that no better grave awaits you. So don’t imagine you will be allowed
to lie in churchyard mould--you who were so corrupt when you died.”
This was spoken with firm conviction, for she knew, of course, that he
had been a hard man, and really considered him unworthy a decent
burial.
“You have no cause to rise out of your grave and demand vengeance,” she
went on, “for you only got what you deserved.”
When she said this, the ghost seemed to grow darker and more distinct;
it looked as if ready to fall upon her. Quite undaunted, she addressed
it again, determined to put an end to that nuisance.
“If you will lie still in your grave I promise you that my eldest son
shall take up your calling, and become a priest. He is a good lad and I
know that he will be one of those servants of our Lord who turn
people’s hearts toward God, and not away from Him.”
She had barely uttered the first words, when the ghost began to fade in
the moonlight till there was nothing left of it but a faint outline;
and before she had finished speaking, even that had vanished.
The Ghost of Vilarstensbacken never appeared again.
That torment luckily ended, there was increasing peace and comfort at
Mårbacka. The place became as fine a farm as any in the parish, and
the owners thrived and prospered.
All this, the old mistress had said, was undoubtedly true, for some
years later, in the beginning of the eighteenth century, a youth from
Mårbacka was sent to a theological seminary, where he studied for the
ministry and was finally ordained.
He called himself Morell, after his ancestral home, and in due time was
made curate at Ämtervik. He settled on his family estate (Mårbacka),
and was the first clergyman to reside within the parish--his
predecessors having all lived at Sunne and come down to Ämtervik only
on specified Sundays.
The peasants of Ämtervik were very glad to have their own pastor,
especially one who had a home of his own so that they did not have to
provide him with a living. To be sure, Mårbacka was a good distance
away from the church, but that disadvantage was more than made up for
by the priest’s being a man of independent means.
The parson’s pay was small, and of that little the lion’s share went to
the Dean of Sunne, so that the priest would have been as poor as the
proverbial church mouse but for Mårbacka.
In order that this arrangement, which was for the good of both pastor
and parishioners, might be perpetuated, the first clergyman at Mårbacka
gave one of his daughters in marriage to a priest by the name of
Lyselius, whom he made his heir to the estate and the office.
Lyselius, in his turn, did likewise: he married one of his daughters to
Pastor Eric Wennervik, who later came into the property and the office.
The old mistress had said that everyone seemed to think this an
excellent custom which should be kept up; even the clergymen’s
daughters, she thought, had been content to have it so.
III
PASTOR WENNERVIK
THE old mistress had also said it was the three clergymen, Morell,
Lyselius, and Wennervik, who built up Mårbacka.
Before their time the place was just a peasant farm, which, though
large and flourishing, looked like any other farmstead. If there were a
barn for ten cows and a stable for two horses, it was about all that
could be expected. The main house had perhaps but one large room, where
the entire household lived day and night, and a little pitch-dark
kitchen called the _kåve._ There were many other buildings, of
course--a larder, a bath house, a rye-loft and other sheds, a kiln, and
a smithy; but they must have been rather small, as the farm at that
time was not nearly so extensive as it is now. Only the nearest fields
were then under cultivation.
The old mistress used to wonder how the three clergymen had managed to
build a stable for ten horses and a cow-house for thirty cows, besides
all the big granaries, storehouses, and sheds which they seemed to have
required. The brew house with an adjoining room, which was used for a
farm-office, were also from their time, likewise the milk-room,
loom-room, and bailiff’s lodge.
Finally, along in the seventeen-nineties the old mistress’s father,
Pastor Wennervik, built a new dwelling which was planned on a more
modest scale than the other buildings. He was satisfied with a
one-story house of four rooms and kitchen, and an attic with two gable
chambers. But all the rooms, including the kitchen, were large and
light, and so admirably adapted to living purposes that hominess, so to
speak, met one with open arms at the threshold.
