Part 2

The thing moved its bushy tail, but did not answer.

"There is no cake for you to-night, Nipen. I hope the ale will do. Is the ale good, Nipen?"

Off went the dark creature without a word, as quick as it could go.

"It is offended?" thought Oddo; "or is it really what it looks like, a fox? If it does not come back, I will go down presently and see whether it is only a fox."

He presently let himself down to the ground by the way he had come up, and eagerly laid hold of the ale can. It would not stir. It was as fast on the ground as if it was enchanted, which Oddo did not doubt was the case; and he started back with more fear than he had yet had. The cold he felt on this exposed spot soon reminded him, however, that the can was probably frozen to the snow, which it might well be, after being brought warm from the fireside. It was so. The vessel had sunk an inch into the snow, and was there fixed by the frost.

None of the ale seemed to have been drunk; and so cold was Oddo by this time, that he longed for a sup of it. He took first a sup and then a draught; and then he remembered that the rest would be entirely spoiled by the frost if it stood another hour. This would be a pity, he thought; so he finished it, saying to himself that he did not believe Nipen would come that night.

At that very moment he heard a cry so dreadful that it shot, like sudden pain, through every nerve of his body. It was not a shout of anger: it was something between a shriek and a wail--like what he fancied would be the cry of a person in the act of being murdered. That Nipen was here now, he could not doubt; and, at length, Oddo fled. He fled the faster, at first, for hearing the rustle of wings; but the curiosity of the boy even now got the better of his terror, and he looked up at the barn where the wings were rustling. There he saw in the starlight the glitter of two enormous round eyes, shining down upon him from the ridge of the roof. But it struck him at once that he had seen those eyes before. He checked his speed, stopped, went back a little, sprang up once more into the gallery, hissed, waved his cap, and clapped his hands, till the echoes were all awake again; and, as he had hoped, the great white owl spread its wings, sprang off from the ridge, and sailed away over the fiord.

Oddo tossed up his cap, cold as the night was, so delighted was he to have scared away the bird which had, for a moment, scared him. He hushed his mirth, however, when he perceived that lights were wandering in the yard, and that there were voices approaching. He saw that the household were alarmed about him, and were coming forth to search for him. Curious to see what they would do, Oddo crouched down in the darkest corner of the gallery to watch and listen.

First came Rolf and his master, carrying torches, with which they lighted up the whole expanse of snow as they came. They looked round them without any fear, and Oddo heard Rolf say--

"If it were not for that cry, sir, I should think nothing of it. But my fear is that some beast has got him."

"Search first the place where the cake and ale ought to be," said Erlingsen. "Till I see blood, I shall hope the best."

"You will not see that," said Hund, who followed; his gloomy countenance, now distorted by fear, looking ghastly in the yellow light of the torch he carried. "You will see no blood. Nipen does not draw blood."

"Never tell me that any one that was not wounded and torn could send out such a cry as that," said Rolf. "Some wild brute seized him, no doubt, at the very moment that Erica and I were standing at the door listening."

Oddo repented of his prank when he saw, in the flickering light behind the crowd of guests, who seemed to hang together like a bunch of grapes, the figures of his grandfather and Erica. The old man had come out in the cold for his sake; and Erica, who looked as white as the snow, had no doubt come forth because the old man wanted a guide. Oddo now wished himself out of the scrape. Sorry as he was, he could not help being amused, and keeping himself hidden a little longer, when he saw Rolf discover the round hole in the snow where the can had sunk, and heard the different opinions of the company as to what this portended. Most were convinced that his curiosity had been his destruction, as they had always prophesied. What could be clearer, by this hole, than that the ale had stood there, and been carried off with the cake; and Oddo with it, because he chose to stay and witness what is forbidden to mortals?

"I wonder where he is now," said a shivering youth, the gayest dancer of the evening.

