Chapter 10

“Grandmother’s got to have her face blacked!” cried the children. She begged to be let off, as she was just washed for the night; but the children blacked a cork in the stove and surrounded her, and she was given a black streak down her nose. Every one laughed, both old and young, and grandmother laughed with them, saying it was a good thing she could not see it herself. “It’s an ill wind,” she said, “that blows nobody any good. But I should like to have my sight again,” she went on, “if it’s only for five minutes, before I die. It would be nice to see it all once more, now that the trees and everything have grown so, as Kalle says they have. The whole country must have changed. And I’ve never seen the youngest children at all.”

“They say that they can take blindness away over in Copenhagen,” said Kalle to his brother.

“It would cost a lot of money, wouldn’t it?” asked Lasse.

“It would cost a hundred krones at the very least,” the grandmother remarked.

Kalle looked thoughtful. “If we were to sell the whole blooming thing, it would be funny if there wasn’t a hundred krones over. And then grandmother could have her sight again.”

“Goodness gracious me!” exclaimed the old woman. “Sell your house and home! You must be out of your mind! Throw away a large capital upon an old, worn-out thing like me, that has one foot in the grave! I couldn’t wish for anything better than what I have!” She had tears in her eyes. “Pray God I mayn’t bring about such a misfortune in my old age!”

“Oh, rubbish! We’re still young,” said Kalle. “We could very well begin something new, Maria and me.”

“Have none of you heard how Jacob Kristian’s widow is?” asked the old lady by way of changing the subject. “I’ve got it into my head that she’ll go first, and then me. I heard the crow calling over there last night.”

“That’s our nearest neighbor on the heath,” explained Kalle. “Is she failing now? There’s been nothing the matter with her this winter that I know of.”

“Well, you may be sure there’s something,” said the old woman positively. “Let one of the children run over there in the morning.”

“Yes, if you’ve had warning. Jacob Kristian gave good enough warning himself when he went and died. But we were good friends for many years, he and me.”

“Did he show himself?” asked Lasse solemnly.

“No; but one night—nasty October weather it was—I was woke by a knocking at the outside door. That’s a good three years ago. Maria heard it too, and we lay and talked about whether I should get up. We got no further than talking, and we were just dropping off again, when the knocking began again. I jumped up, put on a pair of trousers, and opened the door a crack, but there was no one there. ‘That’s strange!’ I said to Maria, and got into bed again; but I’d scarcely got the clothes over me, when there was a knocking for the third time.

“I was cross then, and lighted the lantern and went round the house; but there was nothing either to be seen or heard. But in the morning there came word to say that Jacob Kristian had died in the night just at that time.”

Pelle, who had sat and listened to the conversation, pressed close up to his father in fear; but Lasse himself did not look particularly valiant. “It’s not always nice to have anything to do with the dead,” he said.

“Oh, nonsense! If you’ve done no harm to any one, and given everybody their due, what can they do to you?” said Kalle. The grandmother said nothing, but sat shaking her head very significantly.

Maria now placed upon the table a jar of dripping and a large loaf of rye-bread.

“That’s the goose,” said Kalle, merrily sticking his sheath-knife into the loaf. “We haven’t begun it yet. There are prunes inside. And that’s goose-fat. Help yourselves!”

After that Lasse and Pelle had to think about getting home, and began to tie handkerchiefs round their necks; but the others did not want to let them go yet. They went on talking, and Kalle made jokes to keep them a little longer. But suddenly he turned as grave as a judge; there was a low sound of crying out in the little passage, and some one took hold of the handle of the door and let go of it again. “Upon my word, it’s ghosts!” he exclaimed, looking fearfully from one to another.

The sound of crying was heard again, and Maria, clasping her hands together, exclaimed: “Why, it’s Anna!” and quickly opened the door. Anna entered in tears, and was attacked on all sides with surprised inquiries, to which her sobs were her only answer.

“And you’ve been given a holiday to come and see us at Christmas time, and you come home crying! You are a nice one!” said Kalle, laughing. “You must give her something to suck, mother!”