Pastor Wennervik had also laid out the kitchen garden with its aromatic
herb-beds and fruit trees, and the little rose garden. He was the son
of a master gardener, and was himself quite clever at gardening. Many
little rose bushes and grafted apple trees still growing on the farms
round Ämtervik he had helped set out.
In his youth he had been tutor at a great manor, where he conceived a
fancy for fences and gates. Round the kitchen garden at Mårbacka he put
a pretty white paling, with ornamental gates, and another round the
rose garden. If one wished to drive in from the road, one had first to
open a great gate, then pass range on range of out-buildings, with
fences and gates at several points. It was the same with the front
yard.
The children loved to hear about their great-grandfather, Pastor
Wennervik. They had found in a corner cupboard of the farm-office some
old books in Greek and Latin which bore his signature, also a number of
poems by Bellman and Leopold copied in his hand. They knew that the
harpsichord and guitar had come to Mårbacka in his time, and they
created in fancy a beautiful image of him. It was not only from the old
housekeeper they had heard anecdotes of him, but also from their father
and their father’s sisters. He was a charming gentleman of fine taste,
who always liked to wear good clothes and who loved flowers and apples.
He must have been a bird-lover, too, for it was he who put up the
octangular dove-cote that stood on the green outside the kitchen
window. He had planned and worked to make Mårbacka a beautiful home.
The clergymen who dwelt there before him must have lived mostly in the
peasant manner, while he had softened the old severe simplicity by
introducing some of the manners and customs of gentlefolk, thus
rendering life there richer and easier.
There was an old oil painting at Mårbacka from the time of Pastor
Wennervik. It was a portrait of his early love--a rich and high-born
young lady of the Province of Västergötland. He had been tutor to her
brother, and being no doubt the best looking and most charming young
man she had met up to then, she fell in love with him, and he with her.
The lovers had their trysting places in the bowers of the manor park,
where they spoke of their love and pledged eternal fidelity. But one
day they were discovered, and the young tutor was promptly dismissed.
All that was left to him of love’s young dream was this counterfeit
presentment of his sweetheart. The young lady’s portrait had not been
done by a skilled artist; the face on the canvas under the powdered
hair was set and expressionless; it looked more like a pretty doll than
the likeness of a human countenance. However, the features were of
delicate mould, and to him who had seen her eyes sparkle and her lips
curve in a smile, the portrait was beautiful enough. Pastor Wennervik
perhaps felt some of the old glow of youth in his heart when his gaze
rested on the picture.
Mayhap ’twas the portrait which inspired the obscure country parson to
surround himself with flowers and birds, to enhance the beauty of life
with music and poetry.
IV
THE GANDER
THERE was only one thing the children had against Pastor
Wennervik--that in his late years he had married Jungfru Raklitz, the
dreadful old housekeeper-person who had gone from manor to manor and
been harassed and tormented by hard mistresses, until she, in her turn,
became a plague and a torment.
If Pastor Wennervik must needs have married again he should at least
have thought to protect his dear daughter against the stepmother. That
she was allowed to treat the girl as she saw fit, to scold and chastise
her and put upon her an unreasonable amount of work--that, the children
could never forgive him.
How they loved the billy-goat that got drunk on dregs and butted into
old Raklitz, upsetting both her and her brandy cruse. They also sided
with the market folk at the Ombergshed Fair who stole her apples and
shouted back to her that the Mårbacka parson was too good a man to take
money from poor folk for his apples. And they gloried in the bold thief
who broke into her larder after she’d had a new lock put on the door
which was so big and strong it might have done for a prison gate. And
they were ready to burst into tears at the thought of the poor
goosey-gander!
One fine April day, in the time of Fru Raklitz, all the Mårbacka geese
had been let out in the farmyard. Suddenly some wild geese came flying
high above them, honking and shrieking as usual. The tame geese flapped
their wings and squawked back--the way they do every spring.
As flock after flock of wild geese flew over, the tame geese grew more
and more restless, and before any one knew what was up, a big gander
darted into the air and joined the wild geese in their flight.
