Part 54 (2/2)
Inger is sad and down-hearted enough; ay, so erringly faithful that she mourns for him. 'Tis hard for her; she is honestly in love, without any thought of vanity or conquest. And not ashamed, no; she is a strong woman full of weakness; she is but following the law of nature all about her; it is the glow of autumn in her as in all things else. Her breast heaves with feeling as she packs up food for Gustaf to take with him. No thought of whether she has the right, of whether she dare risk this or that; she gives herself up to it entirely, hungry to taste, to enjoy. Isak might lift her up to the roof and thrust her to the floor again--ay, what of that! It would not make her feel the less.
She goes out with the parcel to Gustaf.
Now she had set the bucket by the steps on purpose, in case he should care to go with her to the river just once more. Maybe she would like to say something, to give him some little thing--her gold ring; Heaven knows, she was in a state to do anything. But there must be an end of it some time; Gustaf thanks her, says good-bye, and goes.
And there she stands.
”Hjalmar!” she calls out aloud--oh, so much louder than she need. As if she were determined to be gay in spite of all--or crying out in distress.
Gustaf goes on his way....
All through that autumn there was the usual work in the fields all round, right away down to the village: potatoes to be taken up, corn to be got in, the horned cattle let loose over the ground. Eight farms there are now and all are busy; but at the trading station, at s...o...b..rg, there are no cattle, and no green lands, only a garden. And there is no trade there now, and nothing for any to be busy about there.
They have a new root crop at Sellanraa called turnips, sending up a colossal growth of green waving leaves out of the earth, and nothing can keep the cows away from them--the beasts break down all hedgework, and storm in, bellowing. Nothing for it but to set Leopoldine and little Rebecca to keep guard over the turnip fields, and little Rebecca walks about with a big stick in her hand and is a wonder at driving cows away. Her father is at work close by; now and again he comes up to feel her hands and feet, and ask if she is cold.
Leopoldine is big and grown up now; she can knit stockings and mittens for the winter while she is watching the herds. Born in Trondhjem, was Leopoldine, and came to Sellanraa five years old. But the memory of a great town with many people and of a long voyage on a steamer is slipping away from her now, growing more and more distant; she is a child of the wilds and knows nothing now of the great world beyond the village down below where she has been to church once or twice, and where she was confirmed the year before....
And the little casual work of every day goes on, with this thing and that to be done beside; as, for instance, the road down below, that is getting bad one or two places. The ground is still workable, and Isak goes down one day with Sivert, ditching and draining the road. There are two patches of bog to be drained.
Axel Strom has promised to take part in the work, seeing that he has a horse and uses the road himself--but Axel had pressing business in the town just then. Heaven knows what it could be, but very pressing, he said it was. But he had asked his brother from Breidablik to work with them in his stead.
Fredrik was this brother's name. A young man, newly married, a light-hearted fellow who could make a jest, but none the worse for that; Sivert and he are something alike. Now Fredrik had looked in at s...o...b..rg on his way up that morning, Aronsen of s...o...b..rg being his nearest neighbour, and he is full of all the trader has been telling him. It began this way; Fredrik wanted a roll of tobacco. ”I'll give you a roll of tobacco when I have one,” said Aronsen.
”What, you've no tobacco in the place?”
”No, nor won't order any. There's n.o.body to buy it. What d'you think I make out of one roll of tobacco?”
Ay, Aronsen had been in a nasty humour that morning, sure enough; felt he had been cheated somehow by that Swedish mining concern. Here had he set up a store out in the wilds, and then they go and shut down the work altogether!
Fredrik smiles slyly at Aronsen, and makes fun of him now. ”He's not so much as touched that land of his,” says he, ”and hasn't even feed for his beasts, but must go and buy it. Asked me if I'd any hay to sell. No, I'd no hay to sell. 'Ho, d'you mean you don't want to make money?' said Aronsen. Thinks money's everything in the world, seems like. Puts down a hundred-_Krone_ note on the counter, and says 'Money!' 'Ay, money's well enough,' says I. 'Cash down,' says he. Ay, he's just a little bit touched that way, so to speak, and his wife she goes about with a watch and chain and all on weekdays--Lord He knows what can be she's so set on remembering to the minute.”
Says Sivert: ”Did Aronsen say anything about a man named Geissler?”
”Ay. Said something about he'd be wanting to sell some land he'd got. And Aronsen was wild about it, he was--'fellow that used to be Lensmand and got turned out,' he said, and 'like as not without so much as a five _Krone_ in his books, and ought to be shot!' 'Ay, but wait a bit,' says I, 'and maybe he'll sell after all.' 'Nay,' says Aronsen, 'don't you believe it. I'm a business man,' says he, 'and I know--when one party puts up a price of two hundred and fifty thousand, and the other offers twenty-five thousand, there's too big a difference; there'll be no deal ever come out of that. Well, let 'em go their own way, and see what comes of it,' says he. 'I only wish I'd never set my foot in this hole, and a poor thing it's been for me and mine.' Then I asked him if he didn't think of selling out himself.
'Ay,' says he, 'that's just what I'm thinking of. This bit of bogland,' says he, 'a hole and a desert--I'm not making a single _Krone_ the whole day now,' says he.”
They laughed at Aronsen, and had no pity for him at all.
”Think he'll sell out?” asks Isak.
”Well, he did speak of it. And he's got rid of the lad he had already.
Ay, a curious man, a queer sort of man, that Aronsen, 'tis sure. Sends away his lad could be working on the place getting in winter fuel and carting hay with that horse of his, but keeps on his storeman--chief clerk, he calls him. 'Tis true enough, as he says, not selling so much as a _Krone_ all day, for he's no stock in the place at all. And what does he want with a chief clerk, then? I doubt it'll be just by way of looking grand and making a show, must have a man there to stand at a desk and write up things in books. Ha ha ha! ay, looks like he's just a little bit touched that way, is Aronsen.”
The three men worked till noon, ate food from their baskets, and talked a while. They had matters of their own to talk over, matters of good and ill to folk on the land; no trifles, to them, but things to be discussed warily; they are clear-minded folk, their nerves unworn, and not flying out where they should not. It is the autumn season now, a silence in the woods all round; the hills are there, the sun is there, and at evening the moon and the stars will come; all regular and certain, full of kindliness, an embrace. Men have time to rest here, to lie in the heather, with an arm for a pillow.
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