Fundvogel

This was the year Kotts suddenly appeared. He stayed for almost four years at Woyland. Kotts was a spirit and it was lucky that he was only active during the day and slept nights otherwise Katherine would have been long gone from Woyland. She suffered the most from him.

One beautiful day Katherine was washing Funvogel’s neck. Fundvogel shouted at Katherine to be careful, couldn’t she see Kotts standing there? Katherine looked and looked but didn’t see anything.

In the beginning Kotts only tormented Katherine. Andrea had placed a plate of cherries on a footstool and Katherine went to pick them up. The girl called out to her that she better not take Kotts’ meal away. The footstool belonged to Kotts. Sometimes Andrea would put a cup of water there, a piece of soap and a washcloth so he could wash up. The water stayed the way it was but Andrea said that Kotts was so clean he didn’t get the water dirty.

Katherine didn’t like it at all, spoke to all the other maids about it. They all laughed at her. Later they didn’t laugh any more. Kotts became independent and ventured outside of Andrea’s room.

Once at suppertime she led Klaus around as he waited on the table. She didn’t want him to run Kotts over. The Duchess, whom old Griet had told about the spirit, asked how tall he was.

“This high,” pointed Andrea. “He reaches up to my knee.”

“And he is called Kotts?” Grandmother asked again. “And you can see him clearly?”

“Yes, Kotts!” Andrea nodded. “Can’t you see him?”

Jan bent over the table, “Yes, there he is.”

He laughed, “He looks a little foggy.”

Grandmother said, “When you bring Kotts to the table you must also give him something to eat.”

Fundvogel took a desert plate, put some mashed potatoes on it, stuck a pickle in it, then set it on the floor.

“That’s his favorite food,” she explained.

Klaus, the HouseMaster, made a funny face.

*          *

*

Andrea gave Kotts riding lessons. Pittje had to take the pony around on the lead rope.

“Don’t slouch so much Kotts, “ she cried. “You must sit up straight! Press your legs tight against the body! Don’t bounce, do you hear? Don’t bounce!”

She turned to the groom, “Pittje, be more careful! You almost hit Kotts with your stupid whip!”

Pittje was very happy when the riding lesson was over, it was not fun to teach an invisible rider.

In the evenings the old coachman sat on the bench in front of the stables smoking his pipe. Andrea came by, cried out at him:

“Move over Jupp, you are sitting on Kotts!”

The elder looked at her, shook his head, spit on the ground. Then he said slow and deliberate, “Fundvogel is crazy!”

He took a couple of strong pulls but his pipe didn’t taste right anymore. He looked to the side next to him. Was something really sitting next to him on the bench? He stood up, went across the yard looking for another place to sit.

It went that way for some time. Andrea would forget about Kotts for awhile and there would be peace at Woyland.

But every time Jan would come to visit he would always enquire, “How are things with Kotts?”

“Thank you for asking, “ said Andrea. “He has the sniffles and had somewhat of a bad night.”

“Give him some malt candy!” Her cousin cried.

Soon Kotts began to play various little pranks. Jan had been given horse dust from the coachman at Easter and he gave it to Andrea. That was the stuff you scratched off when you curried the horse. Katherine had found this filthy thing in her bed mixed with hedgehog hairs. She woke up in the middle of the night with such itching all over her body that she thought she would go crazy! She scratched herself bloody but it was useless. She ran to the Duchess the next morning to complain. The Duchess asked who had done it.

“The Young Miss said, “ howled the large maid, “that it was Kotts. I would love to wring that fellow’s neck!”

“Then do it, “ laughed the Duchess Roberta. “You have my permission.”

But it didn’t always go so well for Kotts. A beautiful vase was broken and the suspicion fell on Andrea.

“Did you do it?” Grandmother asked.

“No,” said the little girl. “I didn’t do it. Kotts did it.”

“Now look,” cried Grandmother. “That deserves punishment, don’t you agree?”

The girl nodded and instantly her face burned from a resounding box on the ear.

“Give that to Kotts,” laughed Grandmother. “And greet him for me.”

Nevertheless the relationship between Kotts and Andrea continued to be very close. She would sit for hours on the floor conversing with him, telling him fairy tales and playing Piff-Paff-Poultrie. She was the drummer boy and Kotts was the beautiful Katrina. When it rained she went outside with him and came back soaking wet because she had held the umbrella over Kotts. She brought him earthworms, caterpillars and grubs, once she even brought him a fat maggot because he was such an animal lover.

Still, it is sad to say that Kotts came to an inglorious end because Katherine married and went back to Kalkar. Then a new nanny called Petronella came to care for Andrea. The people called her Nellie, which in Kleves was another way of saying Petronella.

Right on the first day they were arguing. Nellie refused to call Andrea “Young Miss” and forbid Andrea to call her “Nellie”. She had come too far just to endure that!

So far! She came- she came from the house in the forest, the Duchess’ hunting lodge, where her father took care of the falcons. Grandmother was called, she suggested they mutually address each other as equals. Fundvogel was enraged. Hadn’t she called Katherine, Katrina and Elizabeth?

