Chapter XII: A Glimpse of Spring 104 (3)

'If thou art a huldre, then pray do not spell me;
If thou art a maiden, then hasten to tell me.'

"But there came no answer; and so he was sure she was a huldre. He gave up tending cattle; but it was all the same; wherever he went, and whatever he did, he was all the while thinking of the beautiful huldre who blew on the horn. Soon he could bear it no longer; and one moonlight evening when all were asleep, he stole away into the forest, which stood there all dark at the bottom, but with its tree-tops bright in the moonbeams. He sat down on the cliff, and called--

'Run forward, my huldre; my love has o'ercome me;
My life is a burden; no longer hide from me.'

"The lad looked and looked; but she didn't appear. Then he heard something moving behind him; he turned round and saw a big black bear, which came forward, squatted on the ground and looked at him. But he ran away from the cliff and through the forest as fast as his legs could carry him: if the bear followed him, he didn't know, for he didn't turn round till he lay safely in bed.

"'It was one of her herd,' the lad thought; 'it isn't worth while to go there any more;' and he didn't go.

"Then, one day, while he was chopping wood, a girl came across the yard who was the living picture of the huldre: but when she drew nearer, he saw it wasn't she. Over this he pondered much. Then he saw the girl coming back, and again while she was at a distance she seemed to be the huldre, and he ran to meet her; but as soon as he came near, he saw it wasn't she.

"After this, wherever the lad was--at church at dances, or any other parties--the girl was, too; and still when at a distance she seemed to be the huldre, and when near she was somebody else. Then he asked her whether she was the huldre or not, but she only laughed at him. 'One may as well leap into it as creep into it,' the lad thought; and so he married the girl.

"But the lad had hardly done this before he ceased to like the girl: when he was away from her he longed for her; but when he was with her he yearned for some one he did not see. So the lad behaved very badly to his wife; but she suffered in silence.

"Then one day when he was out looking for his horses, he came again to the cliff; and he sat down and called out--

'Like fairy moonlight, to me thou seemest;
Like Midsummer-fires, from afar thou gleamest.'

"He felt that it did him good to sit there; and afterwards he went whenever things were wrong at home. His wife wept when he was gone.

"But one day when he was sitting there, he saw the huldre sitting all alive on the other side blowing her horn. He called over--

'Ah, dear, art thou come! all around thee is shining!
Ah, blow now again! I am sitting here pining.'

"Then she answered--

'Away from thy mind the dreams I am blowing;
Thy rye is all rotting for want of mowing.'

"But then the lad felt frightened and went home again. Ere long, however, he grew so tired of his wife that he was obliged to go to the forest again, and he sat down on the cliff. Then was sung over to him--

'I dreamed thou wast here; ho, hasten to bind me!
No; not over there, but behind you will find me.'

"The lad jumped up and looked around him, and caught a glimpse of a green petticoat just slipping away between the shrubs. He followed, and it came to a hunting all through the forest. So swift-footed as that huldre, no human creature could be: he flung steel over her again and again, but still she ran on just as well as ever. But soon the lad saw, by her pace, that she was beginning to grow tired, though he saw, too, by her shape, that she could be no other than the huldre. 'Now,' he thought, you'll be mine easily;' and he caught hold on her so suddenly and roughly that they both fell, and rolled down the hills a long way before they could stop themselves. Then the huldre laughed till it seemed to the lad the mountains sang again. He took her upon his knee; and so beautiful she was, that never in all his life he had seen any one like her: exactly like her, he thought his wife should have been. 'Ah, who are you who are so beautiful?' he asked, stroking her cheek. She blushed rosy red. 'I'm your wife,' she answered."

The girls laughed much at that tale, and ridiculed the lad. But Godfather asked Arne if he had listened well to it.

"Well, now I'll tell you something," said a little girl with a little round face, and a very little nose:--

"Once there was a little lad who wished very much to woo a little girl. They were both grown up; but yet they were very little. And the lad couldn't in any way muster courage to ask her to have him. He kept close to her when they came home from church; but, somehow or other, their chat was always about the weather. He went over to her at the dancing-parties, and nearly danced her to death; but still he couldn't bring himself to say what he wanted. 'You must learn to write,' he said to himself; 'then you'll manage matters.' And the lad set to writing; but he thought it could never be done well enough; and so he wrote a whole year round before he dared do his letter. Now, the thing was to get it given to her without anybody seeing. He waited till one day when they were standing all by themselves behind the church. 'I've got a letter for you,' said the lad. 'But I can't read writing,' the girl answered.

"And there the lad stood.

"Then he went to service at the girl's father's house; and he used to keep hovering round her all day long. Once he had nearly brought himself to speak; in fact, he had already opened his mouth; but then a big fly flew in it. 'Well, I hope, at any rate, nobody else will come to take her away,' the lad thought; but nobody came to take her, because she was so very little.