Everyone expected that he would soon turn back; but indeed he did
nothing of the sort. When he was not there by the next morning, they
thought they’d never lay eyes on him again. He must have fallen prey to
the fox or the eagle, they said, if he had not actually become winded
and dropped dead from exhaustion. It was inconceivable that a tame
goose could fly with wild geese to the far north.
Nothing was seen or heard of the gander the whole summer. But when
autumn came, and the wild geese flew southward, shrieking and calling
as always, the tame geese again lifted their wings and answered them.
Fru Raklitz, seeing how excited the geese were, and being more wary
this time than the last, told her stepdaughter, Lisa Maja, to run out
and drive the geese into the barn.
Lisa Maja had no sooner stepped into the barnyard than she heard a
loud rustling noise just over her head, and almost before she had time
to blink, a flock of wild geese alighted on the ground right in front
of her. A big fine white gander was the leader; behind him walked a
gray mother goose, trailed by nine speckled goslings. The girl hardly
dared move lest she frighten them away. Very cautiously she opened the
barn door and concealed herself behind it.
The goosey-gander made straight for the barn, his family following him.
When they were all inside, Lisa Maja stole softly after to see where
they had gone. Well, the big goosey-gander had walked right into the
goose pen, and was calling and coaxing till those with him went in,
too. Then he led them up to the trough, which was full of oats and
water, and fell to feeding.
“See, this is what I’m used to,” he seemed to be saying to his family.
“This is how I have always lived ... No food worries, only to step up
to a full trough.”
Lisa Maja quietly slipped out, shutting the door after her, and hurried
back to Fru Raklitz.
“Mother dear, do come see!” she said. “The gander who flew away in the
spring has come back with a wild goose and nine little goslings.”
All her life she regretted having shut in the goosey-gander and told of
his return. Fru Raklitz, without saying a word, hunted up the little
knife which was used for killing geese, and before sundown the fine
white goosey-gander, the nice gray mother goose, and all the pretty
goslings were dead and plucked.
“It was a poor reward you gave our goosey-gander, Mother, for coming
back to us with so many nice geese,” was all she dared say.
“’Twas enough at least to make all the geese on this place understand
what happens to those who defy me and try to run away,” Fru Raklitz
retorted, a malicious smile playing round her hard mouth.
V
THE LEMMINGS
FRU RAKLITZ had been hard enough on Lisa Maja while the father was
alive; but when he died, in the year 1801, and she was in full control,
she became even more harsh and exacting. The stepdaughter was now
wholly at her mercy, without support or protection from any quarter.
The girl was but seventeen--too young and inexperienced to hold her own
with a canny old woman. She had a brother, to be sure, but he was at
Upsala University studying, so that she could not look to him for any
help.
The stepmother and she were soon at daggers’ points. Fru Raklitz wanted
her to marry the clergyman who had succeeded her father, but Lisa Maja
would not agree to that. She opposed all the arguments of the
stepmother and the parish folk, who thought the old order such an
excellent thing. The clergyman’s daughter had her own ideas about
marriage. She would not marry a man merely because he happened to be
the priest at Ämtervik; he must also be the sort she could love.
The new pastor was anxious to put the matter through. He had got into
the good graces of the stepmother, who tried to help him by any and
every means. As the girl continued to say No, Fru Raklitz one day drove
down to Öjervik to see Judge Sandelin, who was Lisa Maja’s guardian,
and have a talk with him.
It was clear that she would have the support of both the Judge and his
wife. They knew Fru Raklitz well; she had been housekeeper at Öjervik
for many years and they had always known her to be a wise and prudent
woman. Without doubt she was right, they said; the Mårbacka clergyman’s
daughter should marry the curate. Anything else was out of the
question.
Fru Raklitz was invited to stay for supper, and after the meal she and
the Judge’s wife sat talking till late in the evening. It was eleven
o’clock before she finally set off for home. But the sky was clear and
there was a moon, so that it looked as if she would have no difficulty.