"Oh, there is no doubt about that; any one can tell you that," replied the elderly and experienced M. Holberg. "He is chained upon a wind, poor fellow, like all Nipen's victims. He will have to be shut up in a cave all the hot summer through, when it is pleasantest to be abroad; and when the frost and snow come again, he will be driven out, with a lash of Nipen's whip, and he must go flying wherever the wind flies, without resting, or stopping to warm himself at any fire in the country."

Oddo had thus far kept his laughter to himself; but now he could contain himself no longer. He laughed aloud--and then louder and louder as he heard the echoes all laughing with him. The faces below, too, were so very ridiculous--some of the people staring up in the air; and others at the rock where the echo came from; some having their mouths wide open, others their eyes starting, and all looking unlike themselves in the torchlight. His mirth was stopped by his master.

"Come down, sir," cried Erlingsen, looking up at the gallery. "Come down this moment. We shall make you remember this night, as well perhaps as Nipen could do. Come down, and bring my can, and the ale and the cake. The more pranks you play the more you will repent it."

Most of the company thought Erlingsen very bold to talk in this way; but he was presently justified by Oddo's appearance on the balustrade. His master seized him as he touched the ground, while the others stood aloof.

"Where is my ale can?" said Erlingsen.

"Here, sir;" and Oddo held it up dangling by the handle.

"And the cake--I bade you bring it down with you."

"So I did, sir."

And to his master's look of inquiry, the boy answered by pointing down his throat with one finger, and laying the other hand upon his stomach. "It is all here, sir."

"And the ale in the same place?"

Oddo bowed, and Erlingsen turned away without speaking. He could not have spoken without laughing.

"Bring this gentleman home," said Erlingsen presently to Rolf; "and do not let him out of your hands. Let no one ask him any questions till he is in the house." Rolf grasped the boy's arm, and Erlingsen went forward to relieve Peder, though it was not very clear to him at the moment whether such a grandchild was better safe or missing. The old man made no such question, but hastened back with many expressions of thanksgiving.

As the search-party crowded in among the women, and pushed all before them into the large warm room, M. Kollsen was seen standing on the stair-head, wrapped in the bear-skin coverlid.

"Is the boy there?" he inquired.

Oddo showed himself.

"How much have you seen of Nipen, hey?"

"Nobody ever had a better sight of it, sir. It was as plain as I see you now, and no farther off."

"Nonsense--it is a lie," said M. Kollsen. "Do not believe a word he says," advised the pastor.

Oddo bowed, and proceeded to the great room, where he took up his clarionet, as if it was a matter of course that the dancing was to begin again immediately. He blew upon his fingers, however, observing that they were too stiff with cold to do their duty well. And when he turned towards the fire, every one made way for him, in a very different manner from what they would have dreamed of three hours before. Oddo had his curiosity gratified as to how they would regard one who was believed to have seen something supernatural.

When seriously questioned, Oddo had no wish to say anything but the truth; and he admitted the whole--that he had eaten the entire cake, drunk all the ale, seen a fox and an owl, and heard the echoes, in answer to himself. As he finished his story, Hund, who was perhaps the most eager listener of all, leaped thrice upon the floor, snapping his fingers, as if in a passion of delight. He met Erlingsen's eye, full of severity, and was quiet; but his countenance still glowed with exultation.

The rest of the company were greatly shocked at these daring insults to Nipen: and none more so than Peder. The old man's features worked with emotion, as he said in a low voice that he should be very thankful if all the mischief that might follow upon this adventure might be borne by the kin of him who had provoked it. If it should fall upon those who were innocent, never surely had boy been so miserable as his poor lad would then be. Oddo's eyes filled with tears as he heard this; and he looked up at his master and mistress, as if to ask whether they had no word of comfort to say.

"Neighbour," said Madame Erlingsen to Peder, "is there any one here who does not believe that God is over all, and that He protects the innocent?"

"Is there any one who does not feel," added Erlingsen, "that the innocent should be gay, safe as they are in the goodwill of God and man? Come, neighbours--to your dancing again! You have lost too much time already. Now, Oddo, play your best--and you, Hund."

"I hope," said Oddo, "that, if any mischief is to come, it will fall upon me. We'll see how I shall bear it."

