least of all," replied the upper-engineer. "You may depend, their leader Landsfeld is at the bottom of it. He is to be in Odensburg to-day, when we may certainly expect matters to take a grave aspect."

"So much the less can I assume any longer the responsibility all by myself," declared the director. "I shall tell our chief that we are no longer masters of the situation. He can then do what he chooses."

He started for the telephone, when all of a sudden the noise ceased. He hushed quite suddenly, only a few individual voices being heard; then these too were silent and a deathlike silence prevailed. The officers hurried to the window, in order to see what was going on.

"There is the master!" exclaimed Winning. "I thought that he would appear without summons, if he heard that tumult."

"But how he does look!" added Hagenbach, in a whisper. "I fear that nature will give way."

"Let us open the doors, so that he can retreat here in case of necessity," said the director, who had likewise come up. "He is quite alone, not even Wildenrod is with him. We must go to him! Quick, gentlemen!"

The doors were opened that had been locked from the inside, but the officers could neither reach their chief, nor he them–a dense mass of men stood between, and held the square before the house. The attempt of the director and his colleagues, to break through this living wall, was vain–the workmen standing nearest assumed so threatening an attitude, the gentlemen desisted, so as not to tempt to a deed of violence that would have immediately reacted against Dernburg.

He had made use of the little by-path that led from the Manor to the superintendent's building, without going near the works. Nobody had seen his approach, and now he suddenly stood among his workmen as if he had sprung from the ground. The whole force of his personal presence was shown at this moment–his bare appearance had the most subduing effect upon the just now fiercely excited multitude, who suddenly stood, as it were, spellbound. All eyes were directed toward that tall form, with darkly knitted eyebrows; all waited for the first word from his mouth. His glance slowly swept over the crowd that he had once swayed by a single nod, and who now withstood him thus. Still he spoke not, for it seemed as though utterance had failed him.

Unfortunately it happened that Landsfeld, with Fallner, was in immediate proximity to him. There, in front of the superintendent's building, where they had cooped in the officers, the rashest of his followers had found themselves together, the Socialist leader had taken his stand. Dernburg's appearance seemed to him to be neither surprising nor undesired; on the contrary, there flashed into his eyes a look as of satisfaction, as he whispered to Fallner, who was constantly at his side, as a sort of adjutant:

"There is the old man! I knew that he would not stay quietly at home while the devil was to pay over at his works. Now the ball begins to roll!"

Finally Dernburg began to speak: his voice was loud and firm, and the deep silence round about caused every word to be distinctly heard.

"What means this noise here at the works? There is no reason for it. You gave warning, and I have had the workshops closed and shall keep them closed. You have been paid your wages, so now go home!"

The workmen were startled; they had been accustomed to their chiefs speaking shortly and dictatorially, but this cold, contemptuous tone they heard from his lips now for the first time. They felt it at once, without being able exactly to account for it.

Now Landsfeld deemed that the hour had come for his personal interference. "You and the rest follow me," was his brief command to Fallner, and then, without further ceremony, he turned to Dernburg.

"The question here is not one of pay," he began, with insolent mien. "What the workmen want of you, Herr Dernburg, they have already communicated to you. Those unjust dismissals are to–"

"Who are you? Who gives you the right to put in a word here?" interrupted Dernburg, although he knew the speaker by sight as well as that person knew him.

"My name is Landsfeld," was the haughty reply. "I think that suffices for my justification."

"Intermeddling from without I do not brook. Leave Odensburg on the spot!"

This order sounded proud and contemptuous. Landsfeld retired a step and measured from head to foot the man who stood before him, unsupported, and yet dared to speak thus.

"Such an order I shall not heed," answered he, scornfully. "I stand here in the name of my party, which Odensburg matters very nearly concern. Comrades! do you recognize me as your proxy? Am I to speak for you?"

Fallner and his men, who had followed their leader and encircled him on all sides, answered with stormy approval, while the others remained silent. Landsfeld triumphantly raised his head.

"You hear it! I tell you, then, that the conditions imposed by you before the resumption of work are shameful and degrading. I declare the man that submits to them to be a coward and traitor."

"And I declare that I have nothing to do with you or the like of you," cried Dernburg, extremely provoked by this challenge. "I made conditions for my workmen, to whom alone I shall re-open the works–with men of your stamp I have nothing at all to do."

Landsfeld started up, enraged. "With men of my stamp? We are indeed only worms in the eyes of this high and mighty lord? Comrades! do you put up with this?"

He did not appeal in vain to his comrades. Abusive words and threats were hurled at Dernburg, who was ever more closely wedged in by the mob. Cut off from any assistance, at any instant he might look for the worst.

Then were heard in the distance loud clamor and shouts, not of a fierce and menacing kind, though, but as if some one was being joyfully received, Now they could even distinguish an enthusiastic "huzza" that was loud and long-drawn-out, and continually came nearer. "Long live Runeck! Long live Egbert Runeck!" sounded from all quarters, and, through the midst of the densely-packed masses, a way was opened for the engineer, who rapidly drew near.

Breathless from his impetuous walk, he placed himself by Dernburg's side with an air that showed plainly enough that he was determined to stand by him and fall with him. He looked defiance at Landsfeld, who returned his glance with a scornful shrug of the shoulders.

"Are you actually here, my dear fellow?" he murmured. "If you will break your own neck, then I need not do it for you."

Runeck, meanwhile, had taken a rapid survey of the situation; he recognized its peril, and seized the sole means that had promise of safety.

"Back from the house!" was his order to the workmen who held the superintendent's office beleaguered. "Do you not see that Herr Dernburg wants to get to his officers? I'll escort him; make room!"