Pelle the Conqueror Part 94

In the depths of Pelle's soul lay a confident feeling that he was destined for something particular; it was his old dream of fortune, which would not be wholly satisfied by the good conditions for all men which he wanted to help to bring about. His fate was no longer in his eyes a grievous and crus.h.i.+ng predestination to poverty, which could only be lifted from him by a miracle; he was lord of his own future, and already he was restlessly building it up!

But in addition to this there was something else that belonged only to him and to life, something that no one else in the world could undertake. What it was he had not yet figured to himself; but it was something that raised him above all others, secretly, so that only he was conscious of it. It was the same obscure feeling of being a pioneer that had always urged him forward; and when it did take the form of a definite question he answered it with the confident nod of his childhood. Yes, he would see it through all right! As though that which was to befall him was so great and so wonderful that it could not be put into words, nor even thought of. He saw the straight path in front of him, and he sauntered on, strong and courageous. There were no other enemies than those a prudent man might perceive; those lurking forces of evil which in his childhood had hovered threateningly above his head were the shadows of the poor man's wretchedness. There was nothing else evil, and that was sinister enough. He knew now that the shadows were long. Morten was right. Although he himself when a child had sported in the light, yet his mind was saddened by the misery of all those who were dead or fighting in distant parts of the earth; and it was on this fact that the feeling of solidarity must be based. The miraculous simply had no existence, and that was a good thing for those who had to fight with the weapon of their own physical strength. No invisible deity sat overhead making his own plans for them or obstructing others. What one willed, that could one accomplish, if only he had strength enough to carry it through. Strength--it was on that and that alone that everything depended. And there was strength in plenty. But the strength of all must be united, must act as the strength of one. People always wondered why Pelle, who was so industrious and respectable, should live in the "Ark" instead of in the northern quarter, in the midst of the Movement. He wondered at himself when he ever thought about it at all; but he could not as yet tear himself away from the "Ark." Here, at the bottom of the ladder, he had found peace in his time of need. He was too loyal to turn his back on those among whom he had been happy.

He knew they would feel it as a betrayal; the adoration with which the inmates of the "Ark" regarded the three orphan children was also bestowed upon him; he was the foundling, the fourth member of the "Family," and now they were proud of him too!

It was not the way of the inmates of the "Ark" to make plans for the future. Sufficient to the day was the evil thereof; to-morrow's cares were left for the morrow. The future did not exist for them. They were like careless birds, who had once suffered s.h.i.+pwreck and had forgotten it. Many of them made their living where they could; but however down in the world they were, let the slightest ray of sunlight flicker down to them, and all was forgotten. Of the labor movement and other new things they gossiped as frivolously as so many chattering starlings, who had snapped up the news on the wind.

But Pelle went so confidently out into the world, and set his shoulders against it, and then came back home to them. He had no fear; he could look Life straight in the face, he grappled boldly with the future, before which they shudderingly closed their eyes. And thereby his name came to be spoken with a particular accent; Pelle was a prince; what a pity it was that he wouldn't, it seemed, have the princess!

He was tall and well-grown, and to them he seemed even taller. They went to him in their misery, and loaded it all on his strong young shoulders, so that he could bear it for them. And Pelle accepted it all with an increasing sense that perhaps it was not quite aimlessly that he lingered here--so near the foundations of society!

At this time Widow Frandsen and her son Ferdinand came upon the scene.

Misfortune must house itself somewhere!

Ferdinand was a st.u.r.dy young fellow of eighteen years, with a powerfully modelled head, which looked as though it had originally been intended to absorb all the knowledge there is in all the world. But he used it only for dispensing blows; he had no other use for it whatever.

Yet he was by no means stupid; one might even call him a gifted young man. But his gifts were of a peculiar quality, and had gradually become even more peculiar.

As a little child he had been forced to fight a besotted father, in order to protect his mother, who had no other protector. This unequal battle _had_ to be fought; and it necessarily blunted his capacity for feeling pain, and particularly his sense of danger. He knew what was in store for him, but he rushed blindly into the fray the moment his mother was attacked; just as a dog will attack a great beast of prey, so he hung upon the big man's fists, and would not be shaken off. He hated his father, and he longed in his heart to be a policeman when he was grown up. With his blind and obtuse courage he was particularly adapted to such a calling; but he actually became a homeless vagabond.