And now as the chaise moved rapidly along the shore road toward Sunne,
Fru Raklitz sat thinking how she would worry and torment the poor
stepdaughter in order to break her will. Of course it was only for the
girl’s own good, she flattered herself so that she need have no
conscience in the matter.
Then, all at once, Svarten, the horse, shied with a jerk that nearly
upset the chaise. He acted as if he had the staggers; he dashed off the
road, across the ditch, and was down in a field before Long-Bengt, the
driver, could check him. When the horse was finally under control he
was all a-tremble. Without moving from the spot where he stood he
lifted his feet, one at a time, then suddenly gave a shriek such as
is seldom heard from a horse--and leaped into the air. Back on to the
road he would not go. When Long-Bengt tried to urge him on, he reared
and came near kicking the chaise to pieces.
“What is it, Bengt, what is it?” gasped Fru Raklitz, clutching the
man’s arm in her fright. “Has the horse gone mad?”
“That horse has more sense than Frua and me both,” answered Long-Bengt.
“He’s not mad, he sees something we ain’t got eyes for to see.”
Svarten nosed the ground, snorted, and backed, regardless of the chaise
and those in it. Luckily, they were in a field where the summer’s rye
had been cut, so that the ground was quite smooth and even. They
noticed that they were backing toward a broad, deep ditch; but when the
vehicle was at the very edge, the horse stopped; he probably thought he
had got past the worst danger. Though still nosing the ground and
snorting, he made no more leaps.
“You’d better get out, Frua,” said Long-Bengt, “while I try to urge him
past whatever ’tis he sees.”
Fru Raklitz unbuttoned the carriage apron and was about to set foot to
the ground, when she drew back with a cry.
“I can’t step down, Bengt,” she said.... “It’s moving!”
“I believe Frua’s as daft as the horse,” laughed Long-Bengt. “What’s
moving?”
“The ground under us is moving, the whole field is moving.” Her voice
shook and she felt a lump in her throat.
“_Asch!_” said Long-Bengt, and jumped out. He thought it was a ghost
that had frightened the horse. But ghosts were supposed to come out of
the air; he had never heard of their creeping along the ground.
And now he wasn’t long getting back into the chaise himself, nor did he
venture out of it again. What the mistress had said was true--the
ground certainly appeared to be moving. It did not tremble as in an
earthquake, nor glide away as in a landslide; but it was as if every
clod of earth in the field had taken feet and was running toward the
lake.
The two in the chaise sat gazing at the ground--and at last they saw
what it was that moved: the field was over-run by hordes of little
animals; but they were none the less frightened, the two of them. It
couldn’t be anything real or natural, they thought. Where had they come
from--all those creatures? Every spot in the field was alive with them!
The animals--or whatever they were--scurried across the ditch up on to
the road and then went rushing down an incline into the lake. Now what
sort of creatures could they be, to behave in that way? Had they been
of God’s creation there would surely have been some end to them; but
these kept coming in limitless numbers.
The horse had now become fairly calm. Only when the little animals
ran between his feet he would snort and draw back. Fru Raklitz,
meanwhile, was far from calm. Her teeth chattered from fright, and she
mumbled and talked to herself. However, she sat still as long as they
were in the field. But the horse was not going to stand out there the
whole night. He began to move on his own accord; he walked slowly,
lifting his feet and putting them down very carefully; but at least he
went forward and not backward.
The strange little animals got into the way of the horse and wagon, and
there was a grinding, crunching noise as the wheels passed over the
tiny bodies.
When Fru Raklitz heard that grinding she jumped to her feet, and began
to shriek wildly. Long-Bengt quickly caught her round the waist, to
prevent her throwing herself out of the chaise.
“They’re after me! They’re after me!” she cried. “They’re on the
wheels--they’re on the step--they’re in the wagon!”