"By-and-by, however, some one _did_ come, and he, too, was little. The lad could see very well what he wanted; and when he and the girl went up-stairs together, the lad placed himself at the key-hole. Then he who was inside made his offer. 'Bad luck to me, I, codfish, who didn't make haste!' the lad thought. He who was inside kissed the girl just on her lips----. 'No doubt that tasted nice,' the lad thought. But he who was inside took the girl on his lap. 'Oh, dear me! what a world this is!' the lad said, and began crying. Then the girl heard him and went to the door. 'What do you want, you nasty boy?' said she, 'why can't you leave me alone?'--'I? I only wanted to ask you to have me for your bridesman.'--'No; that, my brother's going to be,' the girl answered, banging the door to.

"And there the lad stood."

The girls laughed very much at this tale, and afterwards pelted each other with husks.

Then Godfather wished Eli Boeen to tell something.

"What, then, must it be?"

"Well, she might tell what she had told him on the hill, the last time he came to see her parents, when she gave him the new garters. Eli laughed very much; and it was some time before she would tell it: however, she did at last,--

"A lad and a girl were once walking together on a road. 'Ah, look at that thrush that follows us!' the girl said. 'It follows _me_,' said the lad. 'It's just as likely to be _me_,' the girl answered. 'That, we'll soon find out,' said the lad; 'you go that way, while I go this, and we'll meet up yonder.' They did so. 'Well, didn't it follow me?' the lad asked, when they met. 'No; it followed me,' answered the girl. 'Then, there must be two.' They went together again for some distance, but then there was only one thrush; and the lad thought it flew on his side, but the girl thought it flew on hers. 'Devil a bit, I care for that thrush,' said the lad. 'Nor do I,' answered the girl.

"But no sooner had they said this, than the thrush flew away. 'It was on _your_ side, it was,' said the lad. 'Thank you,' answered the girl; 'but I clearly saw it was on _your_ side.--But see! there it comes again!' 'Indeed, it's on _my_ side,' the lad exclaimed. Then the girl got angry: 'Ah, well, I wish I may never stir if I go with you any longer!' and she went away.

"Then the thrush, too, left the lad; and he felt so dull that he called out to the girl, 'Is the thrush with you?'--'No; isn't it with you?'--'Ah, no; you must come here again, and then perhaps it will follow you.'

"The girl came; and she and the lad walked on together, hand in hand. 'Quitt, quitt, quitt, quitt!' sounded on the girl's side; 'quitt, quitt, quitt, quitt!' sounded on the lad's side; 'quitt, quitt, quitt, quitt!' sounded on every side; and when they looked there were a hundred thousand million thrushes all round them. 'Ah, how nice this is!' said the girl, looking up at the lad. 'Ah, God bless you!' said he, and kissed her."

All the girls thought this was such a nice tale.

Then Godfather said they must tell what they had dreamed last night, and he would decide who had dreamed the nicest things.

"Tell what they had dreamed! No; impossible!"

And then there was no end of tittering and whispering. But soon one after another began to think she had such a nice dream last night; and then others thought it could not possibly be so nice as what they had dreamed; and at last they all got a great mind for telling their dreams. Yet they must not be told aloud, but to one only, and that one must by no means be Godfather. Arne had all this time been sitting quietly a little lower down the hill, and so the girls thought they dared tell their dreams to him.

Then Arne seated himself under a hazel-bush; and Aasa, the girl who had told the first tale, came over to him. She hesitated a while, but then began,--

"I dreamed I was standing by a large lake. Then I saw one walking on the water, and it was one whose name I will not say. He stepped into a large water-lily, and sat there singing. But I launched out upon one of the large leaves of the lily which lay floating on the water; for on it I would row over to him. But no sooner had I come upon the leaf than it began to sink with me, and I became much frightened, and I wept. Then he came rowing along in the water-lily, and lifted me up to him; and we rowed all over the whole lake. Wasn't that a nice dream?"

Next came the little girl who had told the tale about the little lad,--

"I dreamed I had caught a little bird, and I was so pleased with it, and I thought I wouldn't let it loose till I came home in our room. But there I dared not let it loose, for I was afraid father and mother might tell me to let it go again. So I took it up-stairs; but I could not let it loose there, either, for the cat was lurking about. Then I didn't know what in the world to do; yet I took it into the barn. Dear me, there were so many cracks, I was afraid it might go away! Well, then I went down again into the yard; and there, it seemed to me some one was standing whose name I will not say. He stood playing with a big, big dog. 'I would rather play with that bird of yours,' he said, and drew very near to me. But then it seemed to me I began running away; and both he and the big dog ran after me all round the yard; but then mother opened the front door, pulled me hastily in, and banged the door after me. The lad, however, stood laughing outside, with his face against the window-pane. 'Look, here's the bird,' he said; and, only think, he had my bird out there! Wasn't that a beautiful dream?"

