Look Back on Happiness Part 37

"I could lend you some."

At this Nikolai smiled and shook his head as though my offer were a fairy tale.

"Thank you just the same," he said, turning to walk away.

"Where are you going now?" I asked.

"To look at another horse. It's old and small, still--"

Was I thrusting myself on the man? I? Nonsense! I don't see that at all.

He felt offended because I had pa.s.sed his door last winter without stopping and now I wanted to make him friendly again. That was all. But as I wanted no cause for self-reproach, I stopped packing, nor would I ask Nikolai if I might go back with him. But I went out for a walk in the town. I had as much right to do that as anyone.

I met Nikolai in the street with a colt, and we stopped to exchange a few words.

"Is it yours?"

"Yes, I've bought her; the man met me halfway after all," he replied with a smile.

We walked along to the stable together and fed and petted the horse. She was a mare, two and a half years old, with a tawny coat and an off-white mane and tail--a perfect little lady.

That evening Nikolai came over to my room of his own accord for a chat about the mare and the state of the roads. When he was saying good-bye at the door, he seemed struck by a sudden thought.

"By the way," he said, "I suppose it's no good asking you, but you could get a lift for your knapsack, you know. We could be there day after tomorrow," he added.

How could I offend him again?

We walked all next day, spent the night in the mountain hut at the frontier, and then went on again. Nikolai carried my knapsack all the way, as well as his own smaller parcels. When I suggested that we should share the burden, he said it was no weight at all. I think Nikolai wanted to spare the little tawny lady.

At noon we saw the fjord beneath us. Nikolai stopped and carefully rubbed down the mare once more. As our path sloped downward, I felt a pressure, a contraction in my chest; it was the sea air. Nikolai asked me what was the matter, but it was nothing.

On reaching his home, we found the yard well swept, and in the doorway a woman on her knees with her back toward us, scrubbing the floor. It was the Sat.u.r.day cleaning day.

"Hullo!" Nikolai roared in a tremendously loud voice, stopping dead in his tracks as he did so.

The woman in the doorway looked round; her hair was gray, but it was she, Miss Ingeborg, _Fru_ [Footnote: Mrs. (Translator's note.)] Ingeborg.

"Good heavens!" she exclaimed, hastily mopping up the rest of the floor.

"Look at all the cleaning that goes on here!" Nikolai said, laughing.

"That's her idea of fun!"

And I had believed Carpenter Nikolai incapable of lightheartedness! Yet I had seen how content he had been all the way home, how deeply content, and proud of the little lady he was bringing with him. Even now he was still stroking her.

Fru Ingeborg rose to her feet, her skirts dark with the damp. It all seemed strange to me; her hair was so gray. I needed a little time, a moment, to collect myself, and turned away to give her time, too.

"What a lovely horse!" I heard her exclaim.

Nikolai went on stroking the mare.

"I've brought a visitor with me," he said.

I went to her and perhaps--I don't know--perhaps I rather overdid my unconcern. I greeted her and insisted on shaking her wet hand, which she hesitated to give me. I was anxious to appear quite formal with her, and shook her hand as I repeated my greeting.

"Well, of all people!" she replied.

I persisted in my formal att.i.tude.

"You must blame your husband," I said. "It's his fault that I'm here."

"I wish you heartily welcome," she returned. "How lucky I've just got through the cleaning!"

A slight pause. We looked at each other; two years had pa.s.sed since our last meeting. To break the silence, we all began to admire the mare, Nikolai swelling with pride. Then we heard a child calling from within the house, and the young mother ran off.

"Come in, won't you!" she called back over her shoulder.

As soon as I entered, I saw that the room had been changed. There was too much middle-cla.s.s frippery: white curtains at the windows, numerous pictures on the walls, a lamp pendent from the ceiling, underneath it in the center of the room a round table and chairs, knickknacks in a china cupboard, a pink-painted spinning wheel, flowers in pots--in short, the room was crowded. This, no doubt, was the sort of thing Fru Ingeborg had been used to and considered in good taste. But in Petra's day, this had been a light and s.p.a.cious room.

"How's your mother?" I asked Nikolai.

As usual he was slow to reply. His wife answered for him:

"She's very well."

I wanted to ask, "Where is she?" but I refrained.

"Look, I want to show you something," said Fru Ingeborg.

It was the child in his bed--a boy, big and handsome, about a year old. He frowned at me at first, but only for a moment. As soon as he was on his mother's arm, he looked at me without fear.

How happy and beautiful the young mother looked! Peerless, indeed, with her eyes full of an inscrutable graciousness she had not possessed before.

"What a fine little _man!_" I said, admiring the boy.

"I should think he was!" said the mother.

You get used to everything. The sea air no longer oppresses me; I can speak without losing my breath to the woman who is now the mistress of this house. She likes to talk, too, pouring out her words nervously, as though it had been a long time since she last opened her mouth. What we talked about? Well, we neither asked nor answered questions about measuring angles or a.n.a.lyzing Shakespeare's grammar.

Had she ever thought her matriculation would land her up here, amid livestock and Sat.u.r.day cleaning?

Oh, that parody of an education! She had taken the first toddling steps in a dozen sciences, but if she met someone with fully adult knowledge she was lost. She had other things to think about now, her home and her family and the farm. Of course there wasn't much livestock, now that Nikolai's mother had taken half of it with her--

"Has Petra gone away?"

Married--to the schoolmaster. No, Petra hadn't wanted to stay when the young wife took possession. One evening a strange man had come to the house, and Petra had wanted to admit him, but Fru Ingeborg would not. She knew who he was and wanted him to leave. So there were quarrels between the older woman and the young one.

Petra was also dissatisfied with the young wife's work in the barn. It was true she was not very skillful, but she was learning all the time, and enjoyed improving her skill. She never asked questions; that, she saw, would have been foolish, but she worked things out by herself, and kept her eyes open when she visited neighboring farms. That didn't mean to say she could learn everything. There were things she never learned properly because she was not "to the manner born." Often the wives of rural officials are from small towns, and have not learned the ways of the country, though they must learn them in time. But they never learn them well. They know only just enough for their daily needs. To set up a weave, you must have grown up with the sound of the shuttle in your ears; to tend the cattle as they should be tended, you must have helped your mother since childhood. You can learn from others, but it will not be in your blood.