'Oh!' cried Johannes, for Pluizer nipped him.

It was by this time dark, and the bats flew close over their heads and piped shrilly. The air was black and heavy, not a leaf was stirring in the wood.

'May I go home?' asked Johannes,--'home to my father?'

'To your father! What to do there?' said Pluizer. 'A warm reception you will get from him after staying away so long.'

'I want to get home,' said Johannes, and he thought of the snug room with the bright lamp light where he would sit so often by his father's side, listening to the scratching of his pen. It was quiet there, and not lonely.

'Well then, you would have done better not to come away, and stayed so long for the sake of that senseless jackanapes who has not even any existence. Now it is too late, but it does not matter in the least; I will take care of you. And whether I do it or your father, comes to precisely the same in the end. Such a father--it is a mere matter of education. Did you choose your own father? Do you suppose that there is no one so good or so clever as he? I am just as good, and cleverer--much cleverer.'

Johannes had no heart to answer; he shut his eyes and nodded feebly.

'And it would be of no use to look for anything from Robinetta,' the little man went on. He laid his hands on Johannes's shoulders and spoke close into his ear. That child thought you just as much a fool as the others did. Did you not observe that she sat in the corner and never spoke a word when they all laughed at you? She is no better than the rest. She thought you a nice little boy, and was ready to play with you--as she would have played with a c.o.c.kchafer. She will not care that you are gone away. And she knows nothing of that Book. But I do; I know where it is, and I will help you to find it. I know almost everything.'

And Johannes was beginning to believe him.

'Now will you come with me? Will you seek it with me?'

'I am so tired,' said Johannes, 'let me sleep first.'

'I have no opinion of sleep,' replied Pluizer, 'I am too active for that. A man must always be wide awake and thinking. But I will grant you a little time for rest. Till to-morrow morning!' And he put on the friendliest expression of which he was capable.

Johannes looked hard into his little twinkling eyes till he could see nothing else. His head was heavy and he lay down on the mossy knoll. The little eyes seemed to go further and further from him till they were starry specks in the dark sky; he fancied he heard the sound of distant voices, as though the earth beneath him were going away and away--and then he ceased to think at all.

[Footnote 1: The plucker, the spoiler.]

X

Even before he was fairly awake, he was vaguely conscious that something strange had happened to him while he slept. Still he was not anxious to know what, or to look about him. He would rather return to the dream which was slowly fading like a rising mist--Robinetta had come to be with him again, and had stroked his hair as she used to do--and he had seen his father once more, and Presto, in the garden with the pool.

'Oh! That hurt! Who did that?' Johannes opened his eyes, and in the grey morning light, he saw a little man standing at his side who had pulled his hair. He himself was in bed, and the light was dim and subdued, as in a room.

But the face which bent over him at once carried him back to all the misery and distress of the past evening. It was Pluizer's face, less boguey-like and more human, but as ugly and terrifying as ever.

'Oh, no! Let me dream!' cried Johannes.

But Pluizer shook him. 'Are you crazy, sluggard? Dreaming is folly; you will never get any further by that. A man must work and think and search; that is what you are a man for.'

'I do not want to be a man. I want to dream.'

'I cannot help that; you must. You are now in my charge, and you must work and seek with me. With me alone can you ever find the thing you want. And I will not give in till we have found it.'

Johannes felt a vague dismay; still, a stronger will coerced and drove him. He involuntarily submitted.

The sand-hills, trees, and flowers had vanished. He was in a small dimly-lighted room; outside, as far as he could see, there were houses, and more houses, dingy and grey, in long dull rows. Smoke rose from every one of them in thick wreaths, and made a sort of brown fog in the streets. And along those streets men were hurrying, like great black ants. A mingled, dull clamour came up from the throng without ceasing.

'Look, Johannes,' said Pluizer. 'Now is not that a fine sight? Those are men, and all the houses, whichever way you look, and as far as you can see--even beyond the blue towers there--are full of men--quite full from top to bottom. Is not that wonderful? That is rather different from a sand-hill!'

Johannes listened with alarmed curiosity, as though some huge and hideous monster had risen up before him. He felt as if he stood on the creature's back, and could see the black blood flowing through its great arteries, and the murky breath streaming from its hundred nostrils. And the portentous hum of that terrible voice filled him with fears.

'Look how fast the men walk,' Pluizer went on. 'You can see that they are in a hurry and are seeking something, cannot you? But the amusing thing is, that not one of them knows exactly what he is seeking. When they have been seeking for some little time, some one comes to meet them--his name is Hein.'

'Who is he?' asked Johannes.

'Oh, a very good friend of mine. I will introduce you to him some day.

Then Hein says to them, "Are you looking for me?" To which most of them reply, "Oh no. I do not want you!" But then Hein says again, "But there is nothing to be found but me." So they have to be satisfied with Hein.'

Johannes understood that he meant death.

'And is it always, always so?'

'To be sure, always. And yet, day after day, a new crowd come on, who begin forthwith to seek they know not what, and they seek and seek till at last they find Hein. This has been going on for a good while already, and so it will continue for some time yet.'

'And shall I never find anything, Pluizer--nothing but--?'

'Ay, you will find Hein some day, sure enough! but that does not matter; seek all the same--for ever be seeking.'

'But the Book, Pluizer, you were to make me find the Book.'

'Well who knows? I have not taken back my word. We must seek it diligently. At any rate we know where to look for it; Wistik taught us that. And there are folks who spend all their lives in the search without even knowing so much as that. Those are the men of science, Johannes. But then Hein comes and it is all over with their search.'

'That is horrible, Pluizer!'

'Oh no, not at all! Hein is a very kind creature; but he is misunderstood.'

Some one was heard on the staircase outside the bedroom door. Tramp, tramp, up the wooden steps--tramp, tramp,--nearer and nearer. Then some one tapped at the door, and it was as though iron rapped against the panel.

A tall man came in. He had deep-set eyes and long lean hands. A cold draught blew into the room.

'Good-day,' said Pluizer, 'so it is you! Sit down. We were just speaking of you. How are you getting on?'

'Busy, busy!' said the tall man, and he wiped the cold dews from his bald, bony forehead.

Without moving Johannes looked timidly into the deep-set eyes which were fixed on his. They were grave and gloomy, but not cruel, not angry.

After a few minutes he breathed more freely and his heart beat less wildly.

'This is Johannes,' said Pluizer. 'He has heard of a certain book in which it is written why everything is as it is, and we are now going to seek it together, are we not?' And Pluizer laughed significantly.

'Ay, indeed? That is well!' said Death kindly, and he nodded to Johannes.

'He is afraid he will not find it, but I tell him first to seek it diligently.'

'To be sure,' said Death. 'Seek diligently, that is the best way.'