Gradually as he grew in height and strength and the battle was no longer so unequal, his father began to fear him and to think of revenge; and once, when Ferdinand had thoroughly thrashed him, he reported him, and the boy was flogged. The boy felt this to be a d.a.m.nable piece of injustice; the flogging left scars behind it, and another of its results was that his mother was no longer left in peace.

From that time onward he hated the police, and indulged his hatred at every opportunity. His mother was the only being for whom he still cared. It was like a flash of suns.h.i.+ne when his father died. But it came too late to effect any transformation; Ferdinand had long ago begun to look after his mother in his own peculiar way--which was partly due to the conditions of his life.

He had grown up in the streets, and even when quite a child was one of those who are secretly branded. The police knew him well, and were only awaiting their opportunity to ask him inside. Ferdinand could see it in their eyes--they reckoned quite confidently on that visit, and had got a bed already for him in their hotel on the New Market.

But Ferdinand would not allow himself to be caught. When he had anything doubtful in hand, he always managed to clear himself. He was an unusually strong and supple young fellow, and was by no means afraid to work; he obtained all kinds of occasional work, and he always did it well. But whenever he got into anything that offered him a future, any sort of regular work which must be learned and attacked with patience, he could never go on with it.

"You speak to him, Pelle!" said his mother. "You are so sensible, and he does respect you!" Pelle did speak to him, and helped him to find some calling for which he was suited; and Ferdinand set to work with a will, but when he got to a certain point he always threw it up.

His mother never lacked actual necessaries; although sometimes he only procured them at the last moment. When not otherwise engaged, he would stand in some doorway on the market-place, loafing about, his hands in his pockets, his supple shoulders leaning against the wall. He was always in clogs and mittens; at stated intervals he spat upon the pavement, his sea-blue eyes following the pa.s.sers-by with an unfathomable expression. The policeman, who was aggressively pacing up and down his beat, glanced at him in secret every time he pa.s.sed him, as much as to say, "Shan't we ever manage to catch the rogue? Why doesn't he make a slip?"

And one day the thing happened--quite of itself, and not on account of any clumsiness on his part--in the "Ark" they laid particular stress upon that. It was simply his goodness of heart that was responsible. Had Ferdinand not been the lad he was, matters had not gone awry, for he was a gifted young man.

He was in the grocer's shop on the corner of the Market buying a few coppers' worth of chewing-tobacco. An eight-year-old boy from the "Ark"

was standing by the counter, asking for a little flour on credit for his mother. The grocer was making a tremendous fuss about the affair. "Put it down--I dare say! One keeps shop on the corner here just to feed all the poor folks in the neighborhood! I shall have the money to-morrow?

Peculiar it is, that in this miserable, poverty-stricken quarter folks are always going to have money the very next day! Only the next day never comes!"

"Herre Petersen can depend on it," said the child, in a low voice.

The grocer continued to scoff, but began to weigh the meal. Before the scales there was a pile of yard brooms and other articles, but Ferdinand could see that the grocer was pressing the scale with his fingers. He's giving false weight because it's for a poor person, thought Ferdinand, and he felt an angry p.r.i.c.king in his head, just where his thoughts were.

The boy stood by, fingering something concealed in his hand. Suddenly a coin fell on the floor and went rolling round their feet. Quick as lightning the grocer cast a glance at the till, as he sprang over the counter and seized the boy by the scruff of the neck. "Ay, ay," he said sharply, "a clever little rogue!"

"I haven't stolen anything!" cried the boy, trying to wrench himself loose and to pick up his krone-piece. "That's mother's money!"

"You leave the kid alone!" said Ferdinand threateningly. "He hasn't done anything!"

The grocer struggled with the boy, who was twisting and turning in order to recover his money. "Hasn't done anything!" he growled, panting, "then why did he cry out about stealing before ever I had mentioned the word?

And where does the money come from? He wanted credit, because they hadn't got any! No, thanks--I'm not to be caught like that."

"The money belongs to mother!" shrieked the youngster, twisting desperately in the grocer's grip. "Mother is ill--I'm to get medicine with it!" And he began to blubber.

