Trond Vigfusson must have made a rich harvest of legends at Kvaerk, at
least judging by the time he stayed there; for days and weeks passed,
and he had yet said nothing of going. Not that anybody wished him to
go; no, on the contrary, the longer he stayed the more indispensable he
seemed to all; and Lage Ulfson could hardly think without a shudder of
the possibility of his ever having to leave them. For Aasa, his only
child, was like another being in the presence of this stranger; all that
weird, forest-like intensity, that wild, half supernatural tinge in her
character which in a measure excluded her from the blissful feeling of
fellowship with other men, and made her the strange, lonely creature
she was,--all this seemed to vanish as dew in the morning sun when
Vigfusson’s eyes rested upon her; and with every day that passed, her
human and womanly nature gained a stronger hold upon her. She followed
him like his shadow on all his wanderings, and when they sat down
together by the wayside, she would sing, in a clear, soft voice, an
ancient lay or ballad, and he would catch her words on his paper, and
smile at the happy prospect of perpetuating what otherwise would
have been lost. Aasa’s love, whether conscious or not, was to him an
everlasting source of strength, was a revelation of himself to himself,
and a clearing and widening power which brought ever more and more of
the universe within the scope of his vision. So they lived on from
day to day and from week to week, and, as old Lage remarked, never had
Kvaerk been the scene of so much happiness. Not a single time during
Vigfusson’s stay had Aasa fled to the forest, not a meal had she missed,
and at the hours for family devotion she had taken her seat at the big
table with the rest and apparently listened with as much attention and
interest. Indeed, all this time Aasa seemed purposely to avoid the dark
haunts of the woods, and, whenever she could, chose the open highway;
not even Vigfusson’s entreaties could induce her to tread the tempting
paths that led into the forest’s gloom.
“And why not, Aasa?” he would say; “summer is ten times summer there
when the drowsy noonday spreads its trembling maze of shadows between
those huge, venerable trunks. You can feel the summer creeping into your
very heart and soul, there!”
“Oh, Vigfusson,” she would answer, shaking her head mournfully, “for a
hundred paths that lead in, there is only one that leads out again, and
sometimes even that one is nowhere to be found.”
He understood her not, but fearing to ask, he remained silent.
His words and his eyes always drew her nearer and nearer to him; and the
forest and its strange voices seemed a dark, opposing influence, which
strove to take possession of her heart and to wrest her away from him
forever; she helplessly clung to him; every thought and emotion of
her soul clustered about him, and every hope of life and happiness was
staked on him.
One evening Vigfusson and old Lage Ulfson had been walking about the
fields to look at the crop, both smoking their evening pipes. But as
they came down toward the brink whence the path leads between the two
adjoining rye-fields, they heard a sweet, sad voice crooning some old
ditty down between the birch-trees at the precipice; they stopped to
listen, and soon recognized Aasa’s yellow hair over the tops the
rye; the shadow as of a painful emotion flitted over the father’s
countenance, and he turned his back on his guest and started to go; then
again paused, and said, imploringly, “Try to get her home if you can,
friend Vigfusson.”
Vigfusson nodded, and Lage went; the song had ceased for a moment, now
it began again:
“Ye twittering birdlings, in forest and glen
I have heard you so gladly before;
But a bold knight hath come to woo me,
I dare listen to you no more.
For it is so dark, so dark in the forest.
“And the knight who hath come a-wooing to me,
He calls me his love and his own;
Why then should I stray through the darksome woods,
Or dream in the glades alone?
For it is so dark, so dark in the forest.”
Her voice fell to a low unintelligible murmur; then it rose, and the
last verses came, clear, soft, and low, drifting on the evening breeze:
“Yon beckoning world, that shimmering lay
O’er the woods where the old pines grow,
That gleamed through the moods of the summer day
When the breezes were murmuring low
(And it is so dark, so dark in the forest);
“Oh let me no more in the sunshine hear
Its quivering noonday call;
The bold knight’s love is the sun of my heart--
Is my life, and my all in all.
But it is so dark, so dark in the forest.”
The young man felt the blood rushing to his face--his heart beat
violently. There was a keen sense of guilt in the blush on his cheek, a
loud accusation in the throbbing pulse and the swelling heart-beat. Had
he not stood there behind the maiden’s back and cunningly peered into
her soul’s holy of holies? True, he loved Aasa; at least he thought he
did, and the conviction was growing stronger with every day that passed.
And now he had no doubt that he had gained her heart. It was not so much
the words of the ballad which had betrayed the secret; he hardly knew
what it was, but somehow the truth had flashed upon him, and he could no
longer doubt.
Vigfusson sat down on the moss-grown rock and pondered. How long he
sat there he did not know, but when he rose and looked around, Aasa
was gone. Then remembering her father’s request to bring her home, he
hastened up the hill-side toward the mansion, and searched for her in
all directions. It was near midnight when he returned to Kvaerk, where
Aasa sat in her high gable window, still humming the weird melody of the
old ballad.
By what reasoning Vigfusson arrived at his final conclusion is difficult
to tell. If he had acted according to his first and perhaps most
generous impulse, the matter would soon have been decided; but he was
all the time possessed of a vague fear of acting dishonorably, and it
was probably this very fear which made him do what, to the minds of
those whose friendship and hospitality he had accepted, had something
of the appearance he wished so carefully to avoid. Aasa was rich; he had
nothing; it was a reason for delay, but hardly a conclusive one. They
did not know him; he must go out in the world and prove himself worthy
of her. He would come back when he should have compelled the world to
respect him; for as yet he had done nothing. In fact, his arguments were
good and honorable enough, and there would have been no fault to find
with him, had the object of his love been as capable of reasoning as he
was himself. But Aasa, poor thing, could do nothing by halves; a nature
like hers brooks no delay; to her love was life or it was death.
The next morning he appeared at breakfast with his knapsack on his back,
and otherwise equipped for his journey. It was of no use that Elsie
cried and begged him to stay, that Lage joined his prayers to hers, and
that Aasa stood staring at him with a bewildered gaze. Vigfusson
shook hands with them all, thanked them for their kindness to him,
and promised to return; he held Aasa’s hand long in his, but when he
released it, it dropped helplessly at her side.