The horse increased his speed. The chaise moved joltingly as the wheels
went over the little animals.
“They’re in the chaise, they’re in the chaise!” screamed Fru Raklitz,
springing up on to the seat. “They’re pulling at my skirt--they mean to
drag me to the lake!”
Now Long-Bengt had to stand up to hold her back. “By rights, I ought to
let you tumble into the road for your meanness,” he muttered. All the
same he kept his arm round her.
They were at last back on the road and had driven over great swarms of
the roving animals, when Svarten suddenly stopped and neighed
contentedly.
“It’s all over now,” said Long-Bengt. “Sit down, Frua.”
But Fru Raklitz went on shrieking, “They’re in the chaise; they’re
pulling at my skirt; they’ll drag me to the lake.” Long-Bengt had to
pull her down by main force and set her on the seat. She struggled so
hard he dared not let go of her.
“Go on, Svarten!” he said. “You’ll have to find the way without me
holding the reins.”
The horse set off at a trot, while Fru Raklitz, shaking and blubbering,
rambled on about their climbing the wheels and trying to get into the
chaise.
“You’ll have to run, Svarten,” said Long-Bengt, “or she’ll go clean off
her head before we get her home.”
Svarten perhaps understood. Anyhow, he must have wanted to get home to
his crib, for he took the hills up and down at top speed.
Long-Bengt sat there with beads of cold sweat standing on his forehead;
he tried to assure Fru Raklitz that the trouble was over, but she would
not believe him.
“You are very kind, Bengt,” she whimpered; “but don’t tell me we are
safe; I hear them, I see them, they are after us, and mean to drive me
into the lake.”
When they finally stopped before the front porch at Mårbacka and a maid
came out to receive her mistress, she was afraid to step down.
“No, no, not you!” she cried. “You have no power, you can’t save me
from them.”
The maid drew back in alarm. She had never heard her mistress speak
like that before.
“Go fetch the priest’s daughter,” said Fru Raklitz--“go fetch Lisa
Maja! She is the only one here who has power over the _evil ones._”
“Mamselle Lisa Maja has gone to bed,” said the girl.
“Go ask her to come down as quick as she can,” Long-Bengt put in. “Tell
her Frua got a fright on the way.”
Fru Raklitz sat shaking and gibbering until her stepdaughter appeared.
“Ah, God bless you!” cried the woman, holding out her arms to the girl.
“Come help me! Don’t be angry with me! I’ll never be mean to you
again.”
“What’s the matter, Mother dear?” said the girl as she stood by the
carriage.
“Come, give me your hand,” begged the stepmother. “Dear heart, hold
them back while I get down. Don’t let them take me! They can’t harm you
who have power over them.”
When she was out of the chaise she fell on the stepdaughter’s neck, and
sobbed: “Don’t ever leave me! Don’t be angry with me! You shall marry
whomever you will, and I’ll not say a word.”
“She saw something coming home,” Long-Bengt explained. “She saw all the
little imps of hell let loose, and she thinks they’re after her and
will drag her into the Fryken.”
The priest’s daughter put her arm round the stepmother, and said: “Come
in, Mother dear! You are at Mårbacka now. Here none of the evil ones
can touch you, darling Mother.”
Fru Raklitz was so shaken from fright that Lisa Maja had to talk to her
as to a little child, to get her to her room and to bed. She would not
let her go; so the girl had to sit there holding her hand, and listen
to her ravings until daybreak.
From that time forth Fru Raklitz never dared be cruel to her
stepdaughter; nor was she ever again her old ruthless self. She kept to
her room mostly, and let Lisa Maja run the house. She would lend a hand
when there was extra cleaning and furbishing to be done--as before a
great holiday or a party--but only in the house, never outside it. Thus
she lived until 1835. Whether she had ever any real affection for the
stepdaughter is doubtful. But when Lisa Maja was married, and the
little ones came, she grew very fond of them. Every day the children
would go in to see Granