A Son-in-Law of Pure Gold

As children, Herbert and his sister Aleid had picked flowers in that hollow. Sometimes the eldest glided past them, claws outstretched. The children and the wieve smiled at one another. Then she vanished again. However dangerous the wieven might be to others, she left these two alone.

Their neighbour Johanna did not think that was a reason to keep wandering there.

“One day she’ll take you with her.”

“Maybe she’ll give me gold,” said Herbert.

“Stay away from there.”

And because Johanna asked him, he stayed away.

When they grew older, their parents liked the idea of the two marrying. Especially Johanna’s father, Scholte Lodink, a rich farmer and former soldier. He declared with his fist on the table that love mattered more than money. His wife Christine nodded. Herbert’s parents had enough money.

Then Herbert’s parents won a lawsuit. The costs swallowed their savings. They had been right, but could no longer afford to be.

Christine sat by the fire and thought. They would need another son-in-law.

Albrecht, for instance. He had land and money, and would inherit more. Christine listed his advantages without getting to his face.

She invited him to discuss politics with her husband. Her daughter would happen to be at home.

Johanna beamed when Albrecht arrived. Christine watched with satisfaction. What she did not know was that Johanna had just seen Herbert walk past.

Albrecht sat down. He liked being admired, preferably from the side on which his best clothes looked most impressive. But Scholte Lodink began talking about Herbert.

A few months earlier, Herbert had been riding home from the farrier. A bird had burst out of a pool of water with a shriek. His horse bolted in fright and charged straight toward the hollow.

Just before the animal plunged into the depths, the eldest wieve rose up. She grabbed the mane and clamped her knees against the horse’s sides. The horse stopped, trembling beneath her hands. Herbert calmed it and turned it around.

Below, he had seen the three wieven roasting a plucked bird over a fire.

“I want to thank them,” he had told Aleid at home. “Would you bake a sweet cake like the one for Epiphany?”

“If I can come too.”

He would rather she did not. Aleid let him know for days that without a sister there would be no cake. In the end, she baked one, placed it on an earthenware plate, and arranged ivy around it.

She carried the gift to the hollow. Herbert took it down. Beneath a bush, a large head appeared. A green eye looked at Aleid. She stayed where she was until her brother returned; together they walked calmly home.

The next day, the empty plate lay below. The ivy was beside it.

Scholte Lodink finished his story and looked at Albrecht. That was his contribution to politics.

Albrecht sat with his jaws clenched. Herbert was poor. Albrecht could hire him and make him toil. Even if Johanna married the boy, he could still make life miserable for him as a day labourer. The thought helped. He took his leave politely.

As soon as the door closed, Christine began.

Did her husband know what Albrecht owned? Did he know what Albrecht would inherit? Would a visit to a hollow feed a household? Albrecht was surely brave enough to do what Herbert had done.

The former soldier could hardly get a word in for nearly two hours.

“Then he must prove it,” he finally said.

The next day he asked Johanna outside which young man she wanted. She was already reaching for a corner of her apron to catch her tears.

“Herbert.”

“I thought so.”

She pressed her wet cheek against his rough face and asked whether he would help her.

He would. But he did it like a former soldier.

Both men had to ride to the hollow at midnight: Herbert from the west, Albrecht from the south. Each was to throw in a peening iron, an iron farm tool on which a scythe blade was hammered out. Whoever reached the farm first afterward could marry Johanna.

This would lure the wieven out of their hollow. The ride home would become a race against something faster than a horse.

Both suitors agreed. Albrecht bought the best horse he could find. He would throw from a distance and turn around immediately. It was convenient when you could buy part of your courage from a horse dealer.

Herbert had only his old Bles.

That night, as he approached the hollow, he heard the other horse’s hooves in the distance. Albrecht was on his way. Herbert rode to the edge, threw his peening iron, and called down to the wieven that iron was coming for them.

A white figure shot up from the hollow.

Bles bolted.

The wind flattened the grain. Herbert bent over the horse’s neck. Behind him, he heard laughter, far too close. The wieve needed no hooves to keep pace.

“You’ll never make it, Herbert. Not on that old horse!”

He felt her breath beside his ear.

“Albrecht had a better horse. He’s already turned back halfway.”

Herbert pressed his legs against Bles. If Albrecht was gone, all he had to do was get home alive.

In the farmyard, claws grazed his neck. Something hard whistled past behind him. Then the wieve withdrew into the night.

Scholte Lodink roared that there would be a wedding in a few days and he would dance himself. Christine kept quiet. Johanna threw her arms around Herbert and saw the blood on his neck.

“A scratch,” he said. “She threw something too.”

They went outside to look. There lay a piece of the plate he and Aleid had brought. Lodink picked it up. It was surprisingly heavy.

Johanna wanted to go inside. She was cold, and Herbert was standing beside her; there were more important things than crockery.

Under the lamp, her father turned the piece over.

Gold.

“A wedding present!” He held it up. “That’s why she threw it after you! My boy, you’re richer than Albrecht. Richer than me!”

He looked at his wife.

Christine’s gaze went from the gold to Herbert. She smiled and opened her arms to her daughter.

But Johanna was already leaning against Herbert.