Part 50 (1/2)

Well, perhaps there was no first-rate post vacant just then in the city, and Eleseus, perhaps, was not as sharp as a razor in pus.h.i.+ng his way. Heaven knows--perhaps he wasn't over clever at his work either.

Write? ay, he could write well enough, and quick and hard-working maybe, but there might be something lacking for all that. And if so, what was to become of him?

When he arrived from home with his two hundred _Kroner_, the city was waiting for him with old accounts outstanding, and when those were paid, well, he had to get a proper walking-stick, and not the remains of an umbrella. There were other little things as well that were but reasonable--a fur cap for the winter, like all his companions wore, a pair of skates to go on the ice with as others did, a silver toothpick, which was a thing to clean one's teeth, and play with daintily when chatting with friends over a gla.s.s of this or that. And as long as he had money, he stood treat as far as he was able; at a festive evening held to celebrate his return to town, he ordered half a dozen bottles of beer, and had them opened sparingly, one after another. ”What--twenty _Ore_ for the waitress?” said his friends; ”ten's quite enough.”

”Doesn't do to be stingy,” said Eleseus.

Nothing stingy nor mean about Eleseus, no; he come from a good home, from a big place, where his father the Margrave owned endless tracts of timber, and four horses and thirty cows and three mowing-machines.

Eleseus was no liar, and it was not he who had spread abroad all the fantastic stories about the Sellanraa estate; 'twas the district surveyor who had amused himself talking grandly about it a long while back. But Eleseus was not displeased to find the stories taken more or less for truth. Being nothing in himself, it was just as well to be the son of somebody that counted for something; it gave him credit, and was useful that way. But it could not last for ever; the day came when he could no longer put off paying, and what was he to do then?

One of his friends came to his help, got him into his father's business, a general store where the peasants bought their wares--better than nothing. It was a poor thing for a grown lad to start at a beginner's wage in a little shop; no short cut to the position of a Lensmand; still, it gave him enough to live on, helped him over the worst for the present--oh, 'twas not so bad, after all.

Eleseus was willing and good-tempered here too, and people liked him; he wrote home to say he had gone into trade.

This was his mother's greatest disappointment. Eleseus serving in a shop--'twas not a whit better than being a.s.sistant at the store down in the village. Before, he had been something apart, something different from the rest; none of their neighbours had gone off to live in a town and work in an office. Had he lost sight of his great aim and end? Inger was no fool; she knew well enough that there was a difference between the ordinary and the uncommon, though perhaps she did not always think to reckon with it. Isak was simpler and slower of thought; he reckoned less and less with Eleseus now, when he reckoned at all; his eldest son was gradually slipping out of range. Isak no longer thought of Sellanraa divided between his two sons when he himself should be gone.

Some way on in spring came engineers and workmen from Sweden; going to build roads, put up hutments, work in various ways, blasting, levelling, getting up supplies of food, hiring teams of horses, making arrangements with owners of land by the waterside; what--what was it all about? This is in the wilds, where folk never came but those who lived there? Well, they were going to start that copper mine, that was all.

So it had come to something after all; Geissler had not been merely boasting.

It was not the same big men that had come with him that time--no, the two of them had stayed behind, having business elsewhere, no doubt.

But the same engineer was there, and the mining expert that had come at first. They bought up all the sawn planks Isak could spare, bought food and drink and paid for it well, chatted in kindly fas.h.i.+on and were pleased with Sellanraa. ”Aerial railway,” they said. ”Cable haulage from the top of the fjeld down to the waterside,” they said.

”What, down over all this moorland here?” said Isak, being slow to think. But they laughed at that.

”No, on the other side, man; not this way, 'twould be miles to go. No, on the other side of the fjeld, straight down to the sea; a good fall, and no distance to speak of. Run the ore down through the air in iron tanks; oh, it'll work all right, you wait and see. But we'll have to cart it down at first; make a road, and have it hauled down in carts.

We shall want fifty horses--you see, we'll get on finely. And we've more men on the works than these few here--that's nothing. There's more coming up from the other side, gangs of men, with huts all ready to put up, and stores of provisions and material and tools and things--then we meet and make connection with them half-way, on the top, you see? We'll make the thing go, never fear--and s.h.i.+p the ore to South America. There's millions to be made out of it.”

”What about the other gentlemen,” asked Isak, ”that came up here before?”

”What? Oh, they've sold out. So you remember them? No, they've sold.

And the people that bought them out have sold again. It's a big company now that owns the mine--any amount of money behind it.”

”And Geissler, where'll he be now?” asks Isak.

”Geissler? Never heard of him. Who's he?”

”Lensmand Geissler, that sold you the place first of all.”

”Oh, him! Geissler was his name? Heaven knows where he is now. So you remember him too?”

Blasting and working up in the hills, gangs of men at work all through the summer--there was plenty doing about the place. Inger did a busy trade in milk and farm produce, and it amused her--going into business, as it were, and seeing all the many folk coming and going.

Isak tramped about with his lumbering tread, and worked on his land; nothing disturbed him. Sivert and the two stoneworkers got the new cowshed up. It was a fine building, but took a deal of time before it was finished, with only three men to the work, and Sivert, moreover, often called away to help in the fields. The mowing-machine was useful now; and a good thing, too, to have three active women that could take a turn at the haymaking.

All going well; there was life in the wilds now, and money growing, blossoming everywhere.

And look at s...o...b..rg, the new trader's place--there was a business on a proper scale! This Aron must be a wizard, a devil of a fellow; he had learned somehow beforehand of the mining operations to come, and was on the spot all ready, with his shop and store, to make the most of it. Business? He did business enough for a whole State--ay, enough for a king! To begin with, he sold all kinds of household utensils and workmen's clothes; but miners earning good money are not afraid to spend it; not content with buying necessaries only; they would buy anything and everything. And most of all on Sat.u.r.day evenings, the trading station at s...o...b..rg was crowded with folk, and Aron raking money in; his clerk and his wife were both called in to help behind the counter, and Aron himself serving and selling as hard as he could go at it--and even then the place would not be empty till late at night. And the owners of horse-flesh in the village, they were right; 'twas a mighty carting and hauling of wares up to s...o...b..rg; more than once they had to cut off corners of the old road and make new short cuts--a fine new road it was at last, very different from Isak's first narrow path up through the wilds. Aron was a blessing and a benefactor, nothing less, with his store and his new road. His name was not Aron really, that being only his Christian name; properly, he was Aronsen, and so he called himself, and his wife called him the same. They were a family not to be looked down upon, and kept two servant-girls and a lad.

As for the land at s...o...b..rg, it remained untouched for the present.