Chapter 53

“She’s got a skin as tender as that of a king’s daughter. Wouldn’t one think she was a cuckoo’s child? Her father couldn’t stand her. ‘You’ve betrayed me with some fine gentleman’—he used so often to say that. ‘We poor folks couldn’t bring a piece like that into the world!’ ‘As God lives, Johnsen,’ I used to say, ‘you and no other are the girl’s father.’ But he used to beat us—he wouldn’t believe me. He used to fly into a rage when he looked at the child, and he hated us both because she was so fine. So its no wonder that she had gone a bit queer in the head. You can believe she’s cost me tears of blood, Pelle. But you let her be, Pelle. I could wish you could get her, but it wouldn’t be best for you, and it isn’t good for you to have her playing with you. And if you got her after all, it would be even worse. A woman’s whims are poor capital for setting up house with.”

Pelle agreed with her in cold blood; he had allowed himself to he fooled, and was wasting his youth upon a path that led nowhere. But now there should be an end of it.

Hanne came back and looked at him, radiant, full of visions. “Will you take me for a walk, Pelle?” she asked him.

“Yes!” answered Pelle joyfully, and he threw all his good resolutions overboard.

V

Pelle and his little neighbor used to compete as to which of them should be up first in the morning. When she was lucky and had to wake him her face was radiant with pride. It sometimes happened that he would lie in bed a little longer, so that he should not deprive her of a pleasure, and when she knocked on the wall he would answer in a voice quite stupid with drowsiness. But sometimes her childish years demanded the sleep that was their right, when Pelle would move about as quietly as possible, and then, at half-past six, it would be his turn to knock on the wall. On these occasions she would feel ashamed of herself all the morning. Her brothers were supposed to get their early coffee and go to work by six o’clock. Peter, who was the elder, worked in a tin-plate works, while Earl sold the morning papers, and undertook every possible kind of occasional work as well; this he had to hunt for, and you could read as much in his whole little person. There was something restless and nomadic about him, as though his thoughts were always seeking some outlet.

It was quite a lively neighborhood at this time of day; across the floor of the well, and out through the tunnel-like entry there was an endless clattering of footsteps, as the hundreds of the “Ark” tumbled out into the daylight, half tipsy with sleep, dishevelled, with evidence of hasty rising in their eyes and their garments, smacking their lips as though they relished the contrast between the night and day, audibly yawning as they scuttled away. Up in Pelle’s long gangway factory girls, artisans, and newspaper women came tumbling out, half naked; they were always late, and stood there scolding until their turn came to wash themselves. There was only one lavatory at either end of the gangway, and there was only just time to sluice their eyes and wake themselves up. The doors of all the rooms stood open; the odors of night were heavy on the air.

On the days when Pelle worked at home little Marie was in high spirits. She sang and hummed continually, with her curiously small voice, and every few minutes she would run in and offer Pelle her services. At such times she would station herself behind him and stand there in silence, watching the progress of his work, while her breathing was audibly perceptible, as a faint, whistling sound. There was a curious, still, brooding look about her little under-grown figure that reminded Pelle of Morten’s unhappy sister; something hard and undeveloped, as in the fruit of a too-young tree. But the same shadow did not lie upon her; childish toil had not steeped her as with a bitter sap; only her outer shell was branded by it. There was about her, on the contrary, a gleam of careful happiness, as though things had turned out much better than she had expected. Perhaps this was because she could see the result of her hard childish labors; no one could scatter that to the winds.

She was a capable little housewife, and her brothers respected her, and faithfully brought home what they earned. Then she took what she needed, laid something by toward the rent, in a box which was put away in the chest of drawers, and gave them something wherewith to amuse themselves. “They must have something!” she told people; “besides, men always need money in their pockets. But they deserve it, for they have never yet spent a farthing in drink. On Saturday nights they always come straight home with their earnings. But now I must get on with my work; it’s dreadful how the time runs through one’s hands.”

She talked just like a young married woman, and Pelle inwardly chuckled over her.

After a while she would peep in again; it was time for Pelle to have a bite of something; or else she would bring her mending with her and sit down on the edge of a chair.

She was always in a fidget lest a saucepan should boil over, or something else go amiss.

At such times they had long, sensible talks. Little Marie did not care about gossip; but there were plenty of serious things which had to be talked over; the difficult times, Marie’s parents, and then the wonderful fact that they had met one another once before, a long time ago; that was an event which provided her with an inexhaustible mine of discussion, although she herself could not remember the occasion.

But Pelle remembered it all quite well, and over and over again he had to tell her how one day at home he had gone down to the harbor, in order to show old Thatcher Holm the steamers; and she always laughed when she heard how Holm had run away in his alarm every time the steam-crane blew off steam. And then? Yes, the steamer was just on the point of taking on board a heap of furniture, old beds, tables, and the like.

