It had to be a name that would sufficiently conceal his own, yet one

that would be characteristic of his country, and, after much beating of

the wings of memory, he decided on Christian Christiansson as a name

which not only answered to the conditions, but possessed an added

nobleness of meaning and associations that would forever forbid the

lowering of the flag of his purpose.

But after he had concluded that Christian Christiansson was to be his

name in the future, it cost him a pang to think that Oscar Stephenson

was to be his name no longer. Stephen had been his father's name and his

poor father had expected him to carry it on from strength to strength

and from glory to glory. Oscar had been the name his mother had known

him by, and it came back to him now in the tones of her voice with the

happiest memories of his boyhood. He could hear it in Thora's voice

also in the tremulous happiness of her bridal chamber, in the tender joy

of her motherhood, and in the pleading accents of her despair. It was

like burying something of himself to bury his name, but Oscar Stephenson

was dead, and that name could be his no more.

It was early morning when he reached London, and returning to it after

six months' absence he felt like one who had been dead and was alive

again. As the empty streets echoed to his footsteps his spirits rose

and he looked to the future without fear. Though he was coming back

friendless and nearly penniless, he saw himself as he would be some

day--Christian Christiansson, the composer, rich, respected, honored

perhaps, and perhaps beloved. It might be months, it might be years,

but God willing, it should come! A little longer, only a little longer!

He had at first intended to look for a lodging where he would be quite

unknown, but in his present elevation of feeling it seemed unnecessary

to do so, and he determined to return to his old home in Short Street.

When he came to Westminster Bridge, he stopped for a moment to look down

at the houseless wretches who were still asleep on the benches of the

embankment, and to remember the night when he had been one of them, and

to think of the other night that was soon to come when the first-fruits

of his new life would be in his hands.

He could see it all as in a glass that revealed the future. The curtain

would be down on the new opera and there would be a great demonstration

in the crowded opera-house. Again and again the singers would be

recalled and then there would be loud cries for the composer. The cries

would rise to a deafening clamor, and the whole audience from the royal

box to the top-most gallery would be calling for the unknown man who had

breathed his suffering soul into an old Saga and made the dry bones

live. But the Unknown would not appear; he would not be there. Where

would he be? He would be down here--here under the night sky, weeping

for joy and gratitude, emptying his pockets among these homeless

outcasts in memory of the night when he, too, was homeless and an

outcast, and vowing never again to forget the friendless and the fallen

or to be hard on the sinner and the prodigal. He could see it happening

as plainly as if it had already come to pass. It _should_ come to pass!

A little longer, only a little longer!

When he reached Short Street the hearse of the Necropolis had just

turned the corner and was rattling up the archway. Nearly all the

window-blinds of Number One were still down, but as he hesitated at the

foot of the front steps the door opened and a young woman in curl papers

came out with a mop and pail. She stared at him as if he had been a

stranger, but he knew her instantly.

"Don't you remember me, Jenny?" he said.

At the sound of his voice Jenny's face assumed a look of bewilderment;

this was followed by a smile of recognition.

"Well, I never! Mr. Steevison! Is it you, sir? Ye'r so changed I

wouldn't 'a knowed ye, an' when ye spoke ye might 'a knocked me down

with a feather."

"Can I have lodgings here again, Jenny?"

"Certingly ye can, sir. An' ye've come in the nick o' time, too. We

buried the barman a week come Wednesday and 'is room 'as been just

cleaned out. Come in, Mr. Steevison!"

"Hush, Jenny! That is not my name now."

"Isn't it really?" said Jenny, with a puzzled look, and then, as by

sudden enlightenment, "Well, I'm married myself and I've changed my

name, too. I'm Mrs. Cobb now, an' I've took over the 'ouse since the

missus 'as been down with the stroke, an' my 'usband's asleep in the

cellar."

They had stepped into the lobby by this time and putting down the pail

Jenny cried over the banisters of the basement stairs:

"Jim! Jim Cobb, you bone-lazy thing, come up an' see an old friend."

"Don't disturb him now! Another time! I'm tired."

"Ye look it, sir. Ye really do. I'm afraid she's been 'a treatin' ye

cruel. I knowed she would. It's always the way with them women. Ye'd

better 'a stayed with me, sir--I'd 'a been real good to ye in them days

and never 'a wanted nothink.--But go inside, sir, and I'll get ye some

brekfist. The kittle is just on the boil an' ye'll have a cup o' tea an'

a rasher afore ye can say 'Jack Robison.'"

Jenny went scurrying down the stairs like an old slipper, and Oscar

stepped into the barman's parlor and sat on the shiny leather-covered

sofa. He remembered that he had sat there before, he remembered who had

sat with him, he remembered all that had happened since, and then for

one brief moment his visions of the future failed him; his hopes and

intentions sank away; everything was blotted out except the sweet and

bitter memory of the woman he had loved and lost, and he broke down

utterly.

*XII*

It takes a long time for the truth to travel from a distance, but a lie

flies on the wings of the wind. The report of Oscar's death in a

gambling-house on the Riviera reached Iceland by the next steamer.

Three days before the steamer's arrival Magnus and his mother were

sitting in front of their farm at Thingvellir. Anna was spinning and

Magnus was making rope by a twister turned by a small boy a dozen yards

away, for it was just after the wool-plucking and a little before the

hay-harvest.

The sun was setting behind the crags of the Almanagja, the blueberry

ling was reddening over the green waters of the chasm, and there was no

sound in the evening air save the plash of the Axe waterfall, the lowing

of kine and the cry of curlew. Then over the hum of the wheel and the

wis-wis of the twister came the dull thud of horses' feet on that hollow

ground and Anna stopped to listen.

"That must be the post coming," she said, and Magnus answered,

"Perhaps," without turning to look at the road, which was still empty as

far as to the top of the cleft, where it opened on to the plain.

"I wonder if there will be a letter from Oscar?"

"Why should you wonder, mother? Has he answered your letter of three

years ago? Has he had the decency and humanity to reply to the news of

his father's death? No!"

"Still, I can not give up hoping. He must know by this time how you are

placed with the farm, and perhaps he is only waiting until he can send

you some assistance."

Magnus made no reply, but the wis-wis of the rope was louder.

"It's true he doesn't know everything. He doesn't know that his father

left nothing behind him but the debt to the bank, and that the bank has

been so hard----"

"Mother, if you go on talking like that I shall never get this rope

finished. I don't want anybody to help me to pay my way, and the bank

shall have its money every Christmas if hard work can make it."

"You'll work yourself to death--that's what you'll do, Magnus. You sent

Asher away in the winter, although he was so good at feeding the beasts

when the snow was on the ground, and now that the hay has to be cut and

the lambs killed, you're discharging Jon Vidalin."

"We'll have to thin down somewhere, and the sooner we begin the

better--it's too late to spare when you see the bottom of the

meal-barrel, you know."

"That's what you call thinning down--sending everybody away who can help

you with the farm and keeping a houseful of women who are of no use for

anything."

"Why, which of them is of no use, mother?"

"Gudrun for one. She only milks the cows in the morning and the ewes in

the evening, and I could do both myself and save her keep and wages."

"Nonsense, mother! You're not young enough now to get up at four

o'clock winter and summer and I won't hear of it for a moment."

"Then there's Maria--_she's_ old enough for anything, and what's the use

of her?"

"Maria's been in the family since before I was born, and we can't turn

her away now because she's old and rheumatic."

"And here's Eric," said Anna, dropping her voice and glancing at the boy

who was turning the twister.

"Eric? Poor little chap, he's lost his father, and he only gets a lamb

for his wages anyway."

"It's to be a sheep this year, remember, and then there's his food--

But if it's an orphanage you want to keep, or a home for invalids----"

"Helloa! Here's the post! And who's this he has got with him? The

Rector! The Rector and two strangers!" cried Magnus, as a

canvas-covered wagon, drawn by four ponies, rumbled over the bridge

above the waterfall and galloped up to the Inn-farm.

"Welcome, Rector," said Anna.

"Thanks, Anna. These are friends from America, traveling to see the

country. We should like to sleep here to-night and go on to Geyser in

the morning."

"With pleasure! Maria! Gudrun! Jon Vidalin!" cried Anna, and while

the strangers were being taken to the guest-room and the horses to the

stable, the Rector went indoors with Anna and Magnus and they sat and

talked around the hall table.

"You look hale in spite of everything, Anna."

"And you, too, Rector!"

"Ah, yes, old wood burns slow! But I sometimes wonder if it's well to

live long. Better go to bed early than sit up too late, I say."

"Any new trouble in town lately?"

"The Factor is down at last, poor fellow."

"You mean that he's----"

"Bankrupt, and about to be sold up--business, office, everything."

"Poor Margret Neilsen!"

"What about the child?" asked Magnus.

"I think he would part with it now. To tell you the truth, he is

feeling bitterly about Oscar just at present. 'A dove doesn't come out

of a raven's egg,' he said yesterday."

"He said that?"

"So the new Minister says--but then it was the Minister who made him

bankrupt."

"But I thought they were such friends; and when poor Stephen was

petitioning the King----"

"Then you haven't heard what happened about Thora."

"Thora?" said Magnus.

"Poor Thora's grave, I mean. It makes the blood run between my skin and

my flesh to think about it."

"Tell us," said Anna.

And then the Rector told them how the Minister, acting under

instructions received from abroad, had ordered Thora's grave to be

opened and certain musical compositions which had been buried in it to

be taken out; how this had been done and the papers despatched to

England; how the Factor had heard of it, and, being furious, had

threatened an action against the Minister; and finally how the Minister,

to cut the ground under the Factor's feet, had caused the bank to make

him a bankrupt.

During the progress of the Rector's story Magnus sat without saying a

word, but every moment his cheeks grew whiter and his eyes glared and

his lips quivered. Meantime Anna covered her face and said:

"It must have been Neils who did that. I never liked the boy--he was

always too much like his father--and now that he is----"

"It wasn't Neils, Anna. It was Oscar."

"Oscar?" said Magnus, and his hands clutched the corners of the table.

"Oh, dear! Oh, dear! I couldn't have believed it of Oscar. But who

knows how he may have been tempted? Perhaps he was poor, yes, perhaps

after all he was in want and they offered him money. There are such ups

and downs in these foreign countries--perhaps he was starving in the

streets of London----"

"He wasn't in London at all, Anna. He was at Monte Carlo, or Nice, or

somewhere."

"Then you mean he only wanted the money to--the same as before, when

he--I won't believe it!"

"Be quiet, mother," said Magnus, with the hoarse croak of a raven, and

then turning to the Rector, "Who did it--the work itself, I mean?"

"Hans, the sailor--they could get nobody else, it seems."

"Hans, the sailor," repeated Magnus, in the same hoarse croak, and while

the table creaked under the clutch of his great hands, his face grew

hard and ugly.

During the remainder of that day Magnus went about without speaking to

any one, and next morning, after the strangers had started on their

journey, he saddled Silvertop and rode off toward Reykjavik. Anna saw

him go, and calling to Jon Vidalin, she said:

"Take the fastest horse and ride to town by the low road and find Hans,

the sailor. Tell him to fly before Magnus comes and never to come back

again."

*XIII*

When Magnus returned to the farm three days afterward he was like

another man. His face was no longer hard and ugly, it was as soft as a

tender woman's, and he was smiling down at something that looked like a

huge bundle which he carried on the saddle in front of him. Anna saw

him crossing the bridge, and she ran out to meet him.

"Goodness me!" she cried. "Is it the child?"

"Yes, it is the child, mother," said Magnus, and out of a mountain of

rugs and shawls came little Elin, now in her fifth year, and she was

dropped into Anna's arms.

"The darling! What a great girl she has grown! So she has come to see

her gran'ma?"