“I’ve lost my place,” the girl at last got out between her sobs.

“No, surely not!” exclaimed Kalle, in changed tones. “But what for? Have you been stealing? Or been impudent?”

“No, but the master accused me of being too thick with his son.”

In a flash the mother’s eyes darted from the girl’s face to her figure, and she too burst into tears.

Kalle could see nothing, but he caught his wife’s action and understood. “Oh!” he said quietly. “Is that it?” The little man was like a big child in the way the different expressions came and went upon his good-natured face. At last the smile triumphed again. “Well, well, that’s capital!” he exclaimed, laughing. “Shouldn’t good children take the work off their parents’ shoulders as they grow up and are able to do it? Take off your things, Anna, and sit down. I expect you’re hungry, aren’t you? And it couldn’t have happened at a better time, as we’ve got to have the midwife anyhow!”

Lasse and Pelle drew their neckerchiefs up over their mouths after taking leave of every one in the room, Kalle circling round them restlessly, and talking eagerly. “Come again soon, you two, and thanks for this visit and your present, Brother Lasse! Oh, yes!” he said suddenly at the outside door, and laughed delightedly; “it’ll be something grand—brother-in-law to the farmer in a way! Oh, fie, Kalle Karlsson! You and I’ll be giving ourselves airs now!” He went a little way along the path with them, talking all the time. Lasse was quite melancholy over it.

Pelle knew quite well that what had happened to Anna was looked upon as a great disgrace, and could not understand how Uncle Kalle could seem so happy. “Ah, yes,” said Lasse, as they stumbled along among the stones. “Kalle’s just like what he always was! He laughs where others would cry.”

It was too dark to go across the fields, so they took the quarry road south to get down to the high-road. At the cross-roads, the fourth arm of which led down to the village, stood the country-shop, which was also a hedge-alehouse.

As they approached the alehouse, they heard a great noise inside. Then the door burst open, and some men poured out, rolling the figure of a man before them on the ground. “The police have taken them by surprise!” said Lasse, and drew the boy with him out into the ploughed field, so as to get past without being seen. But at that moment some one placed a lamp in the window, and they were discovered.

“There’s the Stone Farm herdsman!” said a voice. “Hi, Lasse! Come here!” They went up and saw a man lying face downward on the ground, kicking; his hands were tied behind his back, and he could not keep his face out of the mud.

“Why, it’s Per Olsen!” exclaimed Lasse.

“Yes, of course!” said the shopkeeper. “Can’t you take him home with you? He’s not right in his head.”

Lasse looked hesitatingly at the boy, and then back again. “A raving man?” he said. “We two can’t alone.”

“Oh, his hands are tied. You’ve only got to hold the end of the rope and he’ll go along quietly with you,” said one of the men. They were quarrymen from the stone-quarry. “You’ll go with them quietly, won’t you?” he asked, giving the man a kick in the side with the toe of his wooden shoe.

“Oh dear! Oh dear!” groaned Per Olsen.

“What’s he done?” asked Lasse. “And why have you ill-used him so?”

“We had to thrash him a little, because he was going to chop off one of his thumbs. He tried it several times, the beast, and got it half off; and we had to beat him to make him stop.” And they showed Lasse the man’s thumb, which was bleeding. “Such an animal to begin cutting and hacking at himself because he’s drunk half a pint of gin! If he wanted to fight, there were men enough here without that!”

“It must be tied up, or he’ll bleed to death, poor fellow!” said Lasse, slowly drawing out his red pocket-handkerchief. It was his best handkerchief, and it had just been washed. The shopkeeper came with a bottle and poured spirit over the thumb, so that the cold should not get into it. The wounded man screamed and beat his face upon the ground.

“Won’t one of you come with us?” asked Lasse. But no one answered; they wanted to have nothing to do with it, in case it should come to the ears of the magistrate. “Well, then, we two must do it with God’s help,” he said, in a trembling voice, turning to Pelle. “But you can help him up at any rate, as you knocked him down.”