In conclusion they both half agreed, Andrea would continue to be called Miss but without the “Young” or “Little” since she was now ten years old. In return she would be obliged to call Nellie by her beautiful proper name, Petronella. Scarcely was this peace established before a new war broke out in which Kotts played an important role on Andrea’s side.

Namely both girls had absolutely different ideas over Petronella’s position and duties. Andrea desired her as a true Lady’s maid that would help her dress and undress, keep her things in order and always be there if she was needed- like a nimble chamber maid. Like Fanny was for her grandmother.

The flaxen haired Katherine, the large lazy bumpkin, had not been suited for that at all but Petronella, brown eyed, brown haired, slim, graceful, quick and intelligent would be excellent. She would only need a little training thought Andrea.

Petronella had an entirely different view. She had spent a few years in the Heart of Jesus Cloister, had been brought up properly and was also self-taught in many skills! She could honestly read, write, do sums, knew the catechism by heart and even did needlework for everyone ten miles around.

These were all things Andrea was very weak at. Read, yes she could read. Her cousin had brought his books with and she had quickly learned because she enjoyed it. But her writing was very bad. She could scarcely write her name legibly with great difficulty. As for sums, she had never gotten past one plus one. She didn’t know a word of the catechism. In regards to sewing, she couldn’t tell a crochet needle from a sewing needle.

Petronella said that she should be ashamed of herself. That didn’t set well with Andrea at all. Could the educated creature, Petronella, ride? She was welcome to go along with to the stables, catch the pony and saddle it. Then she could prove her worth! Could she swim? Pah, she couldn’t even tend the geese! That shamed Petronella and shut her up. There were no geese at the house in the forest.

Andrea grandly declared that she would gladly learn the catechism if Petronella would in return learn how to tend the geese. But if she could ride Goblin through the yard, then she would take lessons in darning socks.

Petronella took her on. It would really be something if she couldn’t learn what this little stuck up kid could learn! Very early the next day Andrea woke Petronella up. She hung a sack around her neck and put bread in it explaining that it would be her noon meal. She didn’t allow Petronella to put on any shoes. You had to tend geese barefoot. Then she took her along to catch the geese, informed her on where to take them and not to come back before dark.

Andrea was happy, for today at least Petronella would not torment her. Then it occurred to her that it would not be much use. Tending geese was not very difficult; she had learned it in one day when she was only five years old. She would have to learn the catechism in the morning! Wasn’t there something that would make tending geese more difficult for Petronella? Suddenly she shouted with joy. Philipp! Where was Philipp? She searched around and found him in the hay by old Lene.

She called him, enticed him to go out of the stable with her. Petronella was still not out of the courtyard. She was having trouble keeping her little troop in order, which is not easy when you don’t have a switch.

The maids laughed at her but Pittje, who had fallen for the beautiful girl, took pity on her, cried out that he would bring her a switch. That was when Andrea came out from around back with the gander.

“Do you see that, Philipp?” She hissed at him exactly like he hissed at the others. She had learned how to a long time ago.

“Do you see that, she is stealing all of your geese! All of them! The goslings too! She is stealing them, stealing! Do you hear me Philipp?”

She hissed excitedly and the gander understood. He raged over the entire courtyard toward Petronella as if he were possessed. Petronella then did the dumbest thing she could have done; she hit back at him with her hand. Instantly Philipp had her arm caught, pecking at it with his large bill.

Petronella screamed loudly and ran away but the gander was faster than she was, quickly had her by the calf of the leg. Then he flew around and gripped her from the front, chased her around the courtyard. Petronella bellowed and the geese chattered. The farm hands and maids shook with laughter. It would have gone badly for her if Pittje hadn’t quickly pushed her into the stable and shut the door after her.

Andrea got a big piece of bacon, cut a slice off and fed it to Philipp. Then he went alone with his flock across the pasture.

Petronella limped painfully back over the courtyard. The Duchess stood watching in the window above.

“What happened to you Nellie?” She cried.

Petronella miserably lamented her tale of grief and difficulty with the raging gander. Grandmother had seen her grandchild by the gander, feeding it and praising it for doing well. She cried out to Andrea:

“Tell me, who got Philipp to chase after Nellie?”

In her softest and most innocent voice Andrea said convincingly, “It must have been Kotts.”

Grandmother laughed and warned, “Kotts shouldn’t instigate so much mischief.”

Then she decided over the controversy. Andrea didn’t need to learn catechism or sewing but she must become fluent in sums and writing. She was to begin immediately that day.

That was when Kotts stepped in seriously and made many appearances. He sabotaged the lessons and did it so thoroughly that no day went by without some disturbance. He always broke the tips off the pencils and writing quills, put hair, water or flies in the ink bottle, hid all the writing tablets and school books so well that you could look all day and not find them.

He also did inexcusable things to Petronella. He stretched a wire over the stairs so she tripped over it and fell hurting her leg, making it bleed. One morning her hair was so full of burrs that she had to rip out hanks of it. She found dead rats and frogs in her shoes, an old hedgehog in the foot of her bed whose quills stabbed her toes as she stretched out her legs.

“It was Kotts,” Andrea declared calmly when something would happen.

It didn’t work. Things still didn’t go the way Andrea wished because she was blamed for Kotts’ behaviors and unreasonable demands were placed on her in return.

*          *

*