"Yes, gran'ma," said the child.

"And here are her clothes--all of them," said Magnus, swinging a satchel

off his shoulders.

"Then she has come for good! And she is going to live with her gran'ma

and Uncle Magnus!"

"And Silvertop and the sheeps and the doggies," said the little one.

"So she shall, bless her! Jon Vidalin, see to the master's pony. Eric,

where are you? Ah! that's a good boy--carry the satchel into the house.

Maria, did you _ever_ see anything so bonny? But, Magnus, how ever did

the Factor come to part with her?"

"He wouldn't at first, for all his worries and the hard things he had

been saying. And when he came to it at last he wanted me to promise

that if Margret Neilsen died before himself he should have the child

back again."

"You didn't agree to that, Magnus?"

"I said the girl should choose for herself if she was old enough, and at

last he consented."

"But what about Margret Neilsen?"

"That was harder still. 'I promised her mother I should keep her as

long as I lived,' she said."

"Ah, poor thing! She didn't know what was to happen."

"'I wouldn't part with her to anybody in the world hut Anna,' she said."

"I always said Margret Neilsen was as good as gold."

"'And I wouldn't part with her now,' she said, 'only Anna is in such

trouble.'"

"Trouble?"

"Give the child to Maria and come into the house, mother."

The sunshine died off Anna's face; she saw what was coming.

"Here, take her in and give her some barley cake and syrup, and for

goodness' sake, woman, don't sniffle as if you had a cold. What is it,

Magnus? Am I the only one who doesn't know? Tell me plainly--is he in

disgrace again?"

"Have courage, mother," said Magnus.

She looked at him and understood everything. "Wait," she said, and she

went down on her knees in the hall and prayed for some moments. After

that she got up, pale but calm, and said:

"Now tell me everything--I am ready."

Magnus told her what he had heard and all that had happened: how he had

gone to town with murder in his heart, intending to punish Hans, the

sailor; how some one had warned him and Hans had taken refuge in a

schooner that was to sail for Norway; how he had hired a boat to follow

the man when the mail steamer dropped anchor in the bay and somebody

shouted from the deck that Oscar was dead, and it was the same as if a

hand from heaven had stopped him.

"Dead, did he say?"

"Dead in France, he said, and he threw down a Danish newspaper. Here it

is, mother, but God knows if I should read you the report in it."

"Read it," said Anna.

He read it--it was the same which had appeared in Paris--and she

listened without drawing breath.

"Then he died in a gaming-house--by his own hand, too--and to save

himself from further disgrace!"

Magnus did not attempt to speak, and presently Anna's tears began to

flow. After a few moments she wept bitterly and prayed aloud, now for

Oscar, that God would forgive him; now for Elin, that God would protect

the little orphan; finally for herself, that God would have pity upon

her and let her die.

Magnus went over to the dresser for a bowl, dipped it in the

water-crock, and gave her a drink, and after that she seemed better.

"My poor Oscar!" she said. "He wasted his life, poor boy! Such a

precious life, too! Such talents! There wasn't anything he couldn't

master. Everybody said what great things he would do some day. And to

think it should come to this! I never expected to thank God that his

father was dead, but I do now. Oh, God, I thank Thee-- But what am I

saying?"

After a few minutes more she began to blame herself for everything that

had happened.

"I didn't bring him up properly. I could never be strict with children.

And he was always so sweet, and even when he was naughty he was so

loving. Everybody loved that child. Yes, it was my fault, and God

ought to punish me. Almighty Father, be merciful to my poor boy, and if

I was to blame----"

"Mother! Mother!" said Magnus, and she stopped in her self-reproaches,

waiting for a loving word to comfort and support her, but Magnus said no

more.

A few minutes later all she had suffered at Oscar's hands was wiped out

of her mind and the wayward sinner had become a saint.

"He never changed to me, never, and even when he grew to be a man he

always kissed me going to bed, just as he used to do when he was a boy.

He was so good to his mother. Both my sons have been good to me. No

mother ever had such good sons----"

"Mother!" said Magnus, and again she waited, but Magnus did not speak.

At length she checked her tears and began to comfort herself with the

thought that if Oscar had taken his own life it must have been in

madness, therefore God would not hold him accountable.

"And if he died in disgrace, perhaps it was only because he wanted to

come back rich, so that he could pay the mortgage and make us all happy.

I used to think of that and pray for it so often. But now if he could

only come back poor--I shouldn't care how poor--as poor as the prodigal

in the parable----"

"Mother!" cried Magnus. "I can't hear you talk like this--I can't and I

won't. Oscar is dead, but he treated you shamefully."

"Don't say that, Magnus."

"But I do say it. I say you were the best mother to him a son ever had,

and the only return he made to you for your care and loving-kindness was

to neglect you and forget you."

"Don't say it, my son."

"I will say it, mother. And I'll say, too, that Oscar lived in disgrace

and died in disgrace, and now that he is gone I am not going to pretend

that I wish he could come back again."

"Magnus! Magnus!"

"I don't wish it. If he came back poor, what right would he have to

bring his poverty here? And if he came back rich, what reason to expect

that his money would make amends to us for the evil days we have had

through him? I don't believe in the return of the prodigal, mother, and

I don't believe in the parable, either. That may be the way in the

other world, but it isn't the way in this one, and it shouldn't be--I

say it shouldn't be."

"Oh, dear! Oh, dear!"

"As for Oscar, I tried to forgive him--you know I did--but there are

some crimes that seem to be past forgiveness, and when I think of this

last one against Thora I'm not sorry he never came back--I shouldn't

have been able to keep my hands off him. I was thinking of him when I

was following Hans, and if he had returned with the ship that brought

the news of his death it would have been God help both him and me."

"But, my son, your brother is only just dead, and it is your duty to

forgive him whatever he did.'

"He died to me long ago, mother--before he went away from Iceland--and

now that he is dead indeed, I thank God he can never come back again."

"Well, the Lord knows best what He is doing," said Anna, and then her

tears came again, whereupon Magnus, seeing what he had done, walked over

to her and kissed her. He had never done that in the whole course of

his life before, so her tears flowed faster than ever. And then he went

out of the house, muttering to himself:

"Ah, well! My God! My God!"

That night when the bell in the hall rang for prayers, and little Elin

sat in her grandmother's lap and the farm-servants trooped in with the

awesome looks of persons who knew what shadow hung over the little house

among the lonely hills, Magnus, in his quality of family priest, took up

the Bible and hymn-book at the place where Anna opened for him. The

chapter was from second Samuel, and it ended with the verse:

"And the king was much moved, and went up to the chamber over the gate,

and wept: and as he went, thus he said, O my son Absalom, my son, my son

Absalom! Would God I had died for thee, O Absalom, my son, my son."

The hymn was--

"Meek and low, meek and low,

I shall soon my Jesus know."

When the singing ended, the farm-servants went out one by one, each

saying to Magnus:

"God give you a good night!"

And Magnus answered, as well as he could for the emotion that mastered

him:

"And you! And you!"

*XIV*

In the house of sorrow God closes the hearts of little children so that

they may not break. Little Elin had been bright and happy the whole

evening through. She was a merry little sprite whose laughter--like the

rippling of a sunny stream--set everybody else laughing. Old Maria was

at a loss to say which of her parents she resembled most. When the

child laughed, Maria said: "There's a deal of the father in the little

one," and when she listened and looked up sideways Maria thought there

was a deal of the mother, too.

Anna put her to bed, and while she was being undressed her little tongue

went like a shuttle. Existence had gone rapidly since she arrived, and

she was full of stories: how she had gone to the chasm with Maria to

pluck blueberries, and two big, black ravens, sitting on a crag, had

looked down at her and croaked; how she had gone to the cow-house with

Eric to see the cows milked, and Gudrun (to her infinite glee) had

squirted some of the milk at her; and, above all, how all alone she had

found a pet lamb and it was brown, because it had lost its mother, and

lived in the elt-house, because its father had run away from it, and how

it put its cold nose against her face and said, "Bah!" and its name was

"Maggie."

"Maggie shall come and waken you in the morning, darling," said Anna.

"Shall she come in here, gran'ma?"

"Yes, dear," said Anna, and then the sunny stream of the child's

laughter rippled through the room.

"But now it's late, and good little girls must be as quiet as mice."

"Yes, gran'ma"--in a breathless whisper.

"This is to be your own little bedroom always, dearest, and gran'ma has

made it nice, so that it may do for you when you grow up."

"Yes, gran'ma"--another breathless whisper.

"That is the wardrobe for your clothes, and this is your little chest of

drawers, and that--up there on the wall--that is your mamma's guitar and

you will learn to play it some day."

"Yes, gran'ma"--the whisper was growing a little weary.

"The next room is the guest-room, and Uncle Magnus always sleeps there,

except when there are strangers, so if you knock in the night he is sure

to hear you."

"Yea, gran'ma"--the whisper was getting slow and weary.

"Gran'ma wants you to be such a good girl to Uncle Magnus. He loved

your dear, sweet mother so much. Oh, so much, but he lost her----"

"Same as Maggie's mother?"--there was a sudden burst of wakefulness.

"Maggie's mother was only a sheep, darling."

"Oh!"

"But now God has given you to Uncle Magnus to make up to him for

everything, so you must be as good as good to him."

"Yes, gran'ma"--the whisper was becoming faint.

"When you grow up to be a big, big girl, and grandma isn't here, you

must love him and comfort him just the same as if he had been your own

father."

"Ye--es, gran'ma."

"And if anybody ever comes and wants to take you away from him, you

mustn't go--you must always stay with Uncle Magnus."

"Ye--es, gran'----"

"That's a good girl! And now climb up into bed, and grandma will kiss

you and tuck you in for the night."

"And will Maggie come in the morning?"

"Yes, dearest."

"Good night, gran'ma."

"Good night, my own darling."

"Goo--nigh--gran'--ma."

*PART VI*

"_One moment in annihilation's waste_

_One moment of the Well of Life to taste,--_

_The stars are setting and the caravan_

_Draws to the Dawn of Nothing--Oh, make haste!_"

*I*

The Danish mail-steamer "Laura," outward bound on her midwinter trip

from Copenhagen to Leith, and from Leith to Iceland, carried two saloon

passengers only.

One of these, a comfortable, elderly person of ample proportions,

dressed in the warmest Icelandic vadmal, was an Iceland merchant

returning from Edinburgh with a hundred tons of British produce. This

was Jon Oddsson, formerly radical champion in politics, and now

conservative leader in trade.

The other passenger was a tall, spare man apparently about fifty years

of age, with large and luminous but weary eyes, long pale cheeks deeply

scored with lines of thought, and a pointed beard that was beginning to

be tinged with grey. This was Christian Christiansson, now ten years

older than when he returned from the Riviera to London, and so changed

in every feature by the strange characters which work and sorrow

inscribe on a man's face with the stern hand of Time, that few or none

would have recognized him.

In the interval Christian Christiansson had carried out his plans and

realized his expectations. Buried in the depths of London as a man

dying on shipboard is buried in the vast grave of the sea, he had lived

long as one who was dead, but his hour had struck at last. For five

years he had been one of the most popular of living composers. His

operas, founded on the Sagas of his own country, had made Iceland

familiar to people everywhere; his works had been represented in every

capital; his tunes had been played in every street, and it was almost as

if he had breathed over Europe and set the air to song.

Meantime he had been faithful to the pledge he had made with himself.

His name was a household word, but it was no more than a name, and his

identity had never been revealed. No temptation had prevailed with him

to disclose it, and the few who knew his secret had found it to their

interest to maintain the mystery. And now he was returning to his own

country rich and famous--rich as the man who strikes ore from the rock

and finds it pouring down on him in an avalanche of gold, but famous

only as the "hidden folk" are famous, the good fairies who leave food

and drink at the doors of poor men and then steal away before they awake

in the dawn.

