They called it “rummaging,” and great was the charm of “rummaging”; for it was difficult to acquire familiarity with the ground-plan and structure of the old Schloss, and every time they penetrated far enough into the remoter parts they found rooms, closets, and empty halls which they had not yet trodden, or strange round-about ways to already-known rooms. But once when thus wandering about they had a rencontre, an adventure befell them, which made a great impression on Klaus Heinrich, though he did not show it, and opened his eyes.
The opportunity came. While the Swiss governess was absent on leave to attend the evening service, they had drunk their milk from tea-cups with the Grand Duchess, accompanied by the two ladies-in-waiting, had been dismissed and directed to go back hand-in-hand to their ordinary occupations in the nursery, which lay not far off. It was thought that they needed nobody to go with them; Klaus Heinrich was old enough to take care of Ditlinde, of course. He was; and in the corridor he said: “Yes, Ditlinde, we will certainly go back to the nursery, but we need not go, you know, the shortest, dullest way. We'll rummage a bit first. If you go up one step and follow the corridor as far as where the arches begin, you'll find a hall with pillars behind them, and if you go out of one of the doors of the hall with pillars—clamber up the corkscrew staircase, you come to a room with a wooden roof; and there are lots of funny things lying about there. But I don't know what comes after the room, and that's what we've got to find out. So let's go.”
“Yes, let's,” said Ditlinde, “but not too far, Klaus Heinrich, and not where it's too dusty, for this dress shows everything.”
She was wearing a dress of dark-red velvet, trimmed with satin of the same colour. She had at that time dimples in her elbows, and light golden hair, that curled round her ears like ram's horns. In after years she was pale and thin. She too had the broad, rather over-prominent cheek-bones of her father and nation, but they were not accentuated, so that they did not spoil the lines of her face. But with Klaus Heinrich they were strong and emphatic, so that they seemed somewhat to encroach upon, to narrow and to lengthen his steel-coloured eyes. His dark hair was smoothly parted, cut in a careful rectangle on the temples, and brushed straight back from the forehead. He wore an open jacket with a waistcoat buttoning at the throat and a white turn-down collar. In his right hand he held Ditlinde's little hand, but his left arm hung down, with its brown, wrinkled, and undeveloped hand, thin and short from the shoulder. He was glad that he could let it hang without bothering to conceal it; for there was nobody there to stare and to require to be elevated and inspired, and he himself might stare and examine to his heart's content.
So they went and rummaged as they liked. Quiet reigned in the corridors, and they saw hardly a lackey in the distance. They climbed up a staircase and followed the passage till they came to the arches, showing that they were in the part of the Schloss which dated from the time of John the Headstrong and Heinrich the Confessor, as Klaus Heinrich knew and explained. They came to the hall of the pillars, and Klaus Heinrich there whistled several notes close after each other, for the first were still sounding when the last came, and so a clear chord rang under the vaulted ceiling. They scrambled groping and often on hands and knees up the stone winding staircase which opened behind one of the heavy doors, and reached the room with the wooden ceiling, in which there were several strange objects. There were some broken muskets of clumsy size with thickly rusted locks, which had been too bad for the museum, and a discarded throne with torn red velvet cushions, short wide-splayed lion-legs, and cupids hovering over the chair-back, bearing a crown. Then there was a wicked-looking, dusty, cage-like, and horribly interesting thing, which intrigued them much and long. If they were not quite mistaken, it was a rat-trap, for they could see the iron spike to put the bacon on, and it was dreadful to think how the trap-door must fall down behind the great beast…. Yes, this took time, and when they stood up after examining the rat-trap their faces were hot, and their clothes stiff with rust and dust. Klaus Heinrich brushed them both down, but that did not do much good, for his hands were as filthy as his clothes. And suddenly they saw that dusk had begun to fall. They must return quickly, Ditlinde insisted anxiously on that; it was too late to go any farther.
“That's an awful pity,” said Klaus Heinrich. “Who knows what else we mightn't have found, and when we shall get another chance of rummaging, Ditlinde!” But he followed his sister and they hurried back down the turret-stairs, crossed the hall of the pillars, and came out into the arcade, intending to hurry home hand-in-hand.
Thus they wandered on for a time; but Klaus Heinrich shook his head, for it seemed to him that this was not the way he had come. They went still farther; but several signs told them that they had mistaken their direction. This stone seat with the griffin-heads was not standing here before. That pointed window looked to the west over the low-lying quarter of the town and not over the inner courtyard with the rose-bush. They were going wrong, it was no use denying it; perhaps they had left the hall of the pillars by a wrong exit—anyhow they had absolutely lost their way.
They went back a little, but their disquietude would not allow them to go very far back, so they turned right about again, and decided to push on the way they had already come, and to trust to luck. Their way lay through a damp, stuffy atmosphere, and great undisturbed cobwebs stretched across the corners; they went with heavy hearts, and Ditlinde especially was full of repentance and on the brink of tears. People would notice her absence, would “look sadly” at her, perhaps even tell the Grand Duke; they would never find the way, would be forgotten and die of hunger. And where there was a rat-trap, Klaus Heinrich, there were also rats…. Klaus Heinrich comforted her. They only had to find the place where the armour and crossed standards hung; from that point he was quite sure of the direction. And suddenly—they had just passed a bend in the winding passage—suddenly something happened. It startled them dreadfully.
What they had heard was more than the echo of their own steps, they were other, strange steps, heavier than theirs; they came towards them now quickly, now hesitatingly, and were accompanied by a snorting and grumbling which made their blood run cold. Ditlinde made as if to run away from fright: but Klaus Heinrich would not let go her hand, and they stood with starting eyes waiting for what was coming.
It was a man who was just visible in the half-darkness, and, calmly considered, his appearance was not horrifying. He was squat in figure, and dressed like a veteran soldier. He wore a frock-coat of old-fashioned cut, a woollen comforter round his neck and a medal on his breast. He held in one hand a curly top-hat and in the other the bone handle of his clumsily rolled-up umbrella, which he tapped on the flags in time with his steps. His thin grey hair was plastered up from one ear in wisps over his skull. He had bow-shaped black eyebrows, and a yellow-white beard, which grew like the Grand Duke's, heavy upper-lids, and watery blue eyes with pouches of withered skin under them; he had the usual high cheek-bones, and the furrows of his sun-burnt face were like crevasses. When he had come quite close he seemed to recognize the children, for he placed himself against the outer wall of the passage, at once fronted round and began to make a number of bows, consisting of several short forward jerks of his whole body from the feet upwards, while he imparted a look of honesty to his mouth and held his top-hat crown-downwards in front of him. Klaus Heinrich meant to pass him by with a nod, but was surprised into halting, for the veteran began to speak.
“I beg pardon!” he suddenly grunted; then went on in a more natural voice: “I earnestly beg your young Highnesses' pardon! But would your young Highnesses take it amiss if I addressed to them the request that they would very kindly acquaint me with the nearest way to the nearest exit? It need not actually be the Albrechtstor—not in the least necessary that it should be the Albrechtstor. But any exit