When M. Kollsen appeared the next morning, the household had so much of its usual air that no stranger would have imagined how it had been occupied the day before. The large room was fresh strewn with evergreen sprigs; the breakfast-table stood at one end, where each took breakfast, standing, immediately on coming downstairs. At the bottom of the room was a busy group. Peder was twisting strips of leather, thin and narrow, into whips. Rolf and Hund were silently intent upon a sort of work which the Norwegian peasant delights in--carving wood. They spoke only to answer Peder's questions about the progress of the work. Peder loved to hear about their carving, and to feel it; for he had been remarkable for his skill in the art, as long as his sight lasted.

The whole party rose when M. Kollsen entered the room. He talked politics a little with his host, by the fireside; in the midst of which conversation Erlingsen managed to intimate that nothing would be heard of Nipen to-day, if the subject was let alone by themselves: a hint which the clergyman was willing to take, as he supposed it meant in deference to his views.

Erica heard M. Kollsen inquiring of Peder about his old wife, so she started up from her work, and said she must run and prepare Ulla for the pastor's visit. Poor Ulla would think herself forgotten this morning, it was growing so late, and nobody had been over to see her.

Ulla, however, was far from having any such thoughts. There sat the old woman, propped up in bed, knitting as fast as fingers could move, and singing, with her soul in her song, though her voice was weak and unsteady.

"I thought you would come," said Ulla. "I knew you would come, and take my blessing on your betrothment. I must not say that I hope to see you crowned; for we all know--and nobody so well as I--that it is I that stand between you and your crown. I often think of it, my dear----"

"Then I wish you would not, Ulla--you know that."

"I do know it, my dear; and I would not be for hastening God's appointments. Let all be in His own time."

"There was news this morning," said Erica, "of a lodgment of logs at the top of the foss;[1] and they were all going, except Peder, to slide them down the gully to the fiord. The gully is frozen so slippery, that the work will not take long. They will make a raft of the logs in the fiord; and either Rolf or Hund will carry them out to the islands when the tide ebbs."

[1] Waterfall. Pine-trunks felled in the forest are drawn over the frozen snow to the banks of a river, or to the top of a waterfall, whence they may be either slid down over the ice, or left to be carried down by the floods, at the melting of the snows in the spring.

"Will it be Rolf, do you think, or Hund, dear?"

"I wish it may be Hund. If it be Rolf, I shall go with him. O Ulla! I cannot lose sight of him, after what happened last night. Did you hear? I do wish Oddo would grow wiser."

Ulla shook her head. "How did Hund conduct himself yesterday? Did you mark his countenance, dear?"

"Indeed there was no helping it, any more than one can help watching a storm-cloud as it comes up."

"So it was dark and wrathful, was it, that ugly face of his?" There was a knock, and before Erica could reach the door, Frolich burst in.

"Such news!" she cried--"You never heard such news."

"Good or bad?" inquired Ulla.

"Oh, bad--very bad," declared Frolich; "there is a pirate vessel among the islands. She was seen off Soroe some time ago, but she is much nearer to us now. There was a farmhouse seen burning on Alten fiord last week, and as the family are all gone and nothing but ruins left, there is little doubt the pirates lit the torch that did it. And the cod has been carried off from the beach in the few places where any has been caught yet."

"They have not found out our fiord yet?" inquired Ulla.

"Oh dear! I hope not. But they may, any day. And father says the coast must be raised, from Hammerfest to Tronyem, and a watch set till this wicked vessel can be taken or driven away. He was going to send a running message both ways, but there is something else to be done first."

"Another misfortune?" asked Erica faintly.

"No; they say it is a piece of very good fortune--at least for those who like bears' feet for dinner. Somebody or other has lighted upon the great bear that got away in the summer, and poked her out of her den on the fjelde. She is certainly abroad with her two last year's cubs, and their traces have been found just above, near the foss. Oddo has come running home to tell us, and father says he must get up a hunt before more snow falls and we lose the tracks, or the family may establish themselves among us and make away with our first calves."