How changed the old world was when he emerged at length into the light

of open day! The telegram he sent from London, asking for a berth to be

reserved for him, had almost paralyzed the captain with excitement and

delight. It was the same old Captain Zimsen, who in former days had

given him the best room when he was in favor, and the worst when he was

in disgrace. The moment he set foot on the ship, lying in dock at

Leith, the time-serving old salt had been there--hat in hand--to lead

him to his private cabin.

"Do me the honor to occupy my stateroom, sir, and if there is anything

you could wish--any little dainty for the table----"

"You are very good, very obliging."

"Don't mention it, sir. It is a pleasure, a privilege, to do anything

in my power for the most distinguished Icelander of modern times. Do

they know you are coming, Mr. Christiansson?"

"Not yet, Captain."

"What a pity! What a reception they would have given you! But they

will, they will!"

If the world was changed, the man was changed also. The buoyancy of

youth was gone, and over the old captivating gaiety of manner and

expression, a sad gravity, had fallen, as if a lilac-tree, still bright

with blossom, had been borne down by snow. But after two days at sea

his spirits rose, and he felt like a slave who had been emancipated,

like a prisoner set free.

It was fifteen years since he had left his own country, but he was

returning to it at last, as he had always hoped and intended to do. He

had left it in disgrace, he was going back to it in honor; he had left

it in poverty, he was going back to it with wealth. He was going back

as the prodigal, yet not, like the prodigal, empty-handed and ashamed,

but able to make amends, and to wipe the tears from all eyes.

Would it be wrong to permit himself to be known? If the people of

Iceland, more observant than this old captain, identified in Christian

Christiansson the Oscar Stephenson who was thought to be dead, would it

be false to the pledge he had made with himself to submit to their

recognition? Fifteen years he had lived in obscurity--was it not enough

for penance and pardon? Were not the doors of his dungeon even yet

broken open? Could he not believe that he was delivered from the body

of the death he had lived in? He had lived, he had died--might he not

live again?

*II*

During the ten years in which he had been as a dead man all channels of

communication had been closed to him, and except for information

casually gathered, he had little or no knowledge of what had occurred in

Iceland. And now, finding himself for the first time face to face with

men who had been in constant touch with his people, he had a hundred

questions which he yearned to ask: "Is my mother alive? Is she well?

And my little daughter--has God been good to me and let her live, or is

all my labor wasted?"

But he was afraid to learn the truth too suddenly, so he waited and

watched and listened for answers to the questions he dared not ask.

Meantime he tried to amuse himself with the curiosity of the captain and

his fellow-passengers, who were clearly at a loss to know who he was,

where he was born, and what family of the Christianssons he came from.

It was a perilous pleasure, a dizzy joy, to listen to the names of his

family and to hear himself discussed; and sometimes, in mortal shame of

the subterfuges to which his disguise condemned him, he could hardly

resist an impulse to blurt out the truth of his identity, and sometimes

he had to leap up from his place in the smoking-room and fly.

"You've not been home very lately, Mr. Christiansson?" said the captain,

who was smoking his long pipe after mid-day dinner while the ship swung

along in open sea.

"Not very lately, Captain," said Christiansson.

"You'll see changes, then," said the merchant.

"No doubt, no doubt!"

"The new Constitution has worked wonders for Iceland, sir."

"Worked wonders, has it?"

"The barter trade has gone, the cash business is established everywhere,

and as for the fishing, it's another industry, sir."

"Another industry, is it?"

"Judge for yourself, sir. Instead of the old open boats we have sixty

smacks, manned by twenty men apiece, and going as far as six days out

and home again."

"Then the people were right, after all, who used to say the old trade

was doomed and the water was to be the wealth of Iceland?"

"They were that, sir," said the merchant, inflating his chest and

pulling down his waistcoat. "Everybody has benefited by the change, and

I shouldn't be surprised if you find your own people better off than

when you left them--that is to say, if they are still alive."

"If they're still alive," said Christian Christiansson, dropping both

voice and eyes.

"By the way, were you at home in Governor Stephen's time, Mr.

Christiansson?" asked the captain.

"Well, yes, Captain, yes, I was at home then," said Christian

Christiansson, with a momentary faltering in his voice.

"In that case you must have seen the beginning of the end. The old

Governor tried to resist the change, and lived with a sword over his

head all his latter days, poor devil."

"A wise old man, though, wasn't he?" said Christian Christiansson--he

could scarcely trust himself to speak. "Wise?" said the merchant, with a

curl of the lip. "No man is wise who will not be warned, and he had

warning enough. But it was his sons who settled him."

Christian Christiansson looked up with a start. "Ah, yes, of course,

his sons, he had two sons, I remember. What became of them?"

"One of them is living at Thingvellir still."

"Living still, is he?"

"If you call it living--up to his ears in debt."

"In debt, you say?"

"Always has been, always will be. As for the other one--Olaf,

Eric--what was his name, now?"

"Was it Oscar?" said Christian Christiansson, with a catch in his

throat.

"Oscar it was--what a memory you must have, sir! Oscar Stephenson! He

used to think he could do a little in your line, sir, but he was here

to-day and there to-morrow, and he never did anything in his life except

put an end to it. You would hear what happened--it all came out in the

newspapers."

"Died abroad, didn't he?"

"Shot himself in a gambling hell, sir."

"The young rascal!" said the captain, taking his pipe out of his mouth

to laugh. "_I_ took it out of him though. The last time he crossed from

Iceland I made him sleep in the hold."

"Serve him right, the scoundrel," said the merchant.

"A scoundrel, was he?"

"He used to beat his poor young wife black and blue, sir.

"Beat his wife, you say?"

"She died of his ill-usage, anyway. He killed his father, too. The

night he went away he broke open the Governor's safe and carried off

everything."

"Broke open the Governor's safe?"

"That's so--the old man died a pauper."

"Died a pauper?"

"Left nothing behind him, so it comes to the same thing. Every stick in

the house had to be sold to the new Minister."

"But is this true?"

"True enough, sir. Everything came out at the general election. The

Governor and the old Factor were rival candidates, and they told us the

family secrets."

"And is this all they say at home of Oscar Stephenson?"

"All? Not a tenth of it."

"Then his very name must be hated in Iceland?"

"Hated? Execrated, sir. Not that anybody cares about the old Governor;

he is dead and gone with the rotten system he tried to support, but as

for his son, nobody can say bad enough about him."

"So that if he had lived and come back alive----"

"He would have been hounded out of the country, sir."

"Just so, just so," said Christian Christiansson, and rising with a

startling gesture he stumbled back to his stateroom.

The merchant looked after him uneasily. "Who the deuce can he be, I

wonder!"

"I wonder!" said the captain, pulling at his extinguished pipe.

It was impossible! The odium attaching to the name of Oscar Stephenson

made it impossible that Christian Christiansson could ever reveal his

identity. He had thought that the dust of death might cover his

transgressions, but rumor and report had kept them alive and magnified

them. Even the effort of his family to conceal the truth about his

offenses had given birth to falsehood and fostered slander.

The people of Iceland must never know that Christian Christiansson was

Oscar Stephenson. If they suspected, he must use means to deepen his

disguise; if they questioned, he must deny.

What else had he expected? In thinking he could ever allow himself to

be known in his true name and character, what secret craving of pride

and vanity had he been cherishing unawares? His errand to Iceland was

one of penance and atonement--at the bottom of his heart he had been

looking to it as the top and high-tide of his career, the flush and

crown of his success, as the hour of triumph when he was to justify the

friends who had loved him, and to put to rout the enemies who had hated

him, and to come off with flying colors at the last. If so, he was

rightly punished. Oscar Stephenson was dead, and nothing and nobody

could bring him to life again.

*III*

Christian Christiansson became more reserved as the vessel approached

its destination. Every mile of the voyage was full of memories, and the

sweetest were the bitterest, the happiest were the hardest to bear. He

was standing in the bow when he caught his first glimpse of Iceland,

glimmering white and blue like a sheeted ghost in the distance where its

glaciers rose out of the sea. And then, thinking of the enchanted hopes

of the days when he had first seen, it so, and how many of them now were

dead under ashes, he would have broken down badly but for the captain,

who came up behind him and said in his cheery croak:

"There it is, sir! There's your country! That's the place you've made

them all hear about!"

Christian Christiansson returned to his cabin immediately, and he was

not seen on deck again until the following morning, when the "Laura" was

steaming up the fiord. And then the merchant, in his shore-going hat

and overcoat, began to point out the sights to him as to a stranger.

"There's the old town, sir. Bigger, I'll be bound, than when you saw it

last. That's the new shipyard on the right, and that's the leper

hospital on the left. This is Engey, the island with the eider

duck--famous place for young folks courting, sir. That's the old

cathedral in the middle, and that's Government House to the left of it.

They're nearly hidden by the new warehouses now--I built them myself,

sir."

The "Laura" cast anchor under the town, amid a fleet of smacks and

coal-hulks, and remembering how he had stood there last, Christian

Christiansson's emotion would have mastered him again but for the bustle

that was going on around--the orders of the captain from the bridge, the

shouts of the sailors who were lowering the ladder, and the cries of the

men who had come out in small boats and were clambering up to the deck.

Christian Christiansson knew most of the boatmen, though some were old

who had been middle-aged, and some were middle-aged who had been young,

and some were bearded who had been boys. But none of them recognized

Christian Christiansson, as they tipped their hats to him and pushed

past to the officers of the ship.

"Good morning, mate! Good morning, Captain! What passengers this

time?"

"Only one, besides Jon Oddsson, but he's a host in himself--Christian

Christiansson!"

"What! The great Christian Christiansson?"

In less than three minutes half the small boats were scurrying away to

carry the news to the town, while the owners of the other half were

scrambling for Christiansson's luggage to have the honor of taking it

ashore.

"Easy on, my lads," shouted the captain. "Mr. Christiansson will go

with me in the ship's boat, and don't you forget it."

It was a full half-hour before this could come to pass, for Christian

Christiansson had first to drink the captain's health and the ship's

luck in the chart-room. When at length they were going ashore, with

portmanteaus piled up in the bow of the boat and the captain chattering

in the stern, it was almost more than Christian Christiansson could do

to control himself under the memory of the dark night on which he went

the other way, with no one to see him off except his mother, who sat by

his side and held his hand as if she could never part with it.

When the boat drew up alongside, the jetty was packed with people, and

as Christian Christiansson stepped ashore, with the air of a man trying

to escape from observation but conscious of being under the full fire of

it, a little fat fussy person with asthmatical breathing--Christiansson

knew him instantly--bowed deeply and began to read something from a

sheet of foolscap paper.

It was an effusive address, drawn up hastily by the Chairman of the Town

Board, in the name of the inhabitants, beginning, "Illustrious

fellow-countryman," and going on to hail Christiansson as one who had

"revived the ancient spirit and glory of a thousand years ago."

Agitated and ashamed, hardly daring to speak lest the sound of his voice

should betray him, Christian Christiansson replied with a few

commonplaces, and then, amid a whispered chorus of "Modest!" "The

modesty of greatness, sir," he tried to push his way toward the hotel.

He had not made many paces before he was confronted by a young man in

the uniform, hat, and cloak of a Government Secretary, who parted the

crowd and said, in the breathless gasps of one who had been running:

"The Minister's compliments, sir, and will you do him the honor to

become his guest at Government House?"

Christian Christiansson tried to excuse himself, but every eye was on

him, and seeing that he could not escape without the danger of exposing

himself to suspicion, he yielded and allowed himself to be led away.