“That was all ours!” cried Marie, clapping her hands. “We still had a few things then. We took them to the pawn-shop when father lay ill after his fall.” And then she would meet his gaze, asking for more.

And in the midst of all the furniture stood a man with a fine old mirror in his arms. Thatcher Holm knew him, and had a talk with him.

“He was crying, wasn’t he?” asked Marie compassionately. “Father was so unhappy, because things were going so badly with us.”

And then she herself would talk about the hotel, down among the cliffs of the east coast, and of the fine guests who came there in summer. Three years they had kept the hotel, and Pelle had to name the sum out of which her father had been cheated. She was proud that they had once possessed so much. Ten thousand kroner!

Over here her father had found work as a stonemason’s laborer, but one day he trod on a loose beam and fell. For a few months he lay sick, and all their household goods found their way to the pawn-shop; then he died, and then they came to the “Ark.” Their mother did washing out of doors, but at last she became queer in the head. She could not bear unhappiness, and neglected her housework, to run about seeking consolation from all sorts of religious sects. At last she was quite demented, and one day she disappeared. It was believed that she had drowned herself in the canal. “But things are going well with us now,” Marie always concluded; “now there’s nothing to worry about.”

“But don’t you get tired of having all this to look after?” Pelle would ask, wondering.

She would look at him in astonishment. “Why should I be tired? There’s not more than one can manage—if one only knows how to manage. And the children never make things difficult for me; they are pleased with everything I do.”

The three orphans struggled on as well as they could, and were quite proud of their little household. When things went badly with them, they went hungry, and took serious counsel together; but they accepted help from no one. They lived in the continual fear that the police would get to know of their position, and haul them off to school. Then they would be forcibly separated and brought up at the expense of the poor-rates. They were shy, and “kept themselves to themselves.” In the “Ark” everybody liked them, and helped them to keep their secret. The other inmates managed their family affairs as best they could; there was always a scandal somewhere. It was a sort of satisfaction to have these three children living so decently in the midst of all this hotch-potch. People thought a great deal of their little model household, and protected it as though it had been a sanctuary.

To Pelle they attached themselves blindly. They had picked him up out of the streets, and they certainly regarded him to some extent as a foundling who was still under their protection. When Marie had given the boys their morning coffee, she carried some in to Pelle—it was no use protesting. And in the mornings, when she was busy indoors by herself, she would go round to him with broom and bucket. Her precocious, intelligent face was beaming with circumspection and the desire to help. She did not ask permission, but set to work where need was. If Pelle was away at Beck’s workshop, he always found his room clean and tidy in the evening.

If he had work at home, she would bring coffee for the two of them during the morning. He did not dare to drive her away, for she would take that to heart, and would go about offended all the rest of the day; so he would run below to fetch a roll of white bread. Marie always found some pretext for putting aside her share for the boys; it gave her no real pleasure to enjoy anything by herself.

Pelle felt that he was making headway; and he was conscious of his own youth. He was continually in the rosiest of humors, and even Hanne could not throw any real shadow over his existence. In his relations with her there was something of a beautiful unreality; they left no permanent scar upon his heart.

He felt quite simply ashamed in the presence of this much tried child, whenever something cropped up to put him out of temper. He felt it was his duty to brighten her poverty-stricken life with his high spirits. He chatted merrily to her, chaffed her, teased her, to charm her from her unnatural solemnity. And she would smile, in her quiet, motherly fashion, as one smiles at a much-loved child who seeks to drive away our cares—and would then offer to do something for him.

“Shall I wash out your blouse or do up your shirt?” she would ask. Her gratitude always found its expression in some kind of work.

“No, thanks, Marie; Hanne and her mother look after that.”

“But that’s not work for the Princess—I can do it much better.”

“The Princess?” said Pelle, raising his head. “Is that what they call her?”

“Only us children—we don’t mean it unkindly. But we always played at there being a princess when she was with us—and she was always the princess. But do you know what? Some one will come and take her away— some one very distinguished. She has been promised from the cradle to a fine gentleman.”

“What nonsense!” said Pelle crossly.

“But that’s really true! When it rained we used to sit under the gallery—in the corner by the dustbin—and she used to tell us—and it’s really true! And, besides, don’t you think she’s fascinating? She’s really just like a princess—like that!” Marie made a gesture in the air with her fingers outspread. “And she knows everything that is going to happen. She used to run down to us, in the courtyard, in her long dress, and her mother used to stand up above and call her; then she’d sit on the grating as if it was a throne and she was the queen and we were her ladies. She used to braid our hair, and then dress it beautifully with colored ribbons, and when I came up here again mother used to tear it all down and make my hair rough again. It was a sin against God to deck one’s self out like that, she said. And when mother disappeared I hadn’t time to play down there any more.”

