Growth of the Soil Part 42

"I bought it for a brother of mine up in Helgeland."

"Ho!"

"Then I thought perhaps I'd half a mind to change with him, too."

"Change with him--would you?"

"And perhaps how Barbro she'd like it better that way."

"Ay, maybe," said Isak.

They walk on for a good way in silence. Then says Axel:

"They've been after me to take over that telegraph business."

"The telegraph? H'm. Ay, I heard that Brede he's given it up."

"H'm," says Axel, smiling. "'Tis not so much that way of it, but Brede that's been turned off."

"Ay, so," says Isak, and trying to find some excuse for Brede. "It takes a deal of time to look after, no doubt."

"They gave him notice to the new year, if he didn't do better."

"H'm."

"You don't think it'd be worth my while to take it?"

Isak thought for a long while, and answered: "Ay, there's the money, true, but still...."

"They've offered me more."

"How much?"

"Double."

"Double? Why, then, I'd say you should think it over."

"But they've made the line a bit longer now. No, I don't know what's best to do--there's not so much timber to sell here as you've got on yours, and I've need to buy more things for the work that I've got now. And buying things needs money in 'cash, and I've not so much out of the land and stock that there's much over to sell. Seems to me I'll have to try a year at the telegraph to begin with...."

It did not occur to either of them that Brede might "do better" and keep the post himself.

When they reached Maaneland, Oline was there already, on her way down.

Ay, a strange creature, Oline, crawling about fat and round as a maggot, and over seventy years and all, but still getting about. She sits drinking coffee in the hut, but seeing the men come up, all must give way to that, and she comes out.

"_G.o.ddag_, Axel, and welcome back from the sale. You'll not mind me looking in to see how you and Barbro's getting on? And you're getting on finely, to see, and building a new house and getting richer and richer! And you been buying sheep, Isak?"

"Ay," said Isak. "You know her, maybe?"

"If I know her? Nay...."

"With these flat ears, you can see."

"Flat ears? How d'you mean now? And what then? What I was going to say: Who bought Brede's place, after all? I was just saying to Barbro here, who'd be your neighbours that way now? said I. And Barbro, poor thing, she sits crying, as natural enough, to be sure; but the Almighty that's decreed her a new home here at Maaneland ... Flat ears? I've seen a deal of sheep in my day with flat ears and all. And I'll tell you, Isak, that machine of yours, 'twas almost more than my old eyes could see nor understand. And what she'll have cost you I won't even ask for I never could count so far. Axel, if you've seen it, you know what I mean; 'twas all as it might be Elijah and his chariot of fire, and Heaven forgive me that I say it...."

When the hay was all in, Eleseus began making preparations for his return to town. He had written to the engineer to say he was coming, but received the extraordinary reply that times were bad, and they would have to economize; the office would have to dispense with Eleseus' services, and the chief would do the work himself.

The deuce and all! But after all, what did a district surveyor want with an office staff? When he had taken Eleseus on as a youngster, he had done so, no doubt, only to show himself as a great man to these folks in the wilds; and if he had given him clothes and board till his confirmation, he had got some return for it in the way of writing work, that was true. Now the boy was grown up, and that made all the difference.

"But," said the engineer, "if you do come back I will do all I can to get you a place somewhere else, though it may be a difficult matter, as there are more young men than are wanted looking out for the same thing. With kind regards...."

Eleseus would go back to town, of course, there could be no question about that. Was he to throw himself away? He wanted to get on in the world. And he said nothing to those at home as to the altered state of affairs; it would be no use, and, to tell the truth, he felt a little out of humour with the whole thing.