The little journey to Government House was like the progress to a

Calvary. Every step was sown with memories--memories of the pleasures,

the passions, the darling joys, the sorrows and the tragedies of the

past--but while they seemed to strike up at him out of the very stones

of the street, he had to nod and smile as the Secretary, walking by his

side, rattled along with explanations and descriptions of the places

they passed on their way.

"This is our principal thoroughfare, Mr. Christiansson. That is our

chief hotel, and this is our national bank. The large building flying

the Iceland falcon is our parliament hall. That is our old cathedral,

sir, and this--this is Government House."

Suffocated with shame, choking with a sense of duplicity, and trembling

with the fear of detection, Christian Christiansson continued to say,

"Yes" and "Is that so?" until he reached the porch of his old home. And

then, remembering how and when he had passed out of it last--alone, at

night, disgraced and with his father's door closed against him--it was

almost as much as he could do to restrain an impulse to turn about and

fly. But just at that moment his father's door opened quickly, and

there on the threshold another man, in the uniform of the Governor,

stood waiting with outstretched hand to welcome him.

The palpitation of Christian Christiansson's heart was almost choking

him. What wild harlequinade of real life was this, that he who had been

so nearly flung out of Iceland should be received back to it with open

arms? What mad game of blind-man's buff were the powers of destiny

playing with him? It was not for nothing that he had taken the name of

Christian Christiansson. What invisible wings of Fate had been over him

when he did so? And were they plumed to honor or to dishonor, to reward

or to punishment, to joy or to sorrow, to life or to death?

*IV*

The Sheriff made Minister was the same man still. He received Christian

Christiansson with suavest politeness but without a trace of

recognition.

"Welcome!" he said. "Welcome to Iceland! My wife is in the

drawing-room--she will be delighted to see you. We may go this

way--this way through my bureau--do me the honor to follow me. Don't

knock against the stove--strangers do sometimes. A ramshackle old

house, sir, for which my predecessor was responsible--I'm building a

better in another part of the town. You've not yet dined? How

fortunate! In these high latitudes we keep up primitive customs, Mr.

Christiansson. We dine in the middle of the day, and you are just in

the nick of time. I was holding a meeting of my executive when the news

of your arrival reached me, and I took the liberty to invite one or two

of my colleagues. This is the drawing-room--have the goodness to step

inside."

Muttering monosyllables only in reply to the Minister's explanations,

Christian Christiansson followed him through the house that was as

familiar as the palm of his hand until he came face to face with his

hostess and the friends who had been invited to meet him.

The hostess was an acquaintance of his school-days, grown middle-aged

and matronly, and the friends were the Rector of the Latin School,

looking elderly and iron-grey, and the Bishop, looking white and old.

They received him with the utmost cordiality, but, like the Minister,

without a sign of recognition.

Christian Christiansson bowed but scarcely spoke. He was no longer in

fear of discovery, for now he knew that unless he wished it otherwise he

could pass through Iceland unknown; but standing there in the old home,

with the traces of his boyhood about him, his heart swelled and his

throat thickened, and it was as much as he could do to control himself.

After a moment a servant announced dinner, and the Minister led the way

to the dining-room. It was the same old room, with the same furniture,

and hardly altered in any particular. But it was full of ghosts in the

eyes of him who entered it again. In one rapid glance Christian

Christiansson took in everything--the chair his father used to sit in,

his mother's place, Magnus's, and Thora's. And remembering that all

these were gone; that everything connected with his own people had faded

away; that the old house was inhabited by others now, and nothing

remained except himself and he had neither part nor lot in it, the

palpitation of his heart nearly choked him again, and he sat at the

table like a guilty thing.

But if Christian Christiansson was silent the Minister talked

incessantly.

"You will find that Iceland knows all about you, Mr. Christiansson--all

about you! Speaking for myself I may say that in addition to the

ordinary channels of intelligence I have some private sources of

information. My son--you know my son, I think?"

Christian Christiansson bowed.

"My son has kept me constantly informed, so you will find me abreast of

all your movements. Certainly, I take it amiss that he did not warn me

of your coming--but perhaps he didn't know. He didn't? I thought as

much. Not that he would have told me if you had wished it concealed.

Neils is discretion itself, sir--discretion itself. For instance I

could never persuade him to tell me who you were. I tempted him--I

confess I tempted him. But no! 'Business is business, father,' he

would say, and I was forced to be content."

"Iceland is honored that you show yourself first in your own country,

sir," said the Rector.

"Indeed it is, Rector, and Mr. Christiansson will find that his fame is

no empty bubble here."

"There isn't a student who doesn't sing your songs, sir," said the

Rector.

"Nor a girl of fourteen in a farmhouse who doesn't play your music,"

said the Minister's wife.

"Wonderful!" said the Minister himself. "It's perfectly wonderful! But

I always say the musician is the international artist. Other

artists--the poets for example--require their translators, but the

musician needs no go-between. He uses the one universal language, and

when he speaks the whole world may hear. What a gift! What a thing it

must be to be among the great composers! Perhaps it has its penalties,

though. What does the poet say? They learn in suffering what they

teach in song. What a thought that is! I wonder if it's true? I wonder

if every great song, every great symphony, every great opera is born of

the suffering--the actual real life suffering, and perhaps in some cases

the sin and sorrow--of the man who created it! What should you say, Mr.

Christiansson?"

"God knows," said Christiansson, and after that there was silence for a

moment.

"Poor Stephen!" said the Bishop suddenly, and then everybody raised his

face from the table.

"I was thinking," said the Bishop, "that if sin and sorrow, added to the

gift of genius, go to the making of great music, somebody was born in

this very house who should have left immortal works behind him."

Christian Christiansson had looked up with the rest, and now the

Minister leaned across to him and said in an undertone, "A sad story,

sir--a son of my predecessor who made shipwreck of his life, poor

fellow."

"You mean Oscar Stephenson?"

"Yes, indeed. But can it be possible that you knew him?"

"We talked of him on the steamer."

"Ah, of course, certainly! And then he was a kind of humble confrere of

yours, and conducted at Covent Garden. What a tragedy! What a scandal!

When the dreadful news came from Nice everybody here felt ashamed. Such

a well-known Iceland name, and the son of a former Governor! It was

almost as if Iceland had been dishonored in the eyes of the world, sir.

So different, so entirely different, from the effects, the glorious

effects of your own magnificent achievements."

Christian Christiansson was quivering from heart to eyelids, but the

same mysterious impulse that compels the lamb to confront the dog forced

him to go on.

"His mother is alive, isn't she?" he said.

"Anna? Yes! She's alive--that's nearly all you can say about her."

Christian Christiansson's voice deepened and shook. "Is she sick?" he

asked.

"Sick in fortune at all events. When the old Governor died she went to

live with her other son at Thingvellir, and he is in trouble again, poor

creature."

"In debt, isn't he?"

"Yes, he is in debt to the Bank for the interest and principal of some

money which his father borrowed on mortgage to keep his brother out of

prison."

"And what is the Bank going to do with him?"

"Sell him up immediately."

Christian Christiansson sank into silent reverie again, and when the

conversation at the table had taken another turn, he said unexpectedly:

"He left a child behind him, didn't he?"

"Who, sir? Oh, Oscar Stephenson? He did--a girl."

"She's living, too, isn't she?"

"She is, sir--that is to say, for all I know to the contrary. Rector,

Oscar's little daughter is still alive, is she not?"

"Alive and well and hearty," said the Rector.

Christian Christiansson's eyes brightened visibly. "That's good news,

at all events," he said.

The altered tone startled everybody, and nobody spoke for a little

while. Then the Minister said:

"It is really very good of you to take an interest in the family of your

poor dead confrere, and if I'd had the least idea you wished to hear

more about them it would have been so easy--I might have invited the

banker."

"I'll see him to-morrow," said Christian Christiansson, and then,

breaking through his reserve, he talked for the next half-hour on other

subjects.

He talked well and the company were delighted, for there was no one to

know that his vivacity was nervousness and his laughter something like

shame. When the dinner was at an end the Bishop, who had fixed his eyes

constantly on Christian Christiansson, rose and held out his hand to

him.

"It has been a great happiness to have seen you, Mr. Christiansson," he

said, "and I trust we may meet again. I know nothing of music, sir, but

I rejoice to see that the noble musician is only another name for the

noble man, and I pray God to bless you body and soul."

Christian Christiansson could not trust himself to reply, for the

Bishop's praise added a new bitterness to his remorse, so he stooped

over the old man's hand and kissed it.

The Bishop was pleased and touched. "How charming he is! How perfectly

charming!" he said, as he put on his overcoat in the porch. "He reminds

me of some one I've met somewhere."

"Me, too," said the Rector.

"Those beautiful manners, that captivating smile, and that voice that

goes through and through you!"

"Does he resemble--or is it only because we have been talking at

table----"

"You mean poor young----"

"Yes."

"Ah me!" said the Bishop as he opened the door. "What brave things he

might have done if Heaven had willed it!"

"He might have been another Christian Christiansson by this time," said

the Rector.

"Poor Stephen!" said the Bishop.

"Poor Anna!" said the Rector, and the two old friends went heavily down

the path.

Meantime the man they were talking of, though they did not know it, was

going through an agony of self-reproach. The duplicity of winning his

way to the love and esteem of his people under the cover of a false name

was suffocating him. It was necessary, it was inevitable, it was a part

of the conduct that was forced upon him by the errand that had brought

him home, but if they who welcomed him in the ignorance of their

enthusiasm could know who he was, how their hearts would turn from him;

how their sympathy would change to loathing and their admiration to

contempt!

The evening was one of prolonged suffering to Christian Christiansson,

for everything that happened in that house, every trivial object that

met his eye, seemed charged with the power to torture him. As soon as

he could, he excused himself, and asked to be shown to his room.

They showed him to the bedroom that had been occupied by Thora!

That was the last drop in his cup. He felt like a man who had stumbled

into a hidden grave, and he wanted to say, "Give me any room in the

house except this." But he dared not speak, lest his slightest word

should betray him.

When the door was closed, he flung himself in the armchair before the

stove, and then one after one, as by flashes of lightning, he saw over

again the scenes of his life with which that room was associated. He

thought of his wedding night, when with a fluttering heart he came on

tiptoe into the cosy nest of his bridal chamber, and heard Thora's

tremulous breathing behind the curtains of the bed. He thought of the

joyous morning when her pale face shone like sunshine, and the air of

the room was full of auroral radiance, because a child was born to them.

He thought of the dark day when he found her lying dead, and of the

heavy hour when he took his last look at her, and buried his

compositions in her coffin.

Oh, miserable mummery! Oh, broken and senseless vow! Yet not senseless

either, save to his own violated intention, for now he knew why he had

taken the name of Christian Christiansson. In the blind spasm of his

accusing conscience he had thought it was merely in order to deny

himself the fame which his works were to win for him, but the

inscrutable and ironical powers of Destiny had sterner purposes than

that.

It was in order that, being dead as Oscar Stephenson, he should yet

return to Iceland; in order that he should see the accumulated

consequences of his conduct; in order that he should follow, as if with

bare feet on the hot ground of a geyser, the footsteps and the funeral

of his youth; in order that the living might torture him with gratitude,

and the dead with memories; in order that God's right hand of Justice

should fall on him as it had never fallen before, and everything he had

done should be paid for.

This was why he had taken the name and won the fame of Christian

Christiansson. And the martyrdom of his new life was beginning.

*V*

As soon as the Bank opened in the morning Christian Christiansson called

on the manager, and was received with extravagant politeness.

"I must take the liberty to introduce myself," he began.

"Quite unnecessary," said the banker with a bow, "all the world--I say

all the world, sir, has been introduced to you."

"You would receive a letter from my banker in London----"

"We did--it came with the mail that was brought by the 'Laura.'"

"I think it asks you to honor my signature up to two hundred thousand

crowns."