They lifted him up. His face was bruised and bleeding; in their eagerness to save his finger, they had handled him so roughly that he could scarcely stand.

“It’s Lasse and Pelle,” said the old man, trying to wipe his face. “You know us, don’t you, Per Olsen? We’ll go home with you if you’ll be good and not hurt us; we mean well by you, we two.”

Per Olsen stood and ground his teeth, trembling all over his body. “Oh dear, oh dear!” was all he said. There was white foam at the corners of his mouth.

Lasse gave Pelle the end of the rope to hold. “He’s grinding his teeth; the devil’s busy with him already,” he whispered. “But if he tries to do any harm, just you pull with all your might at the rope; and if the worst comes to the worst, we must jump over the ditch.”

They now set off homeward, Lasse holding Per Olsen under the arm, for he staggered and would have fallen at almost every step. He kept on murmuring to himself or grinding his teeth.

Pelle trudged behind, holding the rope. Cold shivers ran down his back, partly from fear, partly from secret satisfaction. He had now seen some one whom he knew to be doomed to perdition! So those who became devils in the next world looked like Per Olsen? But he wasn’t unkind! He was the nicest of the farm men to Pelle, and he had bought that bottle for them—yes, and had advanced the money out of his own pocket until May-day!

VIII

Oh! what a pace she was driving at! The farmer whipped up the gray stallion, and sat looking steadily out over the fields, as if he had no suspicion that any one was following him; but his wife certainly did not mind. She whipped the bay as hard as she could, and did not care who saw her.

And it was in broad daylight that they were playing the fool like this on the high-road, instead of keeping their quarrels within four walls as decent people did! It was true enough that gentle folks had no feeling of shame in them!

Then she called out and stood up in the trap to beat the horse—with the handle even! Couldn’t she let him drive out in peace to his fair charmer, whoever she was, and make it warm for him when he came home? How could she do the same thing over and over again for twenty years? Really women were persevering creatures!

And how _he_ could be bothered! Having everlasting disturbances at home for the sake of some hotel landlady or some other woman, who could not be so very different to be with than his own wife! It would take a long-suffering nature to be a brute in that way; but that must be what they call love, properly speaking.

The threshing-machine had come to a standstill, and the people at Stone Farm were hanging out of the doors and windows, enjoying it royally. It was a race, and a sight for the gods to see the bay mare gaining upon the stallion; why, it was like having two Sundays in one week! Lasse had come round the corner, and was following the mad race, his hand shading his eyes. Never had he known such a woman; Bengta was a perfect lamb compared to her! The farmer at Kaase Farm, who was standing at his gate when they dashed past, was secretly of the same opinion; and the workers in the fields dropped their implements, stared and were scandalized at the sight.

At last, for very shame, he had to stop and turn round. She crawled over into his carriage, and the bay followed quietly with her empty vehicle. She put her arm about his shoulder, and looked happy and triumphant, exactly like the district policeman when he has had a successful chase; but he looked like a criminal of the worst kind. In this way they came driving back to the farm.

One day Kalle came to borrow ten krones and to invite Lasse and Pelle to the christening-party on the following Sunday. Lasse, with some difficulty, obtained the money from the bailiff up in the office, but to the invitation they had to say “No, thank you,” hard though it was; it was quite out of the question for them to get off again. Another day the head man had disappeared. He had gone in the night, and had taken his big chest with him, so some one must have helped him; but the other men in the room swore solemnly that they had noticed nothing, and the bailiff, fume as he might, was obliged to give up the attempt to solve the mystery.

One or two things of this kind happened that made a stir for a day or two, but with these exceptions the winter was hard to get through. Darkness ruled for the greater part of the twenty-four hours, and it was never quite light in the corners. The cold, too, was hard to bear, except when you were in the comfortable stable. In there it was always warm, and Pelle was not afraid of going about in the thickest darkness. In the servants’ room they sat moping through the long evenings without anything to occupy themselves with. They took very little notice of the girls, but sat playing cards for gin, or telling horrible stories that made it a most venturesome thing to run across the yard down to the stable when you had to go to bed.