“Poor little girl!” said Pelle, stroking her hair.

“Why do you say that?” she asked him, looking at him in astonishment.

He enjoyed her absolute confidence, and was told things that the boys were not allowed to know. She began to dress more carefully, and her fine fair hair was always brushed smoothly back from her forehead. She was delighted when they both had some errand in the city. Then she put on her best and went through the streets at his side, her whole face smiling. “Now perhaps people will think we are a couple of lovers—but what does it matter? Let them think it!” Pelle laughed; with her thirteen years she was no bigger than a child of nine, so backward in growth was she.

She often found it difficult to make both ends meet; she would say little or nothing about it, but a kind of fear would betray itself in her expression. Then Pelle would speak cheerfully of the good times that would soon be coming for all poor people. It cost him a great deal of exertion to put this in words so as to make it sound as it ought to sound. His thoughts were still so new—even to himself. But the children thought nothing of his unwieldy speech; to them it was easier to believe in the new age than it was to him.

VI

Pelle was going through a peculiar change at this time. He had seen enough need and poverty in his life; and the capital was simply a battlefield on which army upon army had rushed forward and had miserably been defeated. Round about him lay the fallen. The town was built over them as over a cemetery; one had to tread upon them in order to win forward and harden one’s heart. Such was life in these days; one shut one’s eyes—like the sheep when they see their comrades about to be slaughtered—and waited until one’s own turn came. There was nothing else to do.

But now he was awake and suffering; it hurt him with a stabbing pain whenever he saw others suffer; and he railed against misfortune, unreasonable though it might be.

There came a day when he sat working at home. At the other end of the gangway a factory girl with her child had moved in a short while before. Every morning she locked the door and went to work—and she did not return until the evening. When Pelle came home he could hear the sound of crying within the room.

He sat at his work, wrestling with his confused ideas. And all the time a curious stifled sound was in his ears—a grievous sound, as though something were incessantly complaining. Perhaps it was only the dirge of poverty itself, some strophe of which was always vibrating upon the air.

Little Marie came hurrying in. “Oh, Pelle, it’s crying again!” she said, and she wrung her hands anxiously upon her hollow chest. “It has cried all day, ever since she came here—it is horrible!”

“We’ll go and see what’s wrong,” said Pelle, and he threw down his hammer.

The door was locked; they tried to look through the keyhole, but could see nothing. The child within stopped its crying for a moment, as though it heard them, but it began again at once; the sound was low and monotonous, as though the child was prepared to hold out indefinitely. They looked at one another; it was unendurable.

“The keys on this gangway do for all the doors,” said Marie, under her breath. With one leap Pelle had rushed indoors, obtained his key, and opened the door.

Close by the door sat a little four-year-old boy; he stared up at them, holding a rusty tin vessel in his hand. He was tied fast to the stove; near him, on an old wooden stool, was a tin plate containing a few half- nibbled crusts of bread. The child was dressed in filthy rags and presented a shocking appearance. He sat in his own filth; his little hands were covered with it. His tearful, swollen face was smeared all over with it. He held up his hands to them beseechingly.

Pelle burst into tears at the horrible sight and wanted to pick the child up. “Let me do that!” cried Marie, horrified. “You’ll make yourself filthy!”

“What then?” said Pelle stupidly. He helped to untie the child; his hands were trembling.

To some extent they got the child to rights and gave him food. Then they let him loose in the long gangway. For a time he stood stupidly gaping by the doorpost; then he discovered that he was not tied up, and began to rush up and down. He still held in his hand the old tea-strainer which he had been grasping when they rescued him; he had held on to it convulsively all the time. Marie had to dip his hand in the water in order to clean the strainer.

From time to time he stood in front of Pelle’s open door, and peeped inside. Pelle nodded to him, when he went storming up and down again—he was like a wild thing. But suddenly he came right in, laid the tea- strainer in Pelle’s lap and looked at him. “Am I to have that?” asked Pelle. “Look, Marie, he is giving me the only thing he’s got!”

“Oh, poor little thing!” cried Marie pityingly. “He wants to thank you!”

In the evening the factory girl came rushing in; she was in a rage, and began to abuse them for breaking into her room. Pelle wondered at himself, that he was able to answer her so quietly instead of railing back at her. But he understood very well that she was ashamed of her poverty and did not want any one else to see it. “It is unkind to the child,” was all he said. “And yet you are fond of it!”

Then she began to cry. “I have to tie him up, or he climbs out over the window-sill and runs into the street—he got to the corner once before. And I’ve no clothes, to take him to the crêche!”

“Then leave the door open on the gangway! We will look after him, Marie and I.”

After this the child tumbled about the gangway and ran to and fro. Marie looked after him, and was like a mother to him. Pelle bought some old clothes, and they altered them to fit him. The child looked very droll in them; he was a little goblin who took everything in good part. In his loneliness he had not learned to speak, but now speech came quickly to him.