"That is the amount, sir--two hundred thousand. And if you wish to draw

any of it immediately----"

"I do," said Christian Christiansson, and taking a large pocket-book

from his breast-pocket he drew out a cheque-book and took up a pen.

"Mr. Palsson," he said--the banker started at the mention of his name,

then bowed and smiled--"I was much touched by a case of distress which

the Minister spoke of at dinner yesterday, and I could wish to be of

some assistance."

"You are very generous, Mr. Christiansson, and if I can be of the

slightest use to you--I say if I can be of the slightest use, sir, pray

be good enough to command me."

"It was the case of the family of the late Governor--I understand that

they are in debt to the Bank and that the Bank is in the act of

distraining."

"Unhappily true, sir, but the Bank has been very indulgent--I say the

Bank has been very indulgent--it was impossible to hold back longer."

"I think that the debt is for interest on a mortgage on the Inn-farm at

Thingvellir, and that the money was borrowed by the father of the

present owner?"

"That is so, sir, but the interest is long in arrears, and the

mortgage--I say the mortgage itself, sir, is the reverse of a good

security."

"Mr. Palsson," said Christian Christiansson, "if I were to pay you the

interest out of my own pocket would that stop the proceedings?"

The banker's breath seemed to be arrested. "You are very good, sir," he

said after a moment. "But the interest is large; you can hardly be

prepared for the amount of it."

"What is the amount of it?" asked Christian Christiansson.

"Eight thousand crowns at least, sir--I say at least eight thousand.

And in any case I should be unable to receive it. Things have gone too

far. The deed of execution has been served, the advertisements of the

auction have been published, and the whole matter is now in the hands of

the Sheriff."

"When is the auction to take place?"

"Let me see," said the banker, consulting a newspaper, "this is the last

day of the year, the auction is advertised for to-morrow, sir."

"Did you say to-morrow?" said Christian Christiansson, rising suddenly.

"To-morrow at nine in the morning, sir."

Christian Christiansson resumed his seat and sat for some moments

nibbling the top of the pen. Then he said:

"Mr. Palsson, I have been many years abroad, but I seem to remember that

when landed property has to be sold by the law in Iceland three auctions

are necessary--two at the office of the Sheriff, and the third on the

estate itself."

"That is so, sir, but unfortunately this is the third--the two others

have taken place already."

"So the Inn-farm must go to the hammer in any case?"

"It must go to the hammer in any case."

"You think there is no help for it?"

"I am sure, sir--I say I am sure there is no help for it."

"Ah, well--if it must be, it must be," said Christian Christiansson, and

then, as by an after-thought, dipping the pen in the ink, "The interest

is eight thousand crowns, you say?"

"At least eight thousand, sir. With legal and other expenses probably

ten--I say probably ten."

"And the principal is----"

"The principal is one hundred thousand, sir."

"Poor souls, poor souls!" said Christian Christiansson. He began to

write his cheque, but the banker went on talking.

"I am sorry for the mother, sir--I say I am sorry for the mother. She

belongs to a generation which is rapidly passing away, but there are

still many in the town who remember her. A good, motherly soul, sir--it

is a pity misfortune should fall so fast on her in the evening of her

days---- Blotting paper?"

"Thank you."

"I am sorry for the son, too--I am very sorry for the son. An Ishmael,

sir--always was and always will be--but he seems to have had a terrible

time of it. To tell the truth the farm was frightfully over-mortgaged

at the beginning, and if he had thrown it up fifteen years ago it might

have been better for himself and the Bank and everybody. Apparently he

wished to hold on to it for the sake of the family, and to give the poor

wretch his due he has made a splendid fight for it--I say he has made a

splendid fight for it."

Christian Christiansson had written his cheque and was tearing it out of

the cheque-book.

"Then, as you say, sir, the mortgage was not made by himself, and

everybody knows the conditions under which the first debt was

contracted. Ah, if that scapegrace brother could only be here to-day!

When a man does wrong he seems to think the consequences of his crime

will end with his own action, but they are like snowballs rolling in the

snow--I say they are like---- Two hundred thousand crowns, sir?"

Christian Christiansson had handed his cheque to the banker, and the

banker, fixing his eye-glasses, was reading the amount of it.

"Do you really mean that you wish to draw the whole sum at once, Mr.

Christiansson?"

"If you please," said Christian Christiansson.

The banker began to laugh. "Certainly we have no highwaymen in Iceland,

sir--I say we have no highwaymen--but unless the money is wanted for

immediate purposes----"

"It is wanted for immediate purposes, Mr. Palsson."

"In that case, of course--certainly--may I ask you to wait a little?"

It took half-an-hour to find the money for Christian Christiansson's

cheque, and when it came it was in three banknotes of fifty thousand

each, signed specially by the Minister, and fifty other notes of a

thousand. Christiansson put the whole of them in his pocket-book, and

they filled it to its utmost capacity.

"I've given you a great deal of trouble, Mr. Palsson."

"It has been a pleasure, sir--I say it has been a pleasure. I only

regret that I was unable to help you in that other matter. If you had

come to me two days ago I should have sent a messenger to the Sheriff,

and perhaps he----"

"Who is the Sheriff in that case, Mr. Palsson?"

"The Sheriff of Ames, sir. He lives at Borg."

"How far is that from Thingvellir?"

"Only some thirty to forty miles, sir."

"About as far as from here to there?"

"About the same, sir, but in this country of no roads and no railways

that is sometimes a long day's journey."

"Just so! Good day, and thank you, Mr. Palsson!"

"Good day to you, Mr. Christiansson," said the banker, and looking after

him he thought, "What does he want with two hundred thousand crowns at

once, I wonder? And why--I say why did he wish to pay the interest for

Magnus Stephenson?"

"Thank God I've come in time!" thought Christian Christiansson.

And going out of the Bank he told himself, with a thrill of hope and

joy, that the inscrutable powers of Destiny, which seemed to have made

him the plaything of chance and error, could not be wholly evil if they

had brought him back to Iceland at the moment of his people's greatest

peril, that he might succor and save them at their utmost need.

*VI*

The morning was heavy and cheerless. Dark woolly clouds were rolling

over the mountains, a cold wind was coming up from the east, and the

voice of the North Sea was loud and shrill.

"We shall have snow before the year's out, sir," said one of a group of

fishermen who were stamping their feet and beating their arms at the

bottom of the Bank steps.

"No time to lose!" thought Christian Christiansson. "I must send for

horses immediately and start off without delay."

But before going to Thingvellir there was something to do in Reykjavik,

and that was the most important thing of all--by some excuse or

subterfuge he had to see his child as a first step toward claiming and

recovering her. She had been ten years at the farm, but he thought she

was still at the Factor's, and he bent his steps in that direction.

Of the Factor himself he knew no more than he had been able to glean at

breakfast without betraying a particular interest--that he was still

alive, that enough had been saved out of the wreck of his fortunes to

enable him to keep his house, and that he lived the life of a

misanthrope, blaming the whole world for his misfortunes and all the

trouble of his days.

Christian Christiansson might have walked to the Factor's blindfold, but

the house itself when he came in front of it seemed strangely

unfamiliar. The once bright little villa looked like a witless man who

has lost his place in the world and all hope and all respect for

himself. The white paint of the walls was cracked and dirty, the

windows were smeared with the salt which is borne on the breath of the

sea, the garden was wild, and the cobbled path was overgrown with grass.

It was hardly like a house a young girl might live in, but after he had

rung the bell he listened for a light step in the hall. The door was

opened by a withered old woman in white ringlets, with her gown tucked

up in front. It was Aunt Margret, but the little old maid, once so pert

and dainty, had the neglected and frightened look of a cat in an empty

house, left behind and forgotten.

Her face was the first he had yet seen of the faces of his own people,

and so hard did he find it to play his part that he had mentioned her

name before he was aware of it, and she had started perceptibly, as if

at the sound of a familiar voice.

"Is your brother at home, Margret Neilsen?" he asked.

"He is always at home," she answered, "but he never receives anybody

now. Who shall I say wishes to see him?"

"Say that Christian Christiansson would like to speak to him."

Aunt Margret, who was not wearing her spectacles, seemed to listen for a

moment as to a voice that came to her from afar, and then she asked him

into the house.

As he passed through the hall he listened, in his turn, for the silvery

voice he wished to hear, but he heard nothing save the sound of his own

footsteps, for the house echoed like a vault. The sense of change made

him forget for a moment the object of his visit, and when he stepped

into the sitting-room and found the familiar room so different from what

he remembered it, so bare, so bleak, so stamped with the seal of poverty

(with its scrap of worn carpet on the floor and its two broken

firebricks in the cold stove), he felt as if the ironical powers that

controlled his fate had brought him there not to see his child but only

to torture him.

After a moment the Factor came in with the old fire in his eyes and the

old spirit in his step, but wearing a threadbare skull-cap over a

threadbare suit that had once been black, and looking like a grey rock

in a green place when the sun has gone from it, leaving it grim and

hoary.

"I heard of your arrival, Mr. Christiansson," he said, "and I suppose I

ought to thank you for your call, but I am an old man who has lived past

his day, and I can't think why you wished to see me."

Christian Christiansson had his subterfuge ready. "Coming from London,"

he said, "I thought I might be able to tell you something of your

daughter."

"Helga? You know my daughter Helga?"

"I used to know her, but our ways have parted, and we have met only once

in ten years. Nevertheless I know all about her, and can tell you what

has happened."

"What has happened, sir?"

"She has become a great singer."

"A singer, has she?"

"A great opera-singer."

"Then she's rich, I suppose?"

"In the way of being so, perhaps, but famous at all events, and a

favorite all over Europe."

The Factor was silent for a moment, leaning on his stick; then he said:

"Well, that will suit her mother, I daresay. As for me I don't think it

matters. It's ten years since Helga Neilsen left Iceland, and I've

never seen the scribe of a line from her since. If she's rich I'm poor

and she doesn't care anything about it. What I call a daughter is one

who remembers her father when he is old and past work and the world has

got its heel on him. I had a daughter like that once, but they killed

her between them--they killed her between them, I say."

The old man's voice was breaking, and thinking to comfort him Christian

Christiansson said, hardly knowing what he was saying:

"I heard of your trouble, Mr. Neilsen."

"When did you hear of it? Helga couldn't have told you. She had too

much to do with her sister's death to talk of it. Did you, perhaps--in

those days you speak of--did you know my daughter's husband?"

"Yes," said Christian Christiansson, for in that heart-quelling moment

there seemed to be no escape from it.

"Then you knew a scoundrel, sir," said the Factor.

Christian Christiansson dared not flinch, though the Factor's lash had

cut him to the bone. With a throttled utterance he tried to plead for

charity. "Oscar Stephenson never ceased to reproach himself for his

share in Thora's death or to mourn----"

"It's a pretty way to mourn for one daughter to corrupt another," said

the Factor.

"Corrupt?"

"What else was it? He hadn't been a year in London before he persuaded

Helga to follow him."

"Mr. Neilsen, I have no right to speak for the man we are talking of,

but Helga is your daughter, and if it is any comfort to you I tell you

that you are wrong--I know you are wrong----"

"_How_ do you know--he lived in the same house, didn't he?"

"Nevertheless I--I believe in my heart that whatever his failures of

duty to your daughter Thora while she was alive, when she was dead he

reverenced her memory too much to----"

"Was it reverencing her memory to sell the right to violate her grave,

and then waste the money at the gaming-tables?"

The perspiration was breaking out on Christian Christiansson's forehead

and he had forgotten the object of his errand, when the door opened and

he looked up in the expectation of seeing Elin. It was only Aunt

Margret again, but now washed and oiled, and wearing her spectacles.

Christian Christiansson placed a chair for the childless woman, and

began to talk about the child.