Per Olsen, on account of his good behavior, was raised to the position of head man when the other ran away. Lasse and Pelle were glad of this, for he took their part when they were put upon by any one. He had become a decent fellow in every respect, hardly ever touched spirits, and kept his clothes in good order. He was a little too quiet even for the old day-laborers of the farm and their wives; but they knew the reason of it and liked him because he took the part of the weak and because of the fate that hung over him. They said he was always listening; and when he seemed to be listening within to the unknown, they avoided as far as possible disturbing him.

“You’ll see he’ll free himself; the Evil One’ll have no claim upon him,” was the opinion of both Lasse and the laborers’ wives when they discussed Per Olsen’s prospects at the Sunday milking. “There are some people that even the Almighty can’t find anything to blame for.”

Pelle listened to this, and tried every day to peep at the scar on Per Olsen’s thumb. It would surely disappear when God removed his judgment!

During most of the winter Pelle drove the horse for the threshing- machine. All day he trotted round upon the horse-way outside the farm, over his wooden shoes in trodden-down snow and manure. It was the most intolerable occupation that life had yet offered him. He could not even carve, it was too cold for his fingers; and he felt lonely. As a herd-boy he was his own master, and a thousand things called to him; but here he had to go round and round behind a bar, always round. His one diversion was to keep count of the times he drove round, but that was a fatiguing employment and made you even duller than the everlasting going round, and you could not leave off. Time held nothing of interest, and short as it was the day seemed endless.

As a rule, Pelle awoke happy, but now every morning when he woke he was weary of everything; it was to be that everlasting trudging round behind the bar. After a time doing this for about an hour used to make him fall into a state of half-sleep. The condition came of itself, and he longed for it before it came. It was a kind of vacuity, in which he wished for nothing and took no interest in anything, but only staggered along mechanically at the back of the bar. The machine buzzed unceasingly, and helped to maintain the condition; the dust kept pouring out at the window, and the time passed imperceptibly. Generally now dinner or evening surprised him, and sometimes it seemed to him that the horses had only just been harnessed when some one came out to help him in with them. He had arrived at the condition of torpor that is the only mercy that life vouchsafes to condemned prisoners and people who spend their lives beside a machine. But there was a sleepiness about him even in his free time; he was not so lively and eager to know about everything; Father Lasse missed his innumerable questions and little devices.

Now and again he was roused for a moment out of his condition by the appearance at the window of a black, perspiring face, that swore at him because he was not driving evenly. He knew then that Long Ole had taken the place of Per Olsen, whose business it was to feed the machine. It sometimes happened, too, that the lash of the whip caught on the axle and wound round it, so that the whole thing had to be stopped and drawn backward; and that day he did not fall into a doze again.

In March the larks appeared and brought a little life. Snow still lay in the hollows, but their singing reminded Pelle warmly of summer and grazing cattle. And one day he was wakened in his tramp round and round by seeing a starling on the roof of the house, whistling and preening its feathers in delight. On that day the sun shone brightly, and all heaviness was gone from the air; but the sea was still a pale gray down there.

Pelle began to be a human being again. It was spring, and then, too, in a couple of days the threshing would be finished. But after all, the chief thing was that waistcoat-pocket of his; that was enough to put life into its owner. He ran round in a trot behind the bar; he had to drive quickly now in order to get done, for every one else was in the middle of spring ploughing already. When he pressed his hand against his chest, he could distinctly feel the paper it was wrapped in. For it was still there, wasn’t it? It would not do to open the paper and look; he must find out by squeezing.

Pelle had become the owner of fifty öres—a perfectly genuine fifty-öre piece. It was the first time he had ever possessed anything more than two and one öre pieces, and he had earned it by his own cleverness.