Then came the girl who had told about the thrushes--Eli, they called her. She was laughing so much that she could not speak for some time; but at last she began,--

"I had been looking forward with very much pleasure to our nutting in the wood to-day; and so last night I dreamed I was sitting here on the hill. The sun shone brightly; and I had my lap full of nuts. But there came a little squirrel among them, and it sat on its hind-legs and ate them all up. Wasn't that a funny dream?"

Afterwards some more dreams were told him; and then the girls would have him say which was the nicest. Of course, he must have plenty of time for consideration; and meanwhile Godfather and the whole flock went down to the house, leaving Arne to follow. They skipped down the hill, and when they came to the plain went all in a row singing towards the house.

Arne sat alone on the hill, listening to the singing. Strong sunlight fell on the group of girls, and their white bodices shone bright, as they went dancing over the meadows, every now and then clasping each other round the waist; while Godfather limped behind, threatening them with a stick because they trod down his hay. Arne thought no more of the dreams, and soon he no longer looked after the girls. His thoughts went floating far away beyond the valley, like the fine air-threads, while he remained behind on the hill, spinning; and before he was aware of it he had woven a close web of sadness. More than ever, he longed to go away.

"Why stay any longer?" he said to himself; "surely, I've been lingering long enough now!" He promised himself that he would speak to the mother about it as soon as he reached home, however it might turn out.

With greater force than ever, his thoughts turned to his song, "Over the mountains high;" and never before had the words come so swiftly, or linked themselves into rhyme so easily; they seemed almost like girls sitting in a circle on the brow of a hill. He had a piece of paper with him, and placing it upon his knee, he wrote down the verses as they came. When he had finished the song, he rose like one freed from a burden. He felt unwilling to see any one, and went homewards by the way through the wood, though he knew he should then have to walk during the night. The first time he stopped to rest on the way, he put his hand to his pocket to take out the song, intending to sing it aloud to himself through the wood; but he found he had left it behind at the place where it was composed.

One of the girls went on the hill to look for him; she did not find him, but she found his song.

X.

LOOSENING THE WEATHER-VANE.

To speak to the mother about going away, was more easily thought of than done. He spoke again about Christian, and those letters which had never come; but then the mother went away, and for days afterwards he thought her eyes looked red and swollen. He noticed, too, that she then got nicer food for him than usual; and this gave him another sign of her state of mind with regard to him.

One day he went to cut fagots in a wood which bordered upon another belonging to the parsonage, and through which the road ran. Just where he was going to cut his fagots, people used to come in autumn to gather whortleberries. He had laid aside his axe to take off his jacket, and was just going to begin work, when two girls came walking along with a basket to gather berries. He used generally to hide himself rather than meet girls, and he did so now.

"Ah! only see what a lot of berries! Eli, Eli!"

"Yes, dear, I see!"

"Well, but, then, don't go any farther; here are many basketfuls."

"I thought I heard a rustling among the trees!"

"Oh, nonsense!"

The girls rushed towards each other, clasped each other round the waist, and for a little while stood still, scarcely drawing breath. "It's nothing, I dare say; come, let's go on picking."

"Well, so we will."

And they went on.

"It was nice you came to the parsonage to-day, Eli. Haven't you anything to tell me?"

"Yes; I've been to see Godfather."

"Well, you've told me that; but haven't you anything to tell me about _him_--you know who?"

"Yes, indeed I have!"

"Oh! Eli, have you! make haste and tell me!" "He has been there again."

"Nonsense?"

"Indeed, he has: father and mother pretended to know nothing of it; but I went up-stairs and hid myself."

"Well, what then? did he come after you?"

"Yes; I believe father told him where I was; he's always so tiresome now."

"And so he came there?--Sit down, sit down; here, near me. Well, and then he came?"

"Yes; but he didn't say much, for he was so bashful."

"Tell me what he said, every word; pray, every word!"

"'Are you afraid of me?' he said. 'Why should I be afraid?' I answered. 'You know what I want to say to you,' he said, sitting down beside me on the chest."

"Beside you!"

"And he took me round my waist."

"Round your waist; nonsense!"

"I wished very much to get loose again; but he wouldn't let me. 'Dear Eli,' he said----" She laughed, and the other one laughed, too.

"Well? well?"

"'Will you be my wife?' Ha, ha, ha!"

"Ha, ha, ha!"

And then both laughed together, "Ha, ha, ha, ha!"

At last the laughing came to an end, and they were both quiet for a while. Then the one who had first spoken asked in a low voice, "Wasn't it strange he took you round your waist?"

Either the other girl did not answer that question, or she answered in so low a voice that it could not be heard; perhaps she only answered by a smile.

"Didn't your father or your mother say anything afterwards?" asked the first girl, after a pause.

"Father came up and looked at me; but I turned away from him because he laughed at me."

"And your mother?"

"No, she didn't say anything; but she wasn't so strict as usual."

"Well, you've done with him, I think?"

"Of course!"

Then there was again silence awhile.

"Was it thus he took you round your waist?"

