The Strange Story Book. Mrs. Lang

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ his feet unconsciously halted at the old place. Then he glanced up, but only to receive another shock. The ancient structure with its latticed panes and gabled roof was gone, and instead he beheld a long sort of wooden shed, untidy and dirty, the windows more holes than glass, and stuffed with old hats or even petticoats to keep out the air. Over the door was painted a sign bearing the words 'Union Hotel, by Jonathan Doolittle.' In the room of the great tree in front, where he and his friends had smoked so many pipes, was a pole crowned with a sort of red nightcap from which a flag fluttered. An odd kind of flag it was too, for when the wind blew it out, you saw, not the familiar criss-cross lines of the Union Jack, but stars and stripes which had never appeared on any English banner as far as Rip knew! And when his eyes fell upon the sign where a very pink-faced King George in a red coat was wont to gaze at his loyal subjects, he too had vanished and given place to a gentleman in blue and buff, holding a sword instead of a sceptre, while underneath was painted in large letters

General Washington

      From the inn Rip turned to the crowd that stood about it, and even here the strange alteration that pervaded everything and everybody was visible. There was none of the former air of calm and leisure characteristic of the friends who had sat with him round the tree yesterday – or was it a hundred years ago? This crowd was noisy and bustling and inclined to quarrel: full of plans and inventions to judge by the talk, and eager to discuss and find fault with the contents of a handbill, which one of their number was handing about. Rip did not understand much of what they were saying, but he caught such phrases as 'Members of Congress,' 'Bunker's Hill,' 'liberty,' and other expressions as meaningless to him as if they were uttered in a foreign tongue.

      It was some time before he noticed that to the villagers on their side he himself was an object of great interest and curiosity. They pressed round him and made remarks to each other about his strange dress and the rust on his gun, while the little man with the handbills pushed his way up to him and inquired 'how he had voted?' which Rip, who had not the least idea what he meant, answered merely with a stare. Another who desired to know 'whether he was Federal or Democrat' fared no better; but a third questioner, who asked why he had come to the election with a gun on his shoulder and a mob at his heels, and if he intended to head a riot, at last gave Rip back his power of speech.

      'Alas! gentlemen,' he cried; 'I am a poor, quiet man, a native of this village and a loyal subject of King George.'

      The tumult that broke forth at this reply nearly deafened him. 'A spy! a spy!' shouted the people, 'away with him! to the gallows with him!' and it might have gone hardly with Rip had not a man in a cocked hat interfered and called them to order. The man next demanded of Rip what he wanted and why he was there, to which Rip humbly made answer that he had come in search of some of his neighbours who had been used to meet him at the tavern.

      'Well, give us their names?' said the man in the cocked hat.

      'Nicholas Vedder, the innkeeper,' answered Rip.

      There was a moment's silence; then an old man, in a thin piping voice, spoke.

      'Nicholas Vedder? Why, he's dead and gone these eighteen years; and even his wooden tombstone in the churchyard has got rotten.'

      'And Brom Dutcher?'

      'Oh, he enlisted as a soldier in the beginning of the war. Some say he was killed at the storming of Stony Point; others, that he was drowned in a squall off Antony's Nose. Anyway, he never came back here.'

      'And van Bummel, the schoolmaster?'

      'He went off to the wars too, and became a general, and is now a member of Congress.'

      Rip asked no further questions: his home and his friends were gone, and he seemed to be alone in the world. At length a cry of despair broke from him.

      'Does nobody know Rip van Winkle?'

      'Rip van Winkle?' answered two or three. 'Oh, to be sure! There's Rip van Winkle leaning against that tree.'

      Rip looked where they pointed, and grew more bewildered and despairing than ever. For what he saw was himself; himself as he had been yesterday when he went up the mountain; himself in the rags that he had worn with such a light heart.

      'And what is your name?' asked the man in the cocked hat, watching his face.

      'God knows,' cried Rip; 'I don't know who I am. I'm not myself. I'm somebody else – that's me yonder – at least I can't tell; he seems to have got into my shoes. I was myself last night, but I fell asleep on the mountain and they changed my gun, and now everything is changed and I'm changed, and I don't know what is my name or who I am.'

      When he had ceased, the bystanders looked at each other and tapping their foreheads, whispered something about taking away the gun so that he might not do himself a mischief. They were still talking when a pleasant-faced woman pushed through the crowd to get a peep of the stranger with the long beard. His looks frightened the child she was carrying, and it began to cry. 'Hush, Rip! hush!' she said; 'the old man won't hurt you.'

      As he heard her words Rip started and turned towards her eagerly.

      'What is your name?' he asked.

      'Judith Gardener.'

      'And who was your father?'

      'Ah, poor man, he was Rip van Winkle; but he went away from home more than twenty years agone. He took his dog and his gun with him, and the dog was found lying in front of the door early next morning. But as for father, whether he shot himself by accident or was carried away by the Indians, we never knew. I was only a little girl then.'

      'And your mother?'

      'Oh, she died only a short time since. She flew into such a passion with a pedlar who she thought had cheated her, that she broke a blood vessel.'

      But though Rip had inquired after his wife, all affection for her had long died away, and he did not take this news much to heart. He flung his arms round his daughter and cried.

      'I am your father. Don't you know me? Young Rip van Winkle once, now old Rip van Winkle. Does nobody know poor Rip van Winkle?'

      The crowd heard, amazed, and in silence. Then suddenly an old woman went up to him, and peered closely into his face.

      'Why, 'tis Rip van Winkle, for sure!' said she. 'Welcome home, neighbour! Where have you been these twenty long years?'

      Rip's story was soon told, but the people who listened to it had as much difficulty in believing that you could sleep for twenty years and think it was one night, as Rip himself. 'Mad!' was the only interpretation they put upon the tale, though they did not say so openly.

      In the midst of the general perplexity an old man was seen coming along the road, and someone called out:

      'Here is Peter Vanderdonk! Let us ask him if he ever knew of such doings?'

      'Ay, let us! He is the oldest dweller in the village, and we will abide by his words,' the rest answered in chorus, and they watched intently till Peter came up.

      'Why! 'tis Rip van Winkle back again!' he exclaimed, just as the old woman had done. 'Right glad I am to see him, too.'

      Who can tell the joy of poor Rip at this hearty greeting? So he was no ghost after all, as he had almost begun to think, but a flesh and blood man, with friends like other people. He could hardly speak for happiness, but he grasped Peter's hand tightly, and then the man with the cocked hat asked Peter if he had ever heard any strange stories of the Catskill Mountains.

      'Ay, СКАЧАТЬ