"The man we are speaking of had his faults, God knows, but if you had

heard him talk about you, sir, and your sister and his

daughter--especially his little daughter----"

"He talked about his daughter, did he?"

"Constantly--he seemed to be always thinking of her."

"He never did anything else, then. He left me to bring her up and never

sent a penny toward her support."

"He was poor himself perhaps--indeed I know he was poor."

"Then what about the letters he wrote to his mother, bragging of his

business and the fine friends he was making?"

Christian Christiansson dropped his head.

"And when my own business was broken up, did he offer to relieve me of

my burden?"

"That was afterward, Oscar--you are confusing the dates," said Aunt

Margret.

"Hold your tongue, Margret Neilsen--I know what I'm saying. No, sir,

when the ingrate at Government House made me a bankrupt and I didn't

know if I should have a roof to cover me, it was the father's brother

who had to take the child off my hands."

"Magnus?"

"Magnus Stephenson, and he had his mother to provide for already."

"Then Elin is at Thingvellir! And Magnus has been bringing her up all

these years! How good of him! And now he is a broken man himself, poor

fellow!"

"Serve him right if he is," said the Factor. "I've no pity for him

either--he was the beginning of all the trouble."

"But when a brave man who has borne other people's burdens----"

"A brave fool, you mean, sir. Fortune comes to every man once, sir, and

it came to him, but he wouldn't have it. Look at this room, sir. You

may not believe it, but I used to have four assistants eating and

drinking with me here, and Magnus Stephenson was one of them. He had

good ideas in those days, and if he had stayed with me we should have

kept out the free traders, and he would have been the first man in the

west of Iceland by this time. I gave him every chance, too. I was

willing to make him my partner and marry him to my daughter Thora. But

no, grasp all lose all, he insulted my girl and turned up his nose at my

contract. And now he's down, but he's not done yet. What gets wet on a

fool gets dry on a knave, and Magnus Stephenson will be worse than a

bankrupt before we've heard the end of him."

"Mr. Neilsen," said Christian Christiansson, who was breathing heavily,

"you are wrong again, and you ought to know it."

"Who says I am wrong, sir? And what am I wrong in?"

"You are wrong in thinking that when Magnus Stephenson refused to marry

your daughter Thora he did so from selfishness."

"If it wasn't selfishness, sir, what was it?"

"It was unselfishness--sublime unselfishness."

"So?"

"Thora had found that she loved his brother Oscar, and to make her happy

Magnus was willing to give her up to him. But the contract was made, and

you had built all your hopes on it, so to save your daughter from your

displeasure he allowed it to appear that he refused her, although he

loved her dearly and his heart was breaking."

The Factor rose to his feet with a wild lustre in his eyes. "But is this

true?" he said.

"It is God's truth, sir."

"Who did you have it from?"

"From one who should have told you himself fifteen years ago but dared

not."

The Factor turned rigidly to his sister. "Margret Neilsen, do you hear

what he is saying?"

Aunt Margret, who was breathing audibly, merely bowed her head.

"I don't know what to say to you, sir. If what you tell me is true I've

been hating the wrong man for half a life-time. And yet people talk of

Providence!"

"God veils His face from us, Factor. We are only His little children.

He has His own plans and purposes."

"Good Lord! sir," said the Factor in a husky croak, "what purpose can

there be in blinding a man for fifteen years and letting him break up

all his friendships?"

He was walking to and fro to calm his nerves under the shock as of a

moral earthquake.

"If I have been wrong about Magnus I may have been wrong about Oscar,

also. I got frightened when he signed my name, so I helped to send him

out of Iceland. And now he is dead!"

Christian Christiansson's head was down--his throat was surging.

"His father is dead, too. We quarrelled about our children, and now it

seems it all began with a blunder! He was my friend for fifty years,

and I've never had another. There's no such thing as making an old

friend in your old age, sir, and when your friends are gone the world

gets lonely. Perhaps I was hard on Oscar, too. He was my godson. I

liked the boy in spite of everything, and he always came to see the old

man the minute he set foot in Iceland."

Christian Christiansson wanted to throw off all disguise and cry, "And

I'm here again, godfather," but he could not and dared not speak. He

rose to go, and the Factor took him to the door.

"I'll come again before I leave the country," he said at the last

moment, "and then perhaps I'll have something to say to you."

When the Factor returned to the sitting-room, looking like the same grey

rock but with clouds enveloping it, Aunt Margret, who had scarcely

moved, said in the frightened voice of one who has seen a ghost:

"Do you know who that was?"

"What do you mean?"

"That was Oscar Stephenson."

"Margret Neilson, you are mad. Oscar Stephenson is dead."

"Then he came to life again. That is Oscar Stephenson as sure as I'm a

living woman!"

*VII*

Christian Christiansson left the Factor's house glowing with excitement.

Oh, for the hour when he could lay aside the armor of duplicity! When

he could say to his own people, "I am Oscar Stephenson. Let the world

think me Christian Christiansson, but at least you must know me for who

I am."

It was necessary and inevitable that he should reveal himself to his own

family! How else could he carry out the plan he had formed of buying

the farm at the auction to-morrow morning and giving it back to his

brother? And how, except by right of blood, by right of parentage,

could he claim the child and take her away with him when he returned to

England?

In this mood he went back to Government House and announced his

intention of going on to Thingvellir.

"Thingvellir!" said the Minister. "It's only natural, sir, that you

should wish to see our great historic meeting-place, the scene of so

many of our Sagas. But why go there to-day? It isn't every day the old

town is alive, but this is the last of the year, you know, and before

midnight we shall have many interesting ceremonies. Why not stay until

to-morrow, and then I shall be happy to go with you?"

"I have a particular reason for wishing to go to-day," said Christian

Christiansson.

"That's a pity, and our townspeople will be wofully disappointed. To

tell you the truth, I've done nothing all morning but receive

deputations asking me to offer you a public banquet. Every class of the

community is excited, and the students are talking of a torchlight

procession."

"That settles it, Mr. Finsen, I must go now in any case."

"You are too modest, Mr. Christiansson. But perhaps you don't know the

way. And then look at the clouds--a snowstorm is coming."

"I know every inch of the way, and the snowstorm, if it is not too

heavy, will only add to my pleasure."

"If it is not too heavy! Believe me, there's nothing in the world more

miserable than being caught in a blinding snowstorm on the Moss Fell

Heath. But if you must you must, sir, and if you have a particular

reason for going it is not for me to keep you back."

"It is late, Mr. Finsen, and the days are short--I must get off

immediately."

"I'll send for ponies without delay, sir. You'll want two--one for

yourself, the other for your pony-boy. You'll be back in a few days, I

trust, so you'll leave your baggage behind you."

The pony-boy with the ponies came round at noon, and by that time, the

report of Christiansson's departure having passed through the town, a

number of the townspeople had gathered at the gate to see him off.

Among them were Palsson the banker, Oddsson the merchant, Zimsen the

captain, Jonsson the chairman of the Town Board, and (most surprising of

all) the Factor.

There was a tingling atmosphere of unsatisfied curiosity in the little

crowd, for rumor of the two hundred thousand crowns had passed from lip

to lip, and people were asking who the stranger was, who his father had

been, and what he could want with so much money. When Christian

Christiansson, in his long blue ulster and close-fitting fur cap, came

out of the house, and parted from his host and hostess at the porch, he

seemed to be in high spirits, for he saluted everybody at the gate, and

mentioned most of the company by name.

This intensified the curiosity, and amid a running fire of chaff and

laughter the bolder ones began to probe with questions.

"You'll put up at the Inn-farm to-night, Mr. Christiansson?"

"No doubt, Mr. Jonsson, no doubt."

"But there's to be an auction there in the morning, you know--I say

there's to be an auction in the morning, so you'll be turned out

to-morrow."

"Unless," said the captain, with a wink in his weather eye, "unless Mr.

Christiansson buys up the old place and turns farmer and innkeeper."

"And why not, Captain Zimsen, why not?"

"Hard work early and late, sir."

"Well, no man ever won the day by snoring."

Christian Christiansson had swung to the saddle, when the Factor came up

to him with his rheumy eyes shining, and said:

"Don't be surprised if I follow you to Thingvellir. Life is short, and

before I die I have something to say to Magnus Stephenson."

"We talked of him on the ship, sir, didn't we--him and his rascally

young brother?" said the merchant.

"We did," said Christian Christiansson, and then at the last moment, the

pony-boy being mounted, and everything ready, a spirit of recklessness

came over him, and he added, "But you made one mistake, Mr. Oddsson."

"And what was that, Mr. Christiansson?"

"You said Oscar Stephenson had never done anything in his life, except

putting an end to it, but he did one thing once, I remember. He stood

for parliament when I was at home, and gave a dreadful drubbing to the

dunderhead who opposed him. Good-bye!"

When he was gone it was the same is if a spell had been broken.

Something in his last word, something in his laugh, and something in the

lifting of his cap as he cantered up the road, had struck a vague

consciousness of his identity into the gossips at the gate. For a

moment they stared into each other's face in blank bewilderment and then

the merchant said:

"Who the deuce can he be then?"

"Shall I tell you who my sister says he is?" said the Factor.

"Who?"

"Oscar Stephenson himself."

It fell in their midst like a thunderbolt.

"Well, that would explain something,--I say that would explain

something," said the banker, and he told the story of Magnus

Stephenson's interest.

Within half-an-hour the word had gone through the town with the rush and

rattle of the holme wind. Christian Christiansson was Oscar Stephenson!

Almost in as many words he had said so himself, and there could not be a

doubt about it!

That night at the Artisans' Institute there were a hundred stories of

Oscar Stephenson. Some of them were good, and they were told with

tears; but some were bad, yet they were received with peals of laughter.

In the smoking-room of the hotel the students sang Oscar's songs until

the lamps went out, and then they bellowed them through the darkness in

a dozen different keys, while the windows rattled with the vibration of

their lusty voices.

Meantime a group of sedater citizens had taken their surmise to the

Minister, and he had said with his shy smile:

"We cannot uncover his nakedness, you know, but we can go on with the

arrangements for the banquet, and so tempt him to reveal himself."

They went on with them immediately. The banquet was to be at the

Templars' Hall the night after the stranger's return to Reykjavik. The

Minister was to propose, "Christian Christiansson, Iceland's favorite

son and heir!" Then the students were to sing Oscar Stephenson's

patriotic hymn, "Isafold! my Isafold! great land of frost and fire."

And after the guest had spoken the cathedral choir were to give

Christian Christiansson's stirring anthem, "Who shall ascend into the

hill of the Lord, who shall rise up in His holy place? Even he who has

clean hands and a pure heart, and hath not lifted up his mind with

vanity!"

Everything else was forgotten! The odium attaching for ten years to

Oscar Stephenson's name was gone! The dishonor which Death itself could

not kill had disappeared before the blinding light of genius, the

glittering shrine of success!

*VIII*

Meantime the man himself was on his way to Thingvellir. The clouds might

be low, but his heart was high; the sea might break on the black beach

with a monotonous moan, but his whole being sang a song of hope. A wild

activity of thoughts, imagination, feelings, and impulses possessed him,

and for the first time since he returned to Iceland he was entirely

happy.

God had permitted him to come in time to save his people from being made

houseless and homeless! He had sinned and he had suffered, but the

sacred duty of atonement was not to be denied him! The Inn-farm, which

had been mortgaged to save him from the grip of the law, was to be given

back unburdened to his brother! Two hundred thousand crowns were in his

breast pocket, and they were to buy the old place at the auction

to-morrow morning!