"No; thus."

"Well, then;--it was thus...."

"Eli?"

"Well?"

"Do you think there will ever be anybody come in that way to me?"

"Of course, there will!"

"Nonsense! Ah, Eli? If he took me round the waist?" She hid her face.

Then they laughed again; and there was much whispering and tittering.

Soon the girls went away; they had not seen either Arne or the axe and jacket, and he was glad of it.

A few days after, he gave Opplands-Knut a little farm on Kampen. "You shall not be lonely any longer," Arne said.

That winter Arne went to the parsonage for some time to do carpentry; and both the girls were often there together. When Arne saw them, he often wondered who it might be that now came to woo Eli Boeen.

One day he had to drive for the clergyman's daughter and Eli; he could not understand a word they said, though he had very quick ears. Sometimes Mathilde spoke to him; and then Eli always laughed and hid her face. Mathilde asked him if it was true that he could make verses. "No," he said quickly; then they both laughed; and chattered and laughed again. He felt vexed; and afterwards when he met them seemed not to take any notice of them.

Once he was sitting in the servants' hall while a dance was going on, and Mathilde and Eli both came to see it. They stood together in a corner, disputing about something; Eli would not do it, but Mathilde would, and she at last gained her point. Then they both came over to Arne, courtesied, and asked him if he could dance. He said he could not; and then both turned aside and ran away, laughing. In fact, they were always laughing, Arne thought; and he became brave. But soon after, he got the clergyman's foster-son, a boy of about twelve, to teach him to dance, when no one was by.

Eli had a little brother of the same age as the clergyman's foster-son. These two boys were playfellows; and Arne made sledges, snow-shoes and snares for them; and often talked to them about their sisters, especially about Eli. One day Eli's brother brought Arne a message that he ought to make his hair a little smoother. "Who said that?"

"Eli did; but she told me not to say it was she."

A few days after, Arne sent word that Eli ought to laugh a little less. The boy brought back word that Arne ought by all means to laugh a little more.

Eli's brother once asked Arne to give him something that he had written. He complied, without thinking any more about the matter. But in a few days after, the boy, thinking to please Arne, told him that Eli and Mathilde liked his writing very much.

"Where, then, have they seen any of it?"

"Well, it was for them, I asked for some of it the other day."

Then Arne asked the boys to bring him something their sisters had written. They did so; and he corrected the errors in the writing with his carpenter's pencil, and asked the boys to lay it in some place where their sisters might easily find it. Soon after, he found the paper in his jacket pocket; and at the foot was written, "Corrected by a conceited fellow."

The next day, Arne completed his work at the parsonage, and returned home. So gentle as he was that winter, the mother had never seen him, since that sad time just after the father's death. He read the sermon to her, accompanied her to church, and was in every way very kind. But she knew only too well that one great reason for his increased kindness was, that he meant to go away when spring came. Then one day a message came from Boeen, asking him to go there to do carpentry.

Arne started, and, apparently without thinking of what he said, replied that he would come. But no sooner had the messenger left than the mother said, "You may well be astonished! From Boeen?"

"Well, is there anything strange in that?" Arne asked, without looking at her.

"From Boeen!" the mother exclaimed once more.

"And, why not from Boeen, as well as any other place?" he answered, looking up a little.

"From Boeen and Birgit Boeen!--Baard, who made your father a cripple, and all only for Birgit's sake!"

"What do you say?" exclaimed Arne; "was that Baard Boeen?"

Mother and son stood looking at each other. The whole of the father's life seemed unrolled before them, and at that moment they saw the black thread which had always run through it. Then they began talking about those grand days of his, when old Eli Boeen had himself offered him his daughter Birgit, and he had refused her: they passed on through his life till the day when his spine had been broken; and they both agreed that Baard's fault was the less. Still, it was he who had made the father a cripple; he, it was.

"Have I not even yet done with father?" Arne thought; and determined at the same moment that he would go to Boeen.

As he went walking, with his saw on his shoulder, over the ice towards Boeen, it seemed to him a beautiful place. The dwelling-house always seemed as if it was fresh painted; and--perhaps because he felt a little cold--it just then looked to him very sheltered and comfortable. He did not, however, go straight in, but went round by the cattle-house, where a flock of thick-haired goats stood in the snow, gnawing the bark off some fir twigs. A shepherd's dog ran backwards and forwards on the barn steps, barking as if the devil was coming to the house; but when Arne went to him, he wagged his tail and allowed himself to be patted. The kitchen door at the upper end of the house was often opened, and Arne looked over there every time; but he saw no one except the milkmaid, carrying some pails, or the cook, throwing something to the goats. In the barn the threshers were hard at work; and to the left, in front of the woodshed, a lad stood chopping fagots, with many piles of them behind him.

