A young girl sat at a table sewing; there was no one else in the room.
When I asked for shelter, she answered brightly and trustingly that she
would see, and went into a little room at the side. I called after her
as she went that I would be glad only to sit here by the stove till
daylight.
A little after the girl came in again with her mother, who was still
buttoning her clothes about her. _Godkvæld!_ Shelter for the night?
Well, well, there wasn't that room in the place they could make me
properly comfortable, but I'd be welcome to the bedroom, such as it was.
And where would they sleep themselves?
Why, it was near day now, and the girl'd be sitting up anyhow for a bit
with her sewing.
What was she sewing to sit up for all night? A new dress?
No, only the skirt. She was to wear it to church in the morning, but
wouldn't hear of her mother helping.
I brought up my sewing-machine, and said jestingly that a skirt more or
less was a mere trifle for a thing like this. Wait, and I'd show them.
Was I a tailor, then?
No. But I sold sewing-machines.
I took out the printed directions and studied them to see how it worked.
The girl listened attentively; she was a mere child; her thin fingers
were all blue with the dye from the stuff. There was something so
poor-looking about those blue fingers; I brought out some wine and
poured out for all of us. Then we go on sewing again--I with the printed
paper, and the girl working the machine. She is delighted to see how
easily it goes, and her eyes are all aglow.
How old was she?
Sixteen. Confirmed last year.
And what was her name?
Olga.
Her mother stands watching us, and would dearly like to try the machine
herself, but every time she comes near, Olga says: “Be careful, mother,
you'll despise it.” And when the spool needs filling, and her mother
takes the shuttle in her hand a moment, the child is once more afraid it
may be “despised.” [Footnote: Foragte, literally “despise.” The word
is evidently to be understood as used in error by the girl herself,
in place of some equivalent of “spoil (destroy),” the author's purpose
being to convey an impression of something touchingly “poor,” as with
the dye-stained fingers earlier and her awkward gait and figure later
mentioned. Precisely similar characteristics are used to the same end in
_Pan_, and elsewhere.]
The old woman puts on the coffee-pot, and tends the fire; the room is
soon warm and cosy. The lonely folk are as trusting and kindly as could
be. Olga laughs when I make a little jest about the machine. I noted
that neither of them asked how much the thing cost, though I had told
them it was for sale. They looked on it as hopelessly beyond their
reach. But they could still take a delight in seeing it work.
I hinted that Olga really ought to have a machine like that, seeing
she'd got the way of it so neatly all at once.
Her mother answered it would have to wait till she'd been out in service
for a bit.
Was she going out in service?
Why, yes, she hoped so, anyway. Both her other daughters were in
service, and doing well--thank God. Olga would be meeting them at church
in the morning.
There was a little cracked mirror hanging on one of the walls, on the
other a few cheap prints had been tacked up--pictures of soldiers
on horseback and royalties with a great deal of finery. One of these
pictures is old and frayed. It is a portrait of the Empress Eugenie, and
evidently not a recent purchase. I asked where it had come from.
The good woman did not know. Must be something her husband had bought in
his time.
“Did he buy it here?”
More likely 'twould have been at Hersæt, where he had been in service as
a young man. Might be thirty years gone now.