It was on Sunday, when the men had had a visit from some quarrymen, and one of them had hit upon the idea of sending for some birch-fat to have with their dram. Pelle was to run to the village shop for it, and he was given a half-krone and injunctions to go in the back way, as it was Sunday. Pelle had not forgotten his experience at Christmas, and kept watch upon their faces. They were all doing their best to smooth them out and busy themselves with one thing and another; and Gustav, who gave him the money, kept turning his face away and looking at something out in the yard.

When he stated his errand, the shopman’s wife broke into a laugh. “I say, don’t you know better than that?” she exclaimed. “Why, wasn’t it you who fetched the handle-turner too? You’ve all found that very useful, haven’t you?”

Pelle turned crimson. “I thought they were making fun of me, but I didn’t dare say no,” he said in a low voice.

“No, one has to play the fool sometimes, whether one is it or not,” said the woman.

“What is birch-fat, then?” asked Pelle.

“Why, my gracious! You must have had it many a time, you little imp! But it shows how often you have to put up with things you don’t know the name of.”

A light dawned upon Pelle. “Does it mean a thrashing with a birch-rod?”

“Didn’t I say you knew it?”

“No, I’ve only had it with a whip—on my legs.”

“Well, well, you needn’t mind that; the one may be just as good as the other. But now sit down and drink a cup of coffee while I wrap up the article for them.” She pushed a cup of coffee with brown sugar toward him, and began ladling out soft soap on to a piece of paper. “Here,” she said. “You give them that: it’s the best birch-fat. And you can keep the money yourself.”

Pelle was not courageous enough for this arrangement.

“Very well, then,” she said. “I’ll keep the money for you. They shan’t make fools of us both. And then you can get it yourself. But now you must put on a bold face.”

Pelle did put on a bold face, but he was decidedly nervous. The men swore at the loss of the half-krone, and called him the “greatest idiot upon God’s green earth”; but he had the satisfaction of knowing that that was because he had not been stupid enough. And the half-krone was his!

A hundred times a day he felt it without wearing it out. Here at last was something the possession of which did not rob it of its lustre. There was no end to the purchases he made with it, now for Lasse, now for himself. He bought the dearest things, and when he lingered long enough over one purchase and was satiated with the possession of it, he set about buying something else. And all the while he kept the coin. At times he would be suddenly seized with an insane fear that the money was gone; and then when he felt it, he was doubly happy.

Pelle had suddenly become a capitalist, and by his own cleverness; and he made the most of his capital. He had already obtained every desirable thing that he knew of—he had it all, at any rate, in hand; and gradually as new things made their appearance in his world, he secured for himself the right to their purchase. Lasse was the only person who knew about his wealth, and he had reluctantly to allow himself to be drawn into the wildest of speculations.

He could hear by the sound that there was something wrong with the machine. The horses heard it too, and stopped even before some one cried “Stop!” Then one after another came the shouts: “Stop! Drive on! Stop! On again! Stop! Pull!” And Pelle pulled the bar back, drove on and pulled until the whole thing whizzed again. Then he knew that it was Long Ole feeding the machine while Per Olsen measured the grain: Ole was a duffer at feeding.

It was going smoothly again, and Pelle was keeping an eye on the corner by the cow-stable. When Lasse made his appearance there, and patted his stomach, it meant that it was nearly dinner-time.

Something stopped the bar, the horses had to pull hard, and with a jerk it cleared the invisible hindrance. There was a cry from the inside of the threshing-barn, and the sound of many voices shouting “Stop!” The horses stopped dead, and Pelle had to seize the bar to prevent it swinging forward against their legs. It was some time before any one came out and took the horses in, so that Pelle could go into the barn and see what was the matter.

He found Long Ole walking about and writhing over one of his hands. His blouse was wrapped about it, but the blood was dripping through on to the floor of the barn. He was bending forward and stumbling along, throwing his body from side to side and talking incoherently. The girls, pale and frightened, were standing gazing at him while the men were quarreling as to what was the best thing to do to stop the flow of blood, and one of them came sliding down from the loft with a handful of cobwebs.