Arne laid away his saw and went into the kitchen: the floor was strewed with white sand and chopped juniper leaves; copper kettles shone on the walls; china and earthenware stood in rows upon the shelves; and the servants were preparing the dinner. Arne asked for Baard. "Step into the sitting-room," said one of the servants, pointing to an inner door with a brass knob. He went in: the room was brightly painted--the ceiling, with clusters of roses; the cupboards, with red, and the names of the owners in black letters; the bedstead, also with red, bordered with blue stripes. Beside the stove, a broad-shouldered, mild-looking man, with long light hair, sat hooping some tubs; and at the large table, a slender, tall woman, in a close-fitting dress and linen cap, sat sorting some corn into two heaps: no one else was in the room.

"Good day, and a blessing on the work," said Arne, taking off his cap. Both looked up; and the man smiled and asked who it was. "I am he who has come to do carpentry."

The man smiled still more, and said, while he leaned forward again to his work, "Oh, all right, Arne Kampen."

"Arne Kampen?" exclaimed the wife, staring down at the floor. The man looked up quickly, and said, smiling once more, "A son of Nils, the tailor;" and then he began working again.

Soon the wife rose, went to the shelf, turned from it to the cupboard, once more turned away, and, while rummaging for something in the table drawer, she asked, without looking up, "Is _he_ going to work _here_?"

"Yes, that he is," the husband answered, also without looking up.

"Nobody has asked you to sit down, it seems," he added, turning to Arne, who then took a seat. The wife went out, and the husband continued working: and so Arne asked whether he, too, might begin. "We'll have dinner first."

The wife did not return; but next time the door opened, it was Eli who entered. At first, she appeared not to see Arne, but when he rose to meet her she turned half round and gave him her hand; yet she did not look at him. They exchanged a few words, while the father worked on. Eli was slender and upright, her hands were small, with round wrists, her hair was braided, and she wore a dress with a close-fitting bodice. She laid the table for dinner: the laborers dined in the next room; but Arne, with the family.

"Isn't your mother coming?" asked the husband.

"No; she's up-stairs, weighing wool."

"Have you asked her to come?"

"Yes; but she says she won't have anything."

There was silence for a while.

"But it's cold up-stairs."

"She wouldn't let me make a fire."

After dinner, Arne began to work; and in the evening he again sat with the family. The wife and Eli sewed, while the husband employed himself in some trifling work, and Arne helped him. They worked on in silence above an hour; for Eli, who seemed to be the one who usually did the talking, now said nothing. Arne thought with dismay how often it was just so in his own home; and yet he had never felt it till now. At last, Eli seemed to think she had been silent quite long enough, and, after drawing a deep breath, she burst out laughing. Then the father laughed; and Arne felt it was ridiculous and began, too. Afterwards they talked about several things, soon the conversation was principally between Arne and Eli, the father now and then putting in a word edgewise. But once after Arne had been speaking at some length, he looked up, and his eyes met those of the mother, Birgit, who had laid down her work, and sat gazing at him. Then she went on with her work again; but the next word he spoke made her look up once more.

Bedtime drew near, and they all went to their own rooms. Arne thought he would take notice of the dream he had the first night in a fresh place; but he could see no meaning in it. During the whole day he had talked very little with the husband; yet now in the night he dreamed of no one in the house but him. The last thing was, that Baard was sitting playing at cards with Nils, the tailor. The latter looked very pale and angry; but Baard was smiling, and he took all the tricks.

Arne stayed at Boeen several days; and a great deal was done, but very little said. Not only the people in the parlor, but also the servants, the housemen, everybody about the place, even the women, were silent. In the yard was an old dog which barked whenever a stranger came near; but if any of the people belonging to the place heard him, they always said "Hush!" and then he went away, growling, and lay down. At Arne's own home was a large weather-vane, and here was one still larger which he particularly noticed because it did not turn. It shook whenever the wind was high, as though it wished to turn; and Arne stood looking at it so long that he felt at last he must climb up to unloose it. It was not frozen fast, as he thought: but a stick was fixed against it to prevent it from turning. He took the stick out and threw it down; Baard was just passing below, and it struck him.

"What are you doing?" said he, looking up.

"I'm loosening the vane."

"Leave it alone; it makes a wailing noise when it turns."

"Well, I think even that's better than silence," said Arne, seating himself astride on the ridge of the roof. Baard looked up at Arne, and Arne down at Baard. Then Baard smiled and said, "He who must wail when he speaks had better he silent."

Words sometimes haunt us long after they were uttered, especially when they were last words. So Baard's words followed Arne as he came down from the roof in the cold, and they were still with him when he went into the sitting-room in the evening. It was twilight; and Eli stood at the window, looking away over the ice which lay bright in the moonlight. Arne went to the other window, and looked out also. Indoors it was warm and quiet; outdoors it was cold, and a sharp wind swept through the vale, bending the branches of the trees, and making their shadows creep trembling on the snow. A light shone over from the parsonage, then vanished, then appeared again, taking various shapes and colors, as a distant light always seems to do when one looks at it long and intently. Opposite, the mountain stood dark, with deep shadow at its foot, where a thousand fairy tales hovered; but with its snowy upper plains bright in the moonlight. The stars were shining, and northern lights were flickering in one quarter of the sky, but they did not spread. A little way from the window, down towards the water, stood some trees, whose shadows kept stealing over to each other; but the tall ash stood alone, writing on the snow.