Anyhow, he said nothing. The life at Sellanraa was having its effect on him again; it was an inglorious, commonplace life, but quiet and dulling to the sense, a dreamy life; there was nothing for him to show off about, a looking-gla.s.s was a thing he had no use for. His town life had wrought a schism in himself, and made him finer than the others, made him weaker; he began indeed to feel that he must be homeless anywhere. He had come to like the smell of tansy again--let that pa.s.s. But there was no sense at all in a peasant lad's standing listening in the morning to the girls milking the cows and thinking thus: they're milking, listen now; 'tis almost by way of something wonderful to hear, a kind of song in nothing but little streams, different from the bra.s.s bands in the town and the Salvation Army and the steamer sirens. Music streaming into a pail....

It was not the way at Sellanraa to show one's feelings overmuch, and Eleseus dreaded the moment when he would have to say good-bye. He was well equipped now; again his mother had given him a stock of woven stuff for underclothes, and his father had commissioned some one to hand him money as he went out of the door. Money--could Isak really spare such a thing as money? But it was so, and no otherwise. Inger hinted that it would doubtless be the last time; for was not Eleseus going to get on and rise in the world by himself?

"H'm," said Isak.

There was an atmosphere of solemnity, of stillness in the home; they had each had a boiled egg at the last meal, and Sivert stood outside all ready to go down with his brother and carry his things. It was for Eleseus to begin.

He began with Leopoldine. Well and good, she said good-bye in return, and managed it very well. Likewise Jensine the servant-maid, she sat carding wool and answered good-bye--but both girls stared at him, confound them! and all because he might perhaps be the least bit red about the eyes. He shook hands with his mother, and she cried of course quite openly, never caring to remember how he hated crying."

Goo--ood-bye and bl--bless you!" she sobbed out. It was worst with his father; worst of all with him. Oh, in every way; he was so toil-worn and so utterly faithful; he had carried the children in his arms, had told them of the seagulls and other birds and beasts, and the wonders of the field; it was not so long ago, a few years.... Father stands by the gla.s.s window, then suddenly he turns round, grasps his son's hand, and says quickly and peevishly: "Well, good-bye. There's the new horse getting loose," and he swings out of the door and hurries away. Oh, but he had himself taken care to let the new horse loose a while ago, and Sivert, the rascal, knew it too, as he stood outside watching his father, and smiling to himself. And, anyway, the horse was only in the rowens.

Eleseus had got it over at last.

And then his mother must needs come out on the door-slab and hiccup again and say, "G.o.d bless you!" and give him something. "Take this--and you're not to thank him, he says you're not to. And don't forget to write; write often."

Two hundred _Kroner_.

Eleseus looked down the field: his father was furiously at work driving a tethering-peg into the ground; he seemed to find it a difficult matter, for all that the ground was soft enough.

The brothers set off down the road; they came to Maaneland, and there stood Barbro in the doorway and called to them to come up.

"You going away again, Eleseus? Nay, then, you must come in and take a cup of coffee at least."

They go into the hut, and Eleseus is no longer a prey to the pangs of love, nor wishful to jump out of windows and take poison; nay, he spreads his light spring overcoat across his knees, taking care to lay it so the silver plate is to be seen; then he wipes his hair with his handkerchief, and observes delicately: "Beautiful day, isn't it--simply cla.s.sic!"

Barbro too is self-possessed enough; she plays with a silver ring on one hand and a gold ring on the other--ay, true enough, if she hasn't got a gold ring too--and she wears an ap.r.o.n reaching from neck to feet, as if to say she is not spoiled as to her figure, whoever else may be that way. And when the coffee is ready and her guests are drinking, she sews a little to begin with on a white cloth, and then does a little crochet-work with a collar of some sort, and so with all manner of maidenly tasks. Barbro is not put out by their visit, and all the better; they can talk naturally, and Eleseus can be all on the surface again, young and witty as he pleases.

"What have you done with Axel?" asks Sivert.

"Oh, he's about the place somewhere," she answers, pulling herself up.

"And so we'll not be seeing you this way any more, I doubt?" she asks Eleseus.

"It's hardly probable," says he.

"Ay, 'tis no place for one as is used to the town. I only wish I could go along with you."