Frederik Eeden - The Quest

Johannes listened with shrinking curiosity, as if some huge, horrible monster were being shown him. He seemed to be standing on the back of that monster, and to see the black blood streaming through the swollen arteries, and the dark breath ascending from a hundred nostrils. And the ominous growling of that awful voice filled him with fears.

"Look! How fast these people go, Johannes!" continued Pluizer. "You can see, can you not, that they are all in a hurry, and hunting for something? But it is droll that no one knows precisely what it is. After they have been seeking a little while, they come face to face with some one. His name is Hein."

"Who is that?" asked Johannes.

"Oh, a good friend of mine. I will introduce you to him, without fail. Now this Hein asks: 'Are you looking for me?' At that, most of them usually say: 'Oh, no! Not you.' Then Hein remarks: 'But there is nothing to be found save me.' So they have to content themselves with Hein."

Johannes perceived that he spoke of death.

"Is that always the way – always?"

"To be sure it is – always. But yet, day after day, a new crowd gathers, and they begin their search not knowing for what – seeking, seeking, until at last they find Hein. So it has been for a pretty long while, and so it will continue to be."

"Shall I, too, find nothing else, Pluizer? Nothing but…"

"Yes, Hein you will surely find, some day. But that does not matter. Only seek – always be seeking."

"But the little book, Pluizer? You might let me find the book."

"Well, who knows! I have not forbidden it. We must seek – seek. We know, at least, what we are looking for. Wistik taught us that. Others there are who try all their lives to find out what they are really seeking. They are the philosophers, Johannes. But when Hein comes, it is all up with their search as well."

"That is frightful, Pluizer!"

"Oh, no! Indeed it is not. Hein is very good-hearted, but he is misunderstood."

Some one toiled up the stairs outside the chamber door – Clump! clump! on the wooden stairs.

Clump! clump! Nearer and nearer. Then some one rapped at the door, and it sounded like ice tapping on wood.

A tall man entered. He had deep-set eyes, and long, lean hands. A cold draft swept through the little room.

"Well, well!" said Pluizer. "We were just speaking of you. Take a seat. How goes it with you?"

"Busy, busy!" said the tall man, wiping the cold moisture from his white, bony forehead.

Stiff with fright, Johannes gazed into the deep-set eyes which were fixed upon him. They were very deep and dark, but not cruel – not threatening. After a few moments he breathed more freely, and his heart beat less rapidly.

"This is Johannes," said Pluizer. "He has heard of a certain book which tells why everything is as it is; and we are going together to find that book, are we not?" Then Pluizer laughed, significantly.

"Is that so? Well, that is good," said Death kindly, nodding to Johannes.

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

"Certainly," said Death. "It is best to seek diligently."

"He thought that you were so horrible! You see, do you not, Johannes, that you made a mistake?"

"Ah, yes," said Death, most kindly. "They speak very ill of me. My outward appearance is not prepossessing, but I mean well."

He smiled faintly, like one whose mind was full of more serious matters than those of which he spoke. Then he turned his sombre eyes away from Johannes, and they wandered pensively toward the great town.

It was a long time before Johannes ventured to speak. At last, he said softly:

"Are you going to take me with you, now? "

"What do you mean, my child?" said Death, roused from his meditations. "No, not now. You must grow up and become a good man."

"I will not be a man – like the others."

"Come, come!" said Death. "There is no help for it."

It was clear that this was an every-day phrase with him. He continued:

"My friend, Pluizer, can teach you how to become a good man. It can be learned in various ways, but Pluizer teaches it excellently. It is something very fine and admirable to be a good man. You must not scorn it, my little lad."

"Seeking, thinking, looking!" said Pluizer.

"To be sure! To be sure!" said Death; and then, to Pluizer, "To whom are you going to take him?"

"To Doctor Cijfer, my old pupil."

"Ah, yes. He is a good pupil. He is a very fine example of a man – almost perfect in his way."

"Shall I see Robinetta again?" asked Johannes, trembling.

"What does the boy mean?" asked Death.

"Oh, he was love-struck, and yet fancied himself to be an elf! He, he, he!" laughed Pluizer, maliciously.

"No, my dear child, that will never do," said Death. "You will forget such things with Doctor Cijfer. He who seeks what you are seeking must forget all other things. All or nothing."

"I shall make a doughty man of him. I shall just let him sec what love really is, and then he will have nothing at all to do with it."

And Pluizer laughed gaily. Death again fixed his black eyes upon poor Johannes, who found it hard to keep from sobbing; for he felt ashamed in the presence of Death.

Suddenly Death stood up, "I must away," said he. "I am wasting my time. There is much to be done. Good-by, Johannes. We are sure to see each other again. You must not be afraid of me."

"I am not afraid of you – I wish you would take me with you. Oh, take me!" But Death gently motioned him back. He was used to such appeals.

"No, Johannes. Go now to your task. Seek and see! Ask me no more. Some day I will ask, and that will be soon enough."

When he had disappeared, Pluizer behaved in a very extraordinary manner. He sprang over chairs, tumbled about the floor, climbed up the wardrobe and the mantlepiece, and performed neck-breaking tricks in the open windows.

"Well, that was Hein – my good friend Hein!" said he. "Do you not think him nice? A bit plain and morose in appearance; but he can be quite cheerful when he finds pleasure in his Work. Sometimes, however, it bores him; for it is rather monotonous."

"Who tells him, Pluizer, where he is to go?"

Pluizer leered at Johannes in a teasing, cunning way.

"Why do you ask that? He goes his own gait – he takes whom he can catch."

Later, Johannes saw that it was otherwise. But he could not yet know whether or not Pluizer always spoke the truth.

They went out to the street, and moved with the swarming throng. The grimy men passed on, pell-mell – laughing and chatting so gaily that Johannes could not help wondering. He noticed that Pluizer nodded to many of them; but no one returned the greeting – all were looking straight forward as if they had seen nothing.

"They are going like fun now," said Pluizer, "as though not a single one of them knew me. But that is only a pretext. They cannot cut me when I am alone with them; and then they are not so jolly." Johannes became conscious that some one was following them. On looking round, he saw the tall, pale figure moving among the people with great, inaudible strides. Hein nodded to Johannes.

"Do the people also see him?" asked Johannes of Pluizer.

"Yes, certainly! all of them; but they do not wish to know him. Well, for the present I overlook this defiance."

The din and stir brought to Johannes a kind of stupor in which he forgot his troubles. The narrow streets and the high houses dividing the blue sky into straight strips – the people passing to and fro beside him – the shuffling of footsteps, and the rattling of wagons, effaced the old visions and the dream of that former night, as a storm disturbs the reflections in mirror-like water. It seemed to him that nothing else existed save walls and windows and people; as if he too must do the same, and run and rush in the restless, breathless tumult.