As he cantered up the road that led out of the town his soul careered

like a leaf in autumn under a bottom wind of hope and joy. He saw

himself arriving at the farm in the dusk of the evening and meeting his

mother and Magnus and his daughter Elin. He heard himself saying,

"Mother, don't you know me? I am Oscar, and I have come back to make

amends." And next day, when the auction would be over, the Sheriff gone

and everybody crying for happiness, he saw himself taking Elin between

his knees--Elin with the eyes of Thora, yet with his own face looking at

him as in a glass--and saying, "You are to come with me now, my dearest,

and if you have gone short of anything as a child I will make it up to

you as a woman!"

The pony-boy caught the contagion of his high spirits, and as they

cantered along he sang snatches of the Elf-song:

"Dance by night and dance by day,

Life and time will pass away,

Love alone will last alway."

He was a tall lad of eighteen who must have resembled his mother, for he

had the pink and white face of a girl. They had passed the hot springs

and the Ellida river, and risen to the heights of the first hill on

their journey before the sunshine of the boy's spirits began to be

overcast. Then as they rested their ponies and tightened the girths, he

said in a frightened whisper:

"Do you hear it, sir?"

"Hear what?" said Christian Christiansson.

"The Peak," said the boy, pointing to a rock of rugged outline that

stood on the topmost line of the mountain to their right, with a dark

cloud, that was like a great monster of the air, poised above it.

"What about it, my boy?"

"The storm and the Peak are friends, sir, for they always talk together

before the wind comes down. When people hear them talking they tremble,

because they know the storm is coming."

"Let us get on then," said Christian Christiansson.

In half-an-hour they had come to the bleak and barren country of the Red

Hill, the Red Lake, and the Deep Tarn with its dark waters and gloomy

shore, and by that time the great cloud which had been poised above the

Peak was broken into many parts, and each part seemed to be fighting the

others in the sky, for there were volleys of sound like thunder.

"Hadn't we better stop at the farm at Middale, sir?" said the boy.

But Christian Christiansson thought of his mother, of Magnus, of Elin,

and of the auction to-morrow morning, and he determined to push on.

They were on the edge of the Moss Fell Heath when the snow began to

fall. It fell at first in big flakes like dead butterflies, for there

was yet no wind on the ground, although the clouds were still scurrying

across the sky and the noise overhead was deafening.

Christian Christiansson remembered what the Minister had said, that of

all the miseries of life the worst was to be caught in a snowstorm on

this desolate moor, and for one moment he asked himself if he ought not

to go back to Middale and wait there until the storm had passed. But at

the next instant he told himself that the devilish powers which had

dogged his steps since he landed in Iceland were trying to keep him back

from the good work he meant to do, so he must go on in any case.

"You're not afraid, my lad?"

"Not to say afraid," faltered the boy.

"Let us gallop, then."

The Heath itself when they came to it was a white wilderness within the

embracement of black rocks and mountains. They were only able to find

the road by following the beacons, which were like white-headed

sentinels in single file, with their backs to the storm, going on and on

over the wide waste.

The sense of desolation was appalling, and a voice seemed to say, "Go

back while there is time to do so." But again Christian Christiansson

thought of his mother, of Magnus, of Elin, and of the auction to-morrow

morning, and he urged his horse through the deepening snow.

They had not gone much farther when the wind came down and hurled itself

in their faces. The snowflakes were pelted and slung at them like

splinters of flint. It seemed as if every flake would cut through their

skin. Then the cold became intense. Ice gathered over their eyes, and

at every other minute they had to stop to break it away.

Finally the darkness descended upon them, the deadly, implacable

darkness of the wind and snow. A wild torrent of whirling snowflakes

swept over the moor and concealed them from each other. It became so

dark that they could only see a few yards on either side, and they had

to cry out at intervals in order to keep together.

They were now in the mighty grip of the storm and could no longer think

of going back. The wind hissed and howled and wept; the snow pelted and

cut. There was no shelter of rock or tree or bush on any side; there

was nothing about or above them but the wide wilderness and the

thickening darkness.

Christian Christiansson was sorry for the boy, but thus far his own

spirits had risen with every fresh phase of the tempest. He had a sense

of fighting a fierce duel with the elements. At the other end of his

journey were his mother and Magnus and Elin, and if he could reach them

before morning he would be able to succor and save them. It was a race

as for life, for the lives of his nearest and dearest, against the wild

wantonness of elemental powers. Nature herself, with more than her

usual heartlessness toward man, was at devilish war with his effort to

save his people. But he would conquer her! Let it snow or blow or hail

or thunder, he would reach home in time for the auction!

The ponies were the first to fail. The one that Christian Christiansson

rode was a strong mare of mature age, but the boy's was a young one,

newly broken, and it seemed to be suffocating in the snow and the wind.

After a time it turned its head from the storm and refused to go

forward, and then the boy had to alight and walk in front of it and tug

it along by the bridle. In a little while it stopped altogether and

slid down on its side, and could with difficulty be raised to its feet

again.

"He's only four, and this is his first journey," said the boy in a

whimpering tone, as he laid the lash on the pony's back.

Then the boy himself began to give in. He wore bag gloves (with two

thumbs but no fingers), and in tugging at the bridle he lost one of

them. As a consequence his bare hand got frost-bitten and was soon

quite powerless. In walking before the horse his clothes had frozen

stiff, and he was hardly able to put one foot before the other. His

voice became weaker and his speech more broken, and when his companion

called back to him he could scarcely send forward his reply. At last in

a faint voice he cried:

"Come and fetch me, sir--I have no strength left."

A little later he became delirious, talked of his mother, and tried to

strip off his clothes as if he were going to bed.

Christian Christiansson experienced deep anguish of mind at the thought

of the sufferings he had inflicted upon the lad, but he lifted him to

the saddle with his back to the horse's head, and comforted him as well

as he could in his awful situation.

"Courage, my boy, courage! The House of Rest cannot be far off. We'll

shelter there. The storm will pass."

A vision of the little house of basaltic rocks, which he had entered

with Helga, had been floating through his mind like a dream of the

Calenture. How long it took him to get there and with what desperate

exertions he never knew, but walking in front of the young pony and

leading the mare beside him, he reached the little house at last.

As soon as they were under cover, the boy dropped to his knees, and,

with a gibbering accent, as if speaking through half-frozen lips, he

began to repeat the Greed, "I believe in God the Father Almighty." He

thought he was saying his prayers.

The House of Rest was badly provided, but it had hay for the horses, and

they began to munch it immediately. There was no lamp, and when the

door was shut to keep out the driving snow, the place was in pitch

darkness.

After a while the air became warm with the breath of the ponies, and the

men's clothes melted. This made them very cold, and they had to beat

their arms under their armpits to keep their bodies from shivering and

their teeth from chattering. Then the atmosphere grew hot, for the

ponies began to sweat, and the boy stripped off his outer garments, and

lay down with the young horse, boy and horse side by side, as if they

had been human companions.

Christian Christiansson threw himself upon the wooden platform prepared

for travelers, and listened to the storm outside. The wind was howling

and hissing around the corners of the house, and he had the sense of the

snow becoming deeper and deeper about it. If the storm continued the

little place might be buried before long, and then it would be difficult

or impossible to cut a way out.

His heart fell low. He began to feel appalled by the awfulness of his

position. The devilish elements were beating him. He was only half way

on his journey, and if he could not make the rest of it before morning,

his mother and Magnus and little Elin would be homeless. Yet the storm

showed no sign of abating; the ponies were spent, the boy was done, and

it seemed impossible to go on.

Suddenly a new thought came to him and he raised himself and cried:

"My boy, my boy! do you know the road from Borg to Thingvellir?"

"Yes, sir," said the boy's drowsy voice in the darkness.

"What sort of road is it?"

"Awful, sir."

"Worse than this?"

"Ten times worse--over the Hengel mountain and past the boiling pits,

sir."

"Thank God!" said Christian Christiansson, and he lay down again with

content, telling himself that the same storm that was keeping him back

must keep back the Sheriff, and therefore there could be no auction

to-morrow morning.

The storm still hissed and howled and wept in the wild wilderness

outside, but the tempest had now lost its terrors. The boy and the young

pony had fallen asleep and were breathing heavily, the mare was munching

the last of the hay, and Christian Christiansson, with his heart at ease

and a sense of safety, had settled himself for the night and was

dropping off into unconsciousness when there came a thud on the roof of

the little house.

He started up and listened, and again he heard the thud-thud over his

head. The mare also heard the strange sounds, and ceasing to eat she

came across to him, as if in fear, and laid her head upon his legs. It

was not at first that he realized that the sounds were human footsteps

and that somebody was walking on the roof, but as soon as he did so he

cried out to know who was there, and a voice that was like a voice out

of a grave answered, "Let me in."

He removed the saddles with which he had barricaded the door and opened

it. There was then another doorway of the snow that had fallen since he

entered, but in a little while he had cut it away with the spade that

hung on the wall for that purpose. At the next moment a man crossed the

threshold--a man and a horse.

*IX*

"Oh, God! What a night," said the stranger. He seemed to be scared and

awe-stricken by the uproar he had come out of.

When Christian Christiansson had closed and barricaded the door afresh

the darkness seemed denser than ever.

"Have you any matches?" he asked.

"No--yes--that is to say, I'm afraid they're damp," said the stranger.

He struck one and it spluttered out.

"Take care then. A boy is lying asleep on the floor. Bring your horse

this way."

"Thanks! How lucky I heard you! I had lost the road, and was wondering

what hollow ground I was walking on when you shouted from below. It

nearly frightened my life out."

It was a young voice; the stranger was clearly a young man, probably a

young farmer. They talked together in the darkness, neither being able

to see the other's face.

"Who are you, my lad?" asked Christian Christiansson.

"I am Eric Arnasson. I come from Thingvellir. Who are you, sir?"

"I am a traveler, and I'm on my way there."

"Going to the sale, I suppose?"

"Yes."

"Then I have just come from the house you are bound for."

"Are you a farm-servant at the Inn-farm?"

"Used to be, but the hands are all gone now. I was the last to leave,

sir."

"Where are Gudrun and Jon Vidalin?"

"Farming Korastead these ten years sir."

"And Asher?"

"He has gone too. We thinned down fast when the master got into

trouble. I was with him from the time I was a little chap, but he paid

me off this afternoon."

"Where's old Maria?"

"Dead long ago."

"Is there nobody left then?"

"Nobody but the master and his old mother and his young daughter."

"Daughter?"

"Well, everybody calls her so, but she's only his niece."

"Is there nobody else in the house to-night?"

"Not a soul that I know of. And they will not be there another night, I

suppose."

"But the sale can not take place to-morrow, my lad. The Sheriff will

never be able to get there to-day. He has to come from Borg, and the

road over the mountain is even wilder than this."

"The Sheriff is there now, sir."

"Now?"

"I left him in the kitchen when I came away, making a list of the house

property, and he was to sleep at the Parsonage."

Christian Christiansson's hair seemed to rise from his head. There was

no escape from the terrible journey. He must go on in spite of the

storm. His limbs felt like lead, and when he tried to move them he

could only do so with a tremendous effort. But he shook off his torpor

and began to saddle his mare.

"What do you think is the time, my lad?"

"I don't know, my watch has stopped. And then I have no light either.

It must be seven o'clock at least. But you're not thinking of going on

to-night, sir?"

"I must."

"You'll never get to Thingvellir, sir. It was bad enough for me with my

back to the storm, but it will be ten times worse for you with your face

to it. You'll be lost. Your friends will see no more of you."

"Good night! Take the boy back to Reykjavik in the morning."

Out on the snowfield again Christian Christiansson was conscious of

nothing but a headlong impulse to go on. The saddle was damp, and he

had a sensation of riding in cold water; the snow was deeper than

before, and sometimes his horse stumbled up to its girths; the darkness

was now the darkness of night, and it was with difficulty that he could

follow the line of the beacons; the wind hurled itself against his body,

the snow slung itself against his face, but still he strained along, for

a new and inspiring thought had come to him.

