The Quest

"Men, even if this were so, would it be well that you should always be told it? Would it not make of you conceited fools? Would not the reality revenge itself frightfully upon yourselves, and upon those fawners and flatterers?

"It is, instead, falsehood and conceit.

"You would not rule the world better – you have neither the wisdom nor the charity to do so. You are no more worthy of pity than are your oppressors, for when they injure your bodies they injure also their own souls. The rich are in paths more perilous than are the poor, and it is always better to suffer wrong than to commit it.

"The good things of the earth do not yet belong to you, for you would make the same misuse of them as do those against whom you are being incited.

"Wage war, and desist not until death; but the war of the righteous against the unrighteous, of the wise and charitable against the stupid and sensual. And question not whence come your companions in arms, for you are not the only unhappy ones, you are not alone merciful among men, and good-will and uprightness are not the exclusive possessions of the poor."

Although it seemed to Johannes that Markus' voice was not so wonderfully impressive as at other times, the people had become very attentive. And when he stopped, and sat down without having made a particularly oratorical or cumulative close, they all were still for many seconds. But not a foot stamped, not a hand stirred.

And this very silence made Dr. Felbeck angry.

"Comrades," he began, in his most scornful manner, with an envious, nasal twang in his voice, "we do net need to ask whence the wind blows. This is one more of that obsolete little band of old-fashioned, bourgeois idealists who wish to reform the world with tracts and sermons, and to keep the toilers content in subjection and resignation. Laborers, have you not, I ask, practised patience long enough? Have you, then, no right to the pleasures of life? Must you fill the hungry stomachs of your little ones with palaver about wisdom and charity?"

"No, no!" roared the crowd, freed instantly from the spell of respect under which for a moment they had been held.

"Do not let yourselves be befogged by those tedious maunderings that would reason away the strife of the classes. Oh, true! To such the gentlemen of the safety-box listen eagerly enough, for they are, oh, so afraid of the War of the Classes! But if they were to hear this gentleman talk, they would shout their approval. Take notice, this gentleman will do much to further it. Of course, they have his medal all ready for him."

"And a pension," said Hakkema, while the audience laughed.

"He is an unfrocked priest," said he in the Manchester suit.

"Damn ye, are ye a workman?" cried a voice at the back of the hall. "And do ye mean to say it's my fault that my children perish with hunger, and not the fault of those cursed blood-suckers? You 're a God-forsaken hypocrite, no laborer!"

Markus sat very still, gazing straight before him into the flame of a gas-jet. But Johannes saw that he was deathly pale, and that his eyes seemed to sink deeper into their sockets. Beads of perspiration were standing on his temples.

Hakkema stood up.

"Now I chance to know, fellow-laborers, that this man has escaped from a madhouse. That is a mitigating circumstance. Otherwise," Hakkema went on, drawing his clenched hand from his pocket, and thrusting it out in front of him, "otherwise I would have my fist at his jaw, and ask him if he had no feeling at all in his accursed carcass, that he begrudged the laborer his pittance of the good things of life. It's an enormous amount of pleasure, isn't it – glorious pleasure – you've been able to get on two hundred cents a day!"

"You cad!" cried the young typographer, to Markus – the very same youth who had recited the poem about Golgotha.

"I'll invite you sometime to my home – with my six children, and a seventh one coming, and the clothes in the pawn-shop, and no warm food for three days – then you can see what a fine time of it the laborer has."

"Vile, hateful traitor!" "Hireling socialist!" "I'll ring yer neck for ye!" "I'll guzzle yer blood, ye hateful cur!" Such cries as these rang from various sides, and the uproar steadily increased.

The man in the brown suit shrieked invectives without cessation – "Cad! Carrion! Thief!" and the worst ones he could think of; while, in his excitement, the tears ran down his pale, drawn cheeks.

The din was deafening.

Johannes clenched his fists, and stared at the pale, passionate faces with their evil, flashing glances, which threatened them on every side. He saw Marjon beside him, her eyes distended with terror. Markus sat immovable. The drops of moisture were so thick upon his forehead and cheeks that Johannes took his handkerchief and wiped them away.

Jan van Tijn stood up, but he felt he could do nothing to stem that tide. He began, "Say, are you people – " But he was shouted down, with threats of a broken head; and already fists and chairs were upraised.

Then the chief gave the signal, for which the police had so long waited, and declared in a hard, impartial voice that the place must be vacated. And this work was expedited, with the calm satisfaction of officials who had indeed hoped that matters would end thus – as usual.