"Does he expect to kill them all?"

"I tell you we are all to grow stout on bears' feet. For my part I like bears' feet best on the other side of Tronyem."

"You will change your mind, Miss Frolich, when you see them on the table," observed Ulla.

"That is just what father said. And he asked how I thought Erica and Stiorna would like to have a den in their neighbourhood when they got up to the mountain for the summer."

Erica with a sigh rose to return to the house. In the porch she found Oddo.

Wooden dwellings resound so much as to be inconvenient for those who have secrets to tell. In the porch of Peder's house Oddo had heard all that passed within.

"Dear Erica," said he, "I want you to do a very kind thing for me. Do get leave for me to go with Rolf after the bears. If I get one stroke at them--if I can but wound one of them, I shall have a paw for my share, and I will lay it out for Nipen. You will, will not you?"

"It must be as Erlingsen chooses, Oddo, but I fancy you will not be allowed to go just now."

The establishment was now in a great hurry and bustle for an hour, after which time it promised to be unusually quiet.

M. Kollsen began to be anxious to be on the other side of the fiord. It was rather inconvenient, as the two men were wanted to go in different directions, while their master took a third, to rouse the farmers for the bear-hunt. The hunters were all to arrive before night within a certain distance of the thickets where the bears were now believed to be. On calm nights it was no great hardship to spend the dark hours in the bivouac of the country. Each party was to shelter itself under a bank of snow, or in a pit dug out of it, an enormous fire blazing in the midst, and brandy and tobacco being plentifully distributed on such occasions. Early in the morning the director of the hunt was to go his rounds, and arrange the hunters in a ring enclosing the hiding-place of the bears, so that all might be prepared, and no waste made of the few hours of daylight which the season afforded. As soon as it was light enough to see distinctly among the trees, or bushes, or holes of the rocks where the bears might be couched, they were to be driven from their retreat and disposed of as quickly as possible. Such was the plan, well understood in such cases throughout the country. On the present occasion it might be expected that the peasantry would be ready at the first summons. Yet the more messengers and helpers the better, and Erlingsen was rather vexed to see Hund go with alacrity to unmoor the boat and offer officiously to row the pastor across the fiord. His daughters knew what he was thinking about, and, after a moment's consultation, Frolich asked whether she and the maid Stiorna might not be the rowers.

Nobody would have objected if Hund had not. The girls could row, though they could not hunt bears, and the weather was fair enough; but Hund shook his head, and went on preparing the boat. His master spoke to him, but Hund was not remarkable for giving up his own way. He would only say that there would be plenty of time for both affairs, and that he could follow the hunt when he returned, and across the lake he went.

Erlingsen and Rolf presently departed. The women and Peder were left behind.

They occupied themselves, to keep away anxious thoughts. Old Peder sang to them, too. Hour after hour they looked for Hund. His news of his voyage, and the sending him after his master, would be something to do and to think of; but Hund did not come. Stiorna at last let fall that she did not think he would come yet, for that he meant to catch some cod before his return. He had taken tackle with him for that purpose, she knew, and she should not wonder if he did not appear till the morning.

Every one was surprised and Madame Erlingsen highly displeased. At the time when her husband would be wanting every strong arm that could be mustered, his servant chose to be out fishing, instead of obeying orders. The girls pronounced him a coward, and Peder observed that to a coward, as well as a sluggard, there was ever a lion in the path. Erica doubted whether this act of disobedience arose from cowardice, for there were dangers in the fiord for such as went out as far as the cod. She supposed Hund had heard----

She stopped short, as a sudden flash of suspicion crossed her mind. She had seen Hund inquiring of Olaf about the pirates, and his strange obstinacy about this day's boating looked much as if he meant to learn more.

"Danger in the fiord!" repeated Orga; "oh, you mean the pirates. They are far enough from our fiord, I suppose. If ever they do come, I wish they would catch Hund and carry him off, I am sure we could spare them nothing they would be so welcome to."

"Did not you see M. Kollsen in the boat with Hund?" Madame Erlingsen inquired of Oddo when he came in.