All was silent, save now and then, when a long wailing sound was heard. "What's that?" asked Arne.

"It's the weather-vane," said Eli; and after a little while she added in a lower tone, as if to herself, "it must have come unfastened."

But Arne had been like one who wished to speak and could not. Now he said, "Do you remember that tale about the thrushes?"

"Yes."

"It was you who told it, indeed. It was a nice tale."

"I often think there's something that sings when all is still," she said, in a voice so soft and low that he felt as if he heard it now for the first time.

"It is the good within our own souls," he said.

She looked at him as if she thought that answer meant too much; and they both stood silent a few moments. Then she asked, while she wrote with her finger on the window-pane, "Have you made any songs lately?"

He blushed; but she did not see it, and so she asked once more, "How do you manage to make songs?"

"Should you like to know?"

"Well, yes;--I should."

"I store up the thoughts that other people let slip."

She was silent for a long while; perhaps thinking she might have had some thoughts fit for songs, but had let them slip.

"How strange it is," she said, at last, as though to herself, and beginning to write again on the window-pane.

"I made a song the first time I had seen you."

"Where was that?"

"Behind the parsonage, that evening you went away from there;--I saw you in the water."

She laughed, and was quiet for a while.

"Let me hear that song."

Arne had never done such a thing before, but he repeated the song now:

"Fair Venevill bounded on lithesome feet
Her lover to meet," &c.[4]

[4] As on page 68.

Eli listened attentively, and stood silent long after he had finished. At last she exclaimed, "Ah, what a pity for her!"

"I feel as if I had not made that song myself," he said; and then stood like her, thinking over it.

"But that won't be my fate, I hope," she said, after a pause.

"No; I was thinking rather of myself."

"Will it be your fate, then?"

"I don't know; I felt so then."

"How strange." She wrote on the panes again.

The next day, when Arne came into the room to dinner, he went over to the window. Outdoors it was dull and foggy, but indoors, warm and comfortable; and on the window-pane was written with a finger, "Arne, Arne, Arne," and nothing but "Arne," over and over again: it was at that window, Eli stood the evening before.

XI.

ELI'S SICKNESS.

Next day, Arne came into the room and said he had heard in the yard that the clergyman's daughter, Mathilde, had just gone to the town; as she thought, for a few days, but as her parents intended, for a year or two. Eli had heard nothing of this before, and now she fell down fainting. Arne had never seen any one faint, and he was much frightened. He ran for the maids; they ran for the parents, who came hurrying in; and there was a disturbance all over the house, and the dog barked on the barn steps. Soon after, when Arne came in again, the mother was kneeling at the bedside, while the father supported Eli's drooping head. The maids were running about--one for water, another for hartshorn which was in the cupboard, while a third unfastened her jacket.

"God help you!" the mother said; "I see it was wrong in us not to tell her; it was you, Baard, who would have it so; God help you!" Baard did not answer. "I wished to tell her, indeed; but nothing's to be as I wish; God help you! You're always so harsh with her, Baard; you don't understand her; you don't know what it is to love anybody, you don't." Baard did not answer. "She isn't like some others who can bear sorrow; it quite puts her down, poor slight thing, as she is. Wake up, my child, and we'll be kind to you! wake up, Eli, my own darling, and don't grieve us so."

"You always either talk too much or too little," Baard said, at last, looking over to Arne, as though he did not wish him to hear such things, but to leave the room. As, however, the maid-servants stayed, Arne thought he, too, might stay; but he went over to the window. Soon the sick girl revived so far as to be able to look round and recognize those about her; but then also memory returned, and she called wildly for Mathilde, went into hysterics, and sobbed till it was painful to be in the room. The mother tried to soothe her, and the father sat down where she could see him; but she pushed them both from her.

"Go away!" she cried; "I don't like you; go away!"

"Oh, Eli, how can you say you don't like your own parents?" exclaimed the mother.

"No! you're unkind to me, and you take away every pleasure from me!"

"Eli, Eli! don't say such hard things," said the mother, imploringly.

"Yes, mother," she exclaimed; "now I _must_ say it! Yes, mother; you wish to marry me to that bad man; and I won't have him! You shut me up here, where I'm never happy save when I'm going out! And you take away Mathilde from me; the only one in the world I love and long for! Oh, God, what will become of me, now Mathilde is gone!"

"But you haven't been much with her lately," Baard said.

"What did that matter, so long as I could look over to her from that window," the poor girl answered, weeping in a childlike way that Arne had never before seen in any one.

"Why, you couldn't see her there," said Baard.