In Pelle this incident awakened something quite novel. Poverty he had known before, but now he saw the injustice that lay beneath it, and cried to heaven. His hands would suddenly clench with anger as he sat so quietly in his room. Here was something one must hasten forward, without intermission, day and night, as long as one drew breath—Morten was right about that! This child’s father was a factory hand, and the girl dared not summon him before the magistrates in order to make him pay for its support for fear of being dismissed from her place. The whole business seemed so hopeless—society seemed so unassailable—yet he felt that he must strike a blow. His own hands alone signified so little; but if they could only strike the blow all together—then perhaps it would have some effect.

In the evenings he and Morten went to meetings where the situation was passionately discussed. Those who attended these meetings were mostly young people like himself. They met in some inn by the North Bridge. But Pelle longed to see some result, and applied himself eagerly to the organization of his own craft.

He inspired the weary president with his own zeal, and they prepared together a list of all the members of their trade—as the basis of a more vigorous agitation. When the “comrades” were invited to a meeting through the press, they turned lazy and failed to appear. More effectual means were needed; and Pelle started a house-to-house agitation. This helped immediately; they were in a dilemma when one got them face to face, and the Union was considerably increased, in spite of the persecution of the big masters.

Morten began to treat him with respect; and wanted him to read about the movement. But Pelle had no time for that. Together with Peter and Karl, who were extremely zealous, he took in _The Working Man_, and that was enough for him. “I know more about poverty than they write there,” he said.

There was no lack of fuel to keep this fire burning. He had participated in the march of poverty, from the country to the town and thence to the capital, and there they stood and could go no farther for all their longing, but perished on a desert shore. The many lives of the “Ark” lay always before his eyes as a great common possession, where no one need conceal himself, and where the need of the one was another’s grief.

His nature was at this time undergoing a great change. There was an end of his old careless acceptance of things. He laughed less and performed apparently trivial actions with an earnestness which had its comical side. And he began to display an appearance of self-respect which seemed ill-justified by his position and his poverty.

One evening, when work was over, as he came homeward from Beck’s workshop, he heard the children singing Hanne’s song down in the courtyard. He stood still in the tunnel-like entry; Hanne herself stood in the midst of a circle, and the children were dancing round her and singing:

“I looked from the lofty mountain Down over vale and lea, And I saw a ship come sailing, Sailing, sailing, I saw a ship come sailing, And on it were lordlings three.”

On Hanne’s countenance lay a blind, fixed smile; her eyes were tightly closed. She turned slowly about as the children sang, and she sang softly with them:

“The youngest of all the lordlings Who on the ship did stand…”

But suddenly she saw Pelle and broke out of the circle. She went up the stairs with him. The children, disappointed, stood calling after her.

“Aren’t you coming to us this evening?” she asked. “It is so long since we have seen you.”

“I’ve no time. I’ve got an appointment,” replied Pelle briefly.

“But you must come! I beg you to, Pelle.” She looked at him pleadingly, her eyes burning.

Pelle’s heart began to thump as he met her gaze. “What do you want with me?” he asked sharply.

Hanne stood still, gazing irresolutely into the distance.

“You must help me, Pelle,” she said, in a toneless voice, without meeting his eye.

“Yesterday I met…. Yesterday evening, as I was coming out of the factory … he stood down below here … he knows where I live. I went across to the other side and behaved as though I did not see him; but he came up to me and said I was to go to the New Market this evening!”

“And what did you say to that?” answered Pelle sulkily.

“I didn’t say anything—I ran as hard as I could!”

“Is that all you want me for?” cried Pelle harshly. “You can keep away from him, if you don’t want him!”

A cold shudder ran through her. “But if he comes here to look for me?… And you are so…. I don’t care for anybody in the world but you and mother!” She spoke passionately.

“Well, well, I’ll come over to you,” answered Pelle cheerfully.

He dressed himself quickly and went across. The old woman was delighted to see him. Hanne was quite frolicsome; she rallied him continually, and it was not long before he had abandoned his firm attitude and allowed himself to be drawn into the most delightful romancing. They sat out on the gallery under the green foliage, Hanne’s face glowing to rival the climbing pelargonium; she kept on swinging her foot, and continually touched Pelle’s leg with the tip of her shoe.

She was nervously full of life, and kept on asking the time. When her mother went into the kitchen to make coffee, she took Pelle’s hand and smilingly stroked it.

“Come with me,” she said. “I should so like to see if he is really so silly as to think I’d come. We can stand in a corner somewhere and look out.”

Pelle did not answer.

“Mother,” said Hanne, when Madam Johnsen returned with the coffee, “I’m going out to buy some stuff for my bodice. Pelle’s coming with me.”