"It was once upon a time"--so the fairy stories begin.
At that particular time there was a government clerk, not precisely
young, and a little moth-eaten in appearance, who was on his way home
from the office the day after his wedding.
On the wedding day itself he had also sat in the office and written
until three o'clock. After this he had gone out, and as usual eaten
his frugal midday meal at an unpretending restaurant in a narrow
street, and then had gone home to his upper chamber in an old house in
the Oesterlanggata, in order to get his somewhat worn dress coat, which
had done good and faithful service for twelve years. He had speculated
a good deal about buying a new coat for his wedding day, but had at
last arrived at the conclusion that, all in all, it would be a
superfluous luxury.
The bride was a telegraph operator, somewhat weakly, and nervous from
labor and want, and of rather an unattractive exterior. The wedding
took place in all quietness at the house of the bride's old unmarried
aunt, who lived in Soeder. The bride had on a black-silk dress, and the
newly married pair drove home in a droschke.
So the wedding day had passed, but now it was the day after. From ten
o'clock on he had sat in his office, just as on all other days. Now he
was on the way home--his own home!
That was a strange feeling; indeed, it was such an overpowering
feeling that he stood still many times on the way and fell into a
brown study.
A memory of childhood came into his mind.
He saw himself as a little boy, sitting at his father's desk in the
little parsonage, reading fairy tales. How many times had he read,
again and again, his favorite story out of the Arabian Nights of 'Ali
Baba and the Forty Thieves!' How his heart had beaten in longing
suspense, when he stood with the hero of the story outside the closed
door of the mountain and called, first gently and a little anxiously,
afterwards loudly and boldly: "Sesame, Sesame! Open Sesame!"
And when the mountain opened its door, what splendor! The poor room of
the parsonage was transformed into the rich treasure chamber of the
mountain, and round about on the walls gleamed the most splendid
jewels. There were, besides horses and carriages, beautifully rigged
ships, weapons, armor--all the best that a child's fantasy could
dream. His old father looked in astonishment at his youngest child, it
was so long since he himself had been a child, and all the others were
already grown up. He did not understand him, but asked him half
reprovingly what he was thinking about, that his eyes glistened so.
Thus he also came to think about his youth, about his student years at
Upsala. He was a poet, a singer; he had the name of being greatly
gifted, and stood high in his comrades' estimation. What if any one
had told him at that time that he should end as a petty government
clerk, be married to a telegraph operator, and live in the
Repslagaregata in Soeder! Bah! Life had a thousand possibilities. The
future's perspective was illimitable. Nothing was impossible. No honor
was so great that he could not attain it; no woman so beautiful that
he could not win her. What did it signify that he was poor, that he
was only named Andersson, and that he was the eighth child of a poor
parson, who himself was peasant-born? Had not most of the nation's
gifted men sprung from the ranks of the people? Yes, his endowments,
they were the magic charm, the "Open Sesame!" which were to admit him
to all the splendors of life.
As to how things, later on, had gone with him, he did not allow
himself to think. Either his endowments had not been as great as he
had believed, or the difficulties of living had stifled them, or
fortune had not been with him: enough, it had happened to him as to
Ali Baba's wicked brother Casim, who stood inside the mountain only to
find out to his horror that he had forgotten the magic charm, and in
the anguish of death beat about in his memory to recall it. That was a
cruel time--but it was not worth while now to think about it longer.
Rapidly one thought followed upon another in his mind. Now he came to
think upon the crown princess, who had made a royal entrance into the
capital just at this time. He had received permission to accompany his
superiors and stand in the festal pavilion when she landed. That was a
glorious moment. The poet's gifts of his youth were not far from
awakening again in the exaltation of the moment; and had he still been
the young applauding poet of earlier days, instead of the neglected
government clerk, he would probably have written a festal poem and
sent it to the Post.
For it was fine to be the Princess Victoria at that moment. It was one
of the occasions that life has not many of. To be nineteen years old,
newly married to a young husband, loved and loving, and to make a
ceremonious entry into one's future capital, which is in festal array
and lies fabulously beautiful in the autumn sun, to be greeted with
shouts of joy by countless masses of men, and to be so inexperienced
in life that one has no presentiment of the shadows which hide
themselves back of this bright picture--yes, that might indeed be an
unforgettable moment; one of those that only fall to the lot of few
mortals, so that they seem to belong more to the world of fable than
to reality! Had the magic charm, "Open Sesame!" conjured up anything
more beautiful?
And yet! yet!--The government clerk had neared his home and stood in
front of his own door. No, the crown prince was surely not happier
when he led his bride into his rejoicing capital, than was he at this
moment. He had found again the long-lost magic charm. The little knob
there on the door--that was his "Open Sesame!" He needed only to press
upon it, when the mountain would again open its treasures to him--not
weapons and gleaming armor as in his childhood--not honors and homage
and social position as in his youth--no, something better than all
these. Something that forms the kernel itself of all human happiness,
upon the heights of life as well as in its most concealed
hiding-places--a heart that only beat for him, his own home, where
there was one who longed for him--a wife! Yes, a wife whom he loved,
not with the first passion of youth, but with the tenderness and
faithfulness of manhood.
He stood outside his own door; he was tired and hungry, and his wife
waited for him at the midday meal; that was, to be sure, commonplace
and unimportant--and yet it was so wonderfully new and attractive.
Gently, cautiously as a child who had been given a new plaything, he
pressed upon the little knob on the door--and then he stood still with
restrained breath and listened for the light quick step that
approached.
It was just as though in his childhood he stood outside the mountain
and called, first gently and half in fear, and then loudly and with a
voice trembling with glad expectation, "Sesame, Sesame! Open Sesame!"
Translated for 'A Library of the World's Best Literature'
by William H. Carpenter