"Still, I saw the house," she answered; and the mother added passionately, "You don't understand such things, you don't." Then Baard said nothing more.

"Now, I can never again go to the window," said Eli. "When I rose in the morning, I went there; in the evening I sat there in the moonlight: I went there when I could go to no one else. Mathilde! Mathilde?" She writhed in the bed, and went again into hysterics. Baard sat down on a stool a little way from the bed, and continued looking at her.

But Eli did not recover so soon as they expected. Towards evening they saw she would have a serious illness, which had probably been coming upon her for some time; and Arne was called to assist in carrying her up-stairs to her room. She lay quiet and unconscious, looking very pale. The mother sat by the side of her bed, the father stood at the foot, looking at her: afterwards he went to his work. So did Arne; but that night before he went to sleep, he prayed for her; prayed that she who was so young and fair might be happy in this world, and that no one might bar away joy from her.

The next day when Arne came in, he found the father and mother sitting talking together: the mother had been weeping. Arne asked how Eli was; both expected the other to give an answer, and so for some time none was given, but at last the father said, "Well, she's very bad to-day."

Afterwards Arne heard that she had been raving all night, or, as the father said, "talking foolery." She had a violent fever, knew no one, and would not eat, and the parents were deliberating whether they should send for a doctor. When afterwards they both went to the sick-room, leaving Arne behind, he felt as if life and death were struggling together up there, but he was kept outside.

In a few days, however, Eli became a little better. But once when the father was tending her, she took it into her head to have Narrifas, the bird which Mathilde had given her, set beside the bed. Then Baard told her that--as was really the case--in the confusion the bird had been forgotten, and was starved. The mother was just coming in as Baard was saying this, and while yet standing in the doorway, she cried out, "Oh, dear me, what a monster you are, Baard, to tell it to that poor little thing! See, she's fainting again; God forgive you!" When Eli revived she again asked for the bird; said its death was a bad omen for Mathilde; and wished to go to her: then she fainted again. Baard stood looking on till she grew so much worse that he wanted to help, too, in tending her; but the mother pushed him away, and said she would do all herself. Then Baard gave a long sad look at both of them, put his cap straight with both hands, turned aside and went out.

Soon after, the Clergyman and his wife came; for the fever heightened, and grew so violent that they did not know whether it would turn to life or death. The Clergyman as well as his wife spoke to Baard about Eli, and hinted that he was too harsh with her; but when they heard what he had told her about the bird, the Clergyman plainly told him it was very rough, and said he would have her taken to his own house as soon as she was well enough to be moved. The Clergyman's wife would scarcely look at Baard; she wept, and went to sit with the sick one; then sent for the doctor, and came several times a day to carry out his directions. Baard went wandering restlessly about from one place to another in the yard, going oftenest to those places where he could be alone. There he would stand still by the hour together; then, put his cap straight and work again a little.

The mother did not speak to him, and they scarcely looked at each other. He used to go and see Eli several times in the day; he took off his shoes before he went up-stairs, left his cap outside, and opened the door cautiously. When he came in, Birgit would turn her head, but take no notice of him, and then sit just as before, stooping forwards, with her head on her hands, looking at Eli, who lay still and pale, unconscious of all that was passing around her. Baard would stand awhile at the foot of the bed and look at them both, but say nothing: once when Eli moved as though she were waking, he stole away directly as quietly as he had come.

Arne often thought words had been exchanged between man and wife and parents and child which had been long gathering, and would be long remembered. He longed to go away, though he wished to know before he went what would be the end of Eli's illness; but then he thought he might always hear about her even after he had left; and so he went to Baard telling him he wished to go home: the work which he came to do was completed. Baard was sitting outdoors on a chopping-block, scratching in the snow with a stick: Arne recognized the stick: it was the one which had fastened the weather-vane.

"Well, perhaps it isn't worth your while to stay here now; yet I feel as if I don't like you to go away, either," said Baard, without looking up. He said no more; neither did Arne; but after a while he walked away to do some work, taking for granted that he was to remain at Boeen.

Some time after, when he was called to dinner, he saw Baard still sitting on the block. He went over to him, and asked how Eli was.

"I think she's very bad to-day," Baard said.

"I see the mother's weeping."

Arne felt as if somebody asked him to sit down, and he seated himself opposite Baard on the end of a felled tree.

"I've often thought of your father lately," Baard said so unexpectedly that Arne did not know how to answer.

"You know, I suppose, what was between us?"

"Yes, I know."

"Well, you know, as may be expected, only one half of the story, and think I'm greatly to blame."

"You have, I dare say, settled that affair with your God, as surely as my father has done so," Arne said, after a pause.

"Well, some people might think so," Baard answered. "When I found this stick, I felt it was so strange that you should come here and unloose the weather-vane. As well now as later, I thought." He had taken off his cap, and sat silently looking at it.