"It's quite right--his mother is ill!" said Ferdinand, with a growl.

"And the chemist certainly won't give credit. You'd best let him go, Petersen." He took a step forward.

"You've thought it out nicely!" laughed the grocer scornfully, and he wrenched the shop-door open. "Here, policeman, here!"

The policeman, who was keeping watch at the street corner, came quickly over to the shop. "Here's a lad who plays tricks with other folks'

money," said the grocer excitedly. "Take care of him for a bit, Iversen!"

The boy was still hitting out in all directions; the policeman had to hold him off at arm's length. He was a ragged, hungry little fellow. The policeman saw at a glance what he had in his fingers, and proceeded to drag him away; and there was no need to have made any more ado about the matter.

Ferdinand went after him and laid his hand on the policeman's arm.

"Mister Policeman, the boy hasn't done anything," he said. "I was standing there myself, and I saw that he did nothing, and I know his mother!"

The policeman stood still for a moment, measuring Ferdinand with a threatening eye; then he dragged the boy forward again, the latter still struggling to get free, and bellowing: "My mother is ill; she's waiting for me and the medicine!" Ferdinand kept step with them, in his thin canvas shoes.

"If you drag him off to the town hall, I shall come with you, at all events, and give evidence for him," he continued; "the boy hasn't done anything, and his mother is lying sick and waiting for the medicine at home."

The policeman turned about, exasperated. "Yes, you're a nice witness.

One crow don't pick another's eyes out. You mind your own business--and just you be off!"

Ferdinand stood his ground. "Who are you talking to, you Laban?" he muttered, angrily looking the other up and down. Suddenly he took a run and caught the policeman a blow in the neck so that he fell with his face upon the pavement while his helmet rolled far along the street.

Ferdinand and the boy dashed off, each in a different direction, and disappeared.

And now they had been hunting him for three weeks already. He did not dare go home. The "Ark" was watched night and day, in the hope of catching him--he was so fond of his mother. G.o.d only knew where he might be in that rainy, cold autumn. Madam Frandsen moved about her attic, lonely and forsaken. It was a miserable life. Every morning she came over to beg Pelle to look in _The Working Man_, to see whether her son had been caught. He was in the city--Pelle and Madam Frandsen knew that.

The police knew it also; and they believed him responsible for a series of nocturnal burglaries. He might well be sleeping in the outhouses and the kennels of the suburban villas.

The inmates of the "Ark" followed his fate with painful interest. He had grown up beneath their eyes. He had never done anything wrong there; he had always respected the "Ark" and its inhabitants; that at least could be said of him, and he loved his mother dearly. And he had been entirely in the right when he took the part of the boy; a brave little fellow he was! His mother was very ill; she lived at the end of one of the long gangways, and the boy was her only support. But it was a mad undertaking to lay hands on the police; that was the greatest crime on earth! A man had far better murder his own parents--as far as the punishment went. As soon as they got hold of him, he would go to jail, for the policeman had hit his handsome face against the flagstones; according to the newspaper, anybody but a policeman would have had concussion of the brain.

Old Madam Frandsen loved to cross the gangway to visit Pelle, in order to talk about her son.

"We must be cautious," she said. At times she would purse up her mouth, tripping restlessly to and fro; then he knew there was something particular in the wind.

"Shall I tell you something?" she would ask, looking at him importantly.

"No; better keep it to yourself," Pelle would reply. "What one doesn't know one can't give evidence about."

"You'd better let me chatter, Pelle--else I shall go running in and gossiping with strangers. Old chatterbox that I am, I go fidgeting round here, and I've no one I can trust; and I daren't even talk to myself!

Then that Pipman hears it all through the wooden part.i.tion; it's almost more than I can bear, and I tremble lest my toothless old mouth should get him into trouble!"

"Well, then, tell it me!" said Pelle, laughing. "But you mustn't speak loud."

"He's been here again!" she whispered, beaming. "This morning, when I got up, there was money for me in the kitchen. Do you know where he had put it? In the sink! He's such a sensible lad! He must have come creeping over the roofs--otherwise I can't think how he does it, they are looking for him so. But you must admit that--he's a good lad!"

"If only you can keep quiet about it!" said Pelle anxiously. She was so proud of her son!