The Roodhuis family and the Van Tijns remained with Markus, while Johannes and Marjon were a little in the rear. Roodhuis and Van Tijn wished, they said, to protect Markus if he should need their help. Markus said, "No need."

"Please, Markus," pleaded Van Tijn, "don't think it means so much. I know the workmen. They fly off the handle so easily, but by morning they'll shriek something else. They're not so bad – only a bit rough, you know – sort o' half wild yet. Will ye believe me, Markus, and not despise 'em for't, nor turn yer back on 'em for't, Markus?"

"No, Jan, surely not, if only I have the strength," said Markus, in a hoarse, unsteady voice.

XX

One chilly autumn day, the three sat together in a gloomy bar-room, just as formerly they had done in the small mining town. And, also, the fourth one was there, but in a pitiable condition.

Keesje lay in Markus' lap, under a covering of faded, old red baize. His little black face was as full of folds as an old shoe, his body wasted away, and he was panting and gasping for breath. A hairy little arm came out from under the red baize, and a long, slim black hand clasped Markus' thumb; and whenever Markus had occasion to use his hand, one could see the little black monkey-hand stretch out and feel around, while the brown eyes looked restlessly backward, as if now all safety were gone.

They were in the total-abstainers' coffee-house, for Roodhuis continued to proffer hospitality to Markus, although this did not help his business. After that indignation meeting Markus' stay with Roodhuis was made an excuse by all his friends for their avoidance of the coffee-house. Except Van Tijn and a few other independent ones, none of the old customers returned; but Roodhuis would not permit Markus to go away on that account.

"Now, you must never again lower yourself for that rabble that doesn't understand you, anyway, and isn't worth the trouble," said Marjon, with the pride of one who knows what takes place in high circles, and esteems one's self of better origin.

"Tell me, Johannes, what you would do," said Markus, kindly, while he warmed Keesje's little hand in his own.

"I do not know, Markus," replied Johannes. "It was a wretched evening, for I could not endure that it should cost you so dearly. But if they had done it to me I would not have cared."

"That is right," said Markus. "And now, my dear Johannes, do not think that I am less submissive than yourself. Did you indeed fancy it?"

Johannes shook his head.

"Well, then, it is not scorn which humiliates, but the doing of unworthy deeds. And those people are not less worthy of my help than they were before. Evil inclinations are good inclinations gone astray."

"Then are there not any wicked people?" asked Marjon.

"Ay, ay! Because there is not a black light, is there therefore no night? Calmly call a villain a villain, but take care that you are not one yourself, Marjon."

"But are there not, for the Father, any evil-doers?" asked Johannes.

"Why should there not be for the Father what there is for us? But He knows – what we do not know – the why and the wherefore."

"But, Markus, I saw what you endured that wretched evening. And it must not be. Must you, then, let what is high and noble be so misunderstood and defiled?"

Markus bowed his head in silence over the coughing monkey. Then he said gently:

"I have suffered, my two dear ones, because my Father has not given me strength enough. Did you not see how they listened to me, and trusted, for an instant? But then my Father, in His own way, which is beyond our comprehension, gave power again to the Evil One. Had I more wisdom I should have been able so to speak that they would have understood me. Thus I suffered doubly: on account of their dulness and wickedness, and from shame, not of them, but because of my own weakness. And this I say, Johannes, that you may know what weakness also there is in one who is stronger than you yourself will ever be."

Johannes, his chin upon his clasped hands, looked at him long and thoughtfully, and then whispered:

"Dear Brother, I believe I understand."

In this way they lived together for some time, and saw one another frequently. Johannes and Marjon performed their daily tasks in the boarding-house, and Markus went out every day to look for work. But Johannes was sad and troubled to see that Markus looked more pale and weary than formerly; and as Johannes lay awake in the night, he heard his brother, who slept beside him, sigh often, and softly moan.

One morning Markus did not go out, for Keesje lay still, looking, and could neither get up nor eat. When Markus took away his hand Keesje began to whine; and this brought on a paroxysm of coughing. Markus set him in a patch of sunshine that fell upon the counter from an upper window. There he brightened up a bit, and looked at the flies that, chilled with the cold, crept over the counter near his head. But toward night, when Marjon came, it was all over with Keesje.

He was all shriveled up, and as light as a handful of straw. They put him into a cigar box, and the trio buried him at night, by the light of a lantern, in the bit of soggy, black ground between the foul fences that had to represent a garden, and where shavings and papers supplied the place of flowers and trees.

Marjon and Johannes tried to control themselves, but did not succeed. First one and then the other began to cry.