"I was about fourteen years old when I became acquainted with your father, and he was of the same age. He was very wild, and he couldn't bear any one to be above him in anything. So he always had a grudge against me because I stood first, and he, second, when we were confirmed. He often offered to fight me, but we never came to it; most likely because neither of us felt sure who would beat. And a strange thing it is, that although he fought every day, no accident came from it; while the first time I did, it turned out as badly as could be; but, it's true, I had been wanting to fight long enough.

"Nils fluttered about all the girls, and they, about him. There was only one I would have, and her he took away from me at every dance, at every wedding, and at every party; it was she who is now my wife.... Often, as I sat there, I felt a great mind to try my strength upon him for this thing; but I was afraid I should lose, and I knew if I did, I should lose her, too. Then, when everybody had gone, I would lift the weights he had lifted, and kick the beam he had kicked; but the next time he took the girl from me, I was afraid to meddle with him, although once, when he was flirting with her just in my face, I went up to a tall fellow who stood by and threw him against the beam, as if in fun. And Nils grew pale, too, when he saw it.

"Even if he had been kind to her; but he was false to her again and again. I almost believe, too, she loved him all the more every time. Then the last thing happened. I thought now it must either break or bear. The Lord, too, would not have him going about any longer; and so he fell a little more heavily than I meant him to do. I never saw him afterwards."

They sat silent for a while; then Baard went on:

"I once more made my offer. She said neither yes nor no; but I thought she would like me better afterwards. So we were married. The wedding was kept down in the valley, at the house of one of her aunts, whose property she inherited. We had plenty when we started, and it has now increased. Our estates lay side by side, and when we married they were thrown into one, as I always, from a boy, thought they might be. But many other things didn't turn out as I expected." He was silent for several minutes; and Arne thought he wept; but he did not.

"In the beginning of our married life, she was quiet and very sad. I had nothing to say to comfort her, and so I was silent. Afterwards, she began sometimes to take to these fidgeting ways which you have, I dare say, noticed in her; yet it was a change, and so I said nothing then, either. But one really happy day, I haven't known ever since I was married, and that's now twenty years...."

He broke the stick in two pieces; and then sat for a while looking at them.

"When Eli grew bigger, I thought she would be happier among strangers than at home. It was seldom I wished to carry out my own will in anything, and whenever I did, it generally turned out badly; so it was in this case. The mother longed after her child, though only the lake lay between them; and afterwards I saw, too, that Eli's training at the parsonage was in some ways not the right thing for her; but then it was too late: now I think she likes neither father nor mother."

He had taken off his cap again; and now his long hair hung down over his eyes; he stroked it back with both hands, and put on his cap as if he were going away; but when, as he was about to rise, he turned towards the house, he checked himself and added, while looking up at the bed-room window.

"I thought it better that she and Mathilde shouldn't see each other to say good-bye: that, too, was wrong. I told her the wee bird was dead; for it was my fault, and so I thought it better to confess; but that again was wrong. And so it is with everything: I've always meant to do for the best, but it has always turned out for the worst; and now things have come to such a pass that both wife and daughter speak ill of me, and I'm going here lonely."

A servant-girl called out to them that the dinner was becoming cold. Baard rose. "I hear the horses neighing; I think somebody has forgotten them," he said, and went away to the stable to give them some hay.

Arne rose, too; he felt as if he hardly knew whether Baard had been speaking or not.

XII.

A GLIMPSE OF SPRING.

Eli felt very weak after the illness. The mother watched by her night and day, and never came down-stairs; the father came up as usual, with his boots off, and leaving his cap outside the door. Arne still remained at the house. He and the father used to sit together in the evening; and Arne began to like him much, for Baard was a well-informed, deep-thinking man, though he seemed afraid of saying what he knew. In his own way, he, too, enjoyed Arne's company, for Arne helped his thoughts and told him of things which were new to him.

Eli soon began to sit up part of the day, and as she recovered, she often took little fancies into her head. Thus, one evening when Arne was sitting in the room below, singing songs in a clear, loud voice, the mother came down with a message from Eli, asking him if he would go up-stairs and sing to her, that she might also hear the words. It seemed as if he had been singing to Eli all the time, for when the mother spoke he turned red, and rose as if he would deny having done so, though no one charged him with it. He soon collected himself, however, and replied evasively, that he could sing so very little. The mother said it did not seem so when he was alone.

Arne yielded and went. He had not seen Eli since the day he helped to carry her up-stairs; he thought she must be much altered, and he felt half afraid to see her. But when he gently opened the door and went in, he found the room quite dark, and he could see no one. He stopped at the door-way.

"Who is it?" Eli asked in a clear, low voice.

"It's Arne Kampen," he said in a gentle, guarded tone, so that his words might fall softly.

"It was very kind of you to come."

"How are you, Eli?"

"Thanks, I'm much better now."

"Won't you sit down, Arne?" she added after a while, and Arne felt his way to a chair at the foot of the bed. "It did me good to hear you singing; won't you sing a little to me up here?"

"If I only knew anything you would like."