The Almighty was fighting on his side in his fierce war with the

elements! The devilish powers of Nature had been trying to keep him

back from saving his people, and when he reached the House of Rest they

had lulled him into a false repose, but God had sent the farm-servant to

warn him that his dear ones were still in danger, and that if he stayed

there until morning he would arrive at his journey's end too late!

Thinking so, his heart grew strong, for he felt himself in the immediate

presence of Him who was greater than the greatest tempest.

But after some two hours had passed the sacred fire of this theory began

to fail him. He was growing faint, and the beatings of his heart were

suffocating; he was also losing his way in the deepening snow, and when

his mare stumbled into the drifts he was scarcely strong enough to drag

her out of them. Then, before he was aware of it, the voices of Nature

were speaking to him again.

"Why did you leave the House of Rest? The Sheriff may be at the farm,

but no buyers can get there to-night, and without people to bid there

can be no auction."

Just as this thought came to him he saw a red speck gleaming through the

darkness, and he turned his horse's head in the direction of the light.

It proved to be in the window of a farm-house, and finding the door he

shouted, and presently a man came out to him.

"I've lost my way," he cried, over the wailing of the wind. "Tell me,

please, what place this is?"

"This is Korastead," the man cried back, and then a woman came into the

hall-way and stood behind him. The man was Jon Vidalin and the woman

was Gudrun, but neither of them knew him.

"Where were you going, sir?" said Jon.

"To the auction at Thingvellir."

"You are not so far out of your road, then. Bear to the right until you

cross the river, and then follow the stones until you come to the

Chasm."

Christian Christiansson hesitated. "I'm tired, having ridden from

Reykjavik, and it doesn't seem much good going farther. Nobody else

will be fool enough to travel in weather like this, and without people

to bid there can be no auction. So if you can give me shelter and a

shake-down----"

"You are welcome to the shelter, sir, but if you want the place you had

better go on and get there."

"Why so?"

"Because it's a Sheriff's sale, and he'll sell in any case."

"How can he sell if there's nobody to buy?"

"He'll bid for somebody himself, sir, and we all know who that is."

"Who?"

"Somebody at Government House who has wanted the farm these fifteen

years."

"So you think the Sheriff will hold the auction to-morrow morning

whether anybody is there or not?"

"Sure to, sir. The fewer there are to bid the better he'll be pleased,

and the bigger the Minister's bargain."

"I must go on then, I suppose," said Christian Christiansson.

"Come in and melt yourself first," said Jon. "The wind is going

down--it will be quiet presently."

A few minutes later Christian Christiansson was drinking hot coffee in

the elt-house, while Jon and Gudrun talked of the family at the

Inn-farm.

"We were servants with the family for ten years, so we know them well,

sir," said Jon.

"Poor old Anna!" said Gudrun. "She would be welcome to anything I have,

but with the boys growing up we haven't a bed to spare in the

badstofa."'

"There's an adopted daughter, isn't there?"

"There is, sir, and anybody would be glad to have her for a helper, but

the master won't hear of letting her go. 'Elin shall be servant to

nobody,' he says."

"It isn't Magnus Stephenson's fault if misfortune has overtaken him,"

said Jon. "He has the strength of Samson and has done the work of six

men."

"How does he bear his troubles?"

"Badly," said Gudrun. "He never goes to church now or reads the prayers

at home either."

"Yes," said Jon, "he has lost his religion, poor fellow, and when a man

loses that he loses everything, you know."

"People are afraid of him," said Gudrun. "He looks like a man with no

luck, and he is always beating his arms about him and driving away the

good spirits that walk by a man's side."

"And what do people say is the cause of the change in him?"

"The Bank and bad times," said Jon.

"And a bad brother," said Gudrun. "His brother is dead and the old

mistress has made a saint of him, but she daren't mention his name

before Magnus, or he gets up and goes out of the house."

"Does he hate him so much then?"

"There was a time when I believe in my heart he would have killed him,"

said Jon.

Christian Christiansson started up and prepared to go on to Thingvellir,

although his half-frozen limbs would scarcely cross the saddle or his

swollen fingers hold the reins. Again his heart had fallen low, and the

hope with which he had begun his journey--the hope of a joyful reunion

at the end of it--was now gone.

The intensity of Magnus's feeling made it impossible that he should

reveal himself to his people. If he rode up to the door and said, "I am

Oscar, the report of my death was false, and I have come back rich and

prosperous," what would Magnus say? He would say, "Your father is dead,

your wife is in her grave, your mother and your child have gone through

poverty and perhaps want, and all the consequence of your

transgressions--do you think that your miserable money will make

amends?" And then his brother would fling him back into the road.

Not to-night could he make himself known--not to-night at all events!

Perhaps to-morrow, when the sale would be over and the Sheriff gone, and

he had smoothed the way and made sure of his welcome! But now he must

go to the Inn like any other traveler who had come there to be present

at the auction and to bid for the estate.

Seeing his course clear in this way, his heart rose again and he pushed

on with a better will. The storm had subsided, and when he came to the

sudden mouth of the Almanagja the wind dropped altogether, and it was

almost as if some vast volcano in the sky had poured its lava over the

earth in snow.

The Chasm itself was full of memories--memories of the day of his

triumph, the day of his disgrace--but icicles hung from where the flags

of the nations had floated, and drifts of snow, like mighty mushrooms,

were lying in the holes where the tents had been. He remembered the

witch who had said "Beware of your brother," and he thought of the white

face that had broken in upon the dancing. In the breathless calm the

sky came out and it spanned the brant walls like a majestical roof

studded with stars, but he stumbled in the darkness on to the frozen

surface of the drowning pool, and almost rode up to the spot where he

had sat with Helga.

At the bridge that crossed the frozen waterfall he caught his first

sight of the lighted windows of the Inn-farm, and then his heart seemed

to stand still. His mother, his brother, and his little daughter were

there, and he had been ten years preparing to join them, but now that he

was so near, he could hardly bring himself to go on.

Would his mother recognize him--she who had read his features first and

known him from the cradle up? He was afraid she would, and then, in the

tumult of his tossing heart, he was afraid she would not. Nobody in

Iceland had known him hitherto, and now he was aware that he was leas

like himself than ever, for, seeing his face in a glass as he came out

of Korastead, he saw that his lips were swollen and his eyes bloodshot

with the heavy labor of that awful day.

He had crunched through the broken ice of the river below the bridge and

reached the silent snow of the pathway to the farm, when the door opened

and two men came out of the house. "The Sheriff and the Pastor," he

thought. He drew rein and they did not hear him, but when they had taken

the path to the Parsonage, the dogs inside began to bark.

The palpitation of his heart was almost choking him, and it would have

taken little to make him turn about and fly. How long he stood

there--whether five minutes or ten--he never rightly knew. A hundred

thoughts, more wild than the whirling snow, were tossing within his

brain. But thinking at length that Almighty God who had brought him

through the perils of that fearful day--defeating the designs of the

devil and of the elements, and driving him before His mighty will as

before a greater hurricane--could not have led him there at last to any

end save a good one, he urged his horse to the foot of the steps and

raised his whip to the window.

*X*

Magnus Stephenson had indeed lost his religion. For fifteen years he

had believed with all the strength of his soul that everybody in this

life was treated according to his deserts; that if you did right you

were rewarded sooner or later, and if you did wrong you were punished.

But experience of the world had little by little, and year by year,

inflicted upon his profound faith in the rule of conscience the most

inexplicable contradictions. The man who lived a good life was not

being rewarded, and the man who lived an evil one was not being

punished. What, then, was there left to believe? That there was no God

in the universe at all, or that if there were a God He did nothing!

Magnus Stephenson had tried to do what was right. He had taken up the

burdens which others laid down and he had struggled on with a strong

heart. For fifteen years he had labored like a slave, and though his

arrears of debt constantly accumulated, he had never allowed himself to

believe that the end was coming on. The mortgage was monstrous, the

interest was exorbitant, and the Bank would come to see that more than

he got out of the land and stock it was impossible for man to make!

But the deed of execution had been served on him at length, the

advertisements of the sale had been published, and the two preliminary

auctions had been held. Then, as if in a moment, the man's religion had

disappeared and his soul had sent up that sublime if blasphemous cry,

which since the beginning of the world has borne to heaven the

lamentation and protest of humanity against the misery of man: "I have

obeyed Your laws; I have lived a good life; I have assisted the poor and

helped the oppressed; I have shared my bread with the orphan and

protected the widow--what have You done for me?"

In the grim silence which follows that ghastly question, it is more than

a man's religion that disappears, and Magnus Stephenson's belief in

right and wrong, his faith in justice, in conscience, and in virtue had

gone down together, leaving nothing but the fierce convulsions of his

animal nature.

From the moment the Sheriff arrived to make the inventory he had done

little but sit in the hall and drink. He sat there all day long, with

his coarse snow-stockings over his boots, his sullen face to the stove,

his hands deep in his trouser pockets, his broad forehead heavily

wrinkled under the rough stubble of his iron-grey hair, his massive jaw

resting on his breast, and his mighty loins making the chair creak as he

moved and turned.

At intervals during the day his mother tried to comfort him.

"Don't be too downhearted, Magnus," said Anna. "The stars shine when it

is dark, you know."

"Isn't it dark enough yet?" said Magnus, and he laughed bitterly and

drank again.

At intervals Elin came to him also. She was a tall girl now, nearly

sixteen years of age, with a whisper of womanhood in her face and form,

but coming in her short blue skirt and buckled shoes she would slide

into a seat on Magnus's knee and, slipping one arm about his neck, put

the other hand on his hot forehead, and try to soothe him in her

motherly little way.

But "There, there! That will do. Go to your grandmother. I'm tired,"

he would say.

Early in the day he had been tormented by thoughts of the travelers who

might come from a distance to stay over-night in order to be present at

the auction, and in his mind's eye he saw the Inn-farm full of them,

with their indifferent talk and heartless laughter, and himself in his

impotent rage itching with a desire to fling them into the road. But

when the storm broke his fears on that head were appeased, and while the

wind and snow wailed and wept about the house he sat for hours alone in

a gloomy and tragic pence.

Besides the Sheriff, the only person who visited the house that day was

the Pastor, and he came as late as ten at night to take the Sheriff back

to lodge with him. By that time all that was left of the broken

household had gathered in the hall, where Magnus still sat before the

stove, while the Sheriff, with Anna and Elin, stood by the dresser

making an end of the inventory.

"Ugh! What a night!" said the Pastor, stamping the snow off his

stockings. "You're not likely to be brought out of bed by travelers on

a night like this--that's some consolation, isn't it?"

He was a garrulous old man, with a shallow heart and a shallow head, who

chewed the cud of his humdrum livelihood with content on his stipend of

fifty pounds a year.

"So this is to be your last night in the old home, Anna! What a pity!

Well," tapping his snuff-box, "naked came I out of my mother's womb, and

naked shall I return thither! Blessed be the name of the Lord!"

Magnus moved his chair impatiently and made contemptuous noises in his

throat.

"I've known the old house through all its days of joy and sorrow for

forty-five years, Anna. Ever since your poor father that's dead--I

buried him myself, God rest his soul!----"

"God rest his soul," said Anna.

"Ever since the day he gave you away as a bride. And a nervous,

blushing, tender-hearted little bride you were, too!"

Again Magnus shuffled in his chair and made noises in his throat.

"I remember it so well because it was the same year that your father's

big barn was burnt down, and his cousin Jorgen was found dead in the

Chasm. What a sensation that made! What inquiries! What examining

witnesses! Your predecessor had something on his hands in those days,

Sheriff."