"No, Hund was quite alone, pulling with all his might down the fiord. The tide was with him, so that he shot along like a fish."

"How do you know it was Hund that you saw?"

"Don't I know our boat? And don't I know his pull? It is no more like Rolf's then Rolf's is like master's."

"Perhaps he was making for the best fishing-ground as fast as he could."

"We shall see that by the fish he brings home."

"True. By supper-time we shall know."

"Hund will not be home by supper-time," said Oddo decidedly,

"Why not? Come, say out what you mean."

"Well, I will tell you what I saw, I watched him rowing as fast as his arm and the tide would carry him. It was so plain that there was a plan in his head, that I followed on from point to point, catching a sight now and then, till I had gone a good stretch beyond Salten heights. I was just going to turn back when I took one more look, and he was then pulling in for the land."

"On the north shore or south?" asked Peder.

"The north--just at the narrow part of the fiord, where one can see into the holes of the rocks opposite."

"The fiord takes a wide sweep below there," observed Peder.

"Yes; and that was why he landed," replied Oddo. "He was then but a little way from the fishing-ground, if he had wanted fish. But he drove up the boat into a little cove, a narrow dark creek, where it will lie safe enough, I have no doubt, till he comes back--if he means to come back."

"Why, where should he go? What should he do but come back?" asked Madame Erlingsen.

"He is now gone over the ridge to the north. I saw him moor the boat, and begin to climb; and I watched his dark figure on the white snow, higher and higher, till it was a speck, and I could not make it out."

"What do you think of this story, Peder?" asked his mistress.

"I think Hund has taken the short cut over the promontory, on business of his own at the islands. He is not on any business of yours, depend upon it, madame."

"And what business can he have among the islands?"

"I could say that with more certainty if I knew exactly where the pirate vessel is."

"That is your idea, Erica," said her mistress. "I saw what your thoughts were an hour ago, before we knew all this."

"I was thinking then, madame, that if Hund was gone to join the pirates, Nipen would be very ready to give them a wind just now. A baffling wind would be our only defence; and we cannot expect that much from Nipen to-day."

"I will do anything in the world," cried Oddo eagerly. "Send me anywhere. Do think of something that I can do."

"What must be done, Peder?" asked his mistress.

"There is quite enough to fear, Erica, without a word of Nipen. Pirates on the coast, and one farmhouse seen burning already."

"I will tell you what you must let me do, madame," said Erica. "Indeed you must not oppose me. My mind is quite set upon going for the boat--immediately--this very minute. That will give us time, it will give us safety for this night. Hund might bring seven or eight men upon us over the promontory; but if they find no boat, I think they can hardly work up the windings of the fiord in their own vessel to-night; unless, indeed," she added with a sigh, "they have a most favourable wind."

"All this is true enough," said her mistress; "but how will you go? Will you swim?"

"The raft, madame."

"And there is the old skiff on Thor islet," said Oddo. "It is a rickety little thing, hardly big enough for two; but it will carry down Erica and me, if we go before the tide turns."

"But how will you get to Thor islet?" inquired Madame Erlingsen. "I wish the scheme were not such a wild one."

"A wild one must serve at such a time, madame," replied Erica. "Rolf had lashed several logs before he went. I am sure we can get over to the islet. See, madame, the fiord is as smooth as a pond."

"Let her go," said Peder. "She will never repent."

"Then come back, I charge you, if you find the least danger," said her mistress. "No one is safer at the oar than you; but if there is a ripple in the water, or a gust on the heights, or a cloud in the sky, come back. Such is my command, Erica."

"Wife," said Peder, "give her your pelisse. That will save her seeing the girls before she goes. And she shall have my cap, and then there is not an eye along that fiord that can tell whether she is man or woman."

Ulla lent her deer-skin pelisse willingly enough; but she entreated that Oddo might be kept at home. She folded her arms about the boy with tears; but Peder decided the matter with the words--

"Let him go. It is the least he can do to make up for last night. Equip, Oddo."