Part 9 (1/2)

Everybody agreed with this. But I could never have acted as a mediator, for I thought the a.s.sociate Master was right. In one's early seventies, one still has many pathetically young ideas.

The lawyer rounded off the discussion thus:

”Well, when all's said and done we have Switzerland to thank for being able to sit here at our ease in this comfortable mountain resort. We get tourists into the country on the Swiss model, and earn money and pay off our debts. Ask this man if he would have been willing to do without all we have learned from Switzerland....”

That evening Mrs. Brede asked,

”Why did you make Mr. Hoy look so unreasonable today, Mrs. Molie?”

”I?” said Mrs., Molie innocently. ”Well, really--!”

As a matter of fact, it seemed as though Mrs. Molie had really been innocent, for the very next morning she and the a.s.sociate Master set off up the fjeld together in a very gay mood, and remained away till midday.

If they had the matter out between them, then no doubt the lady spoke to her much-tried friend as follows:

”Surely you can see I'm not interested in that lawyer-person! What an idea! I only drew him out so you'd have the chance to give him a good dressing down--don't you understand that? Really, you're the silliest, sweetest--come here, let me kiss you....”

XIV

Since the departure of the great caravan, there have been no other visitors. Some of us cannot understand it; others have in a manner of speaking got a whiff of what is wrong; but all of us still believe there will be more visitors, because after all we're the only ones that have the Tore peaks!

But no one appears.

The women of the house do their daily work for the inmates and do not complain, but they are not happy. Paul still takes things quietly; he sleeps a great deal in his room behind the kitchen, but once or twice I have seen him walking away from the house at night, walking in deep thought toward the woods.

From the neighboring valley comes the rumor that the motor traffic has started there now. So this is the explanation of the quiet in our valley!

Then one day a Dane came down to us from the fjeld. He had climbed the Tore peaks from the other side, something that had been thought impossible till now. He had simply driven in a car to the foot of the mountains and walked across!

So we no longer had the Tore peaks to ourselves, either.

I wonder whether, after all, Paul is not going to try to sow green-fodder in the long strip of land down by the river. That, at any rate, had been his original intention, but then came the great caravan, and he neglected it. Now, of course, the season is too far advanced for sowing, and there will be nothing but docks and chickweed. Could not the field be turfed, at least, and sown? Why didn't Paul think of such things instead of walking the woods at night?

But Paul has many thoughts. At an early age, his interest in farming was diverted to the tourist traffic, and there it has remained. He hears that our lawyer is also an architect and asks him to draw a plan for the big new house with the six rooms, the hall and the bathroom. Paul has already ordered the log chairs and the reindeer horns for the hall.

”If you weren't alone up here, you might have got some of the cars coming here too,” said the lawyer.

”I've thought of that,” Paul replied. ”It's not impossible I can do something about it. But I must have the house first. And I must have a road.”

The lawyer promised to draw a plan of the house, and went round to look at the site. The house was to cost such and such a sum. Paul was already quite convinced that three or four good tourist summers would pay it off.

Paul was not worrying. As we looked over the site together, I discovered that he smelled of brandy.

Finally a small party of Norwegians and foreigners arrived, travelers who were out to walk, and not to drive in cars. Everyone's spirits rose; the strangers stayed a few days and nights, and were guided across the fjeld by Solem, who earned a fair penny. Paul, too, was visibly cheered, and strolled about the farm in his Sunday clothes. He had a few things to discuss with the lawyer about the house.

”If there's anything to consult about, we had better do it now,” he said.

”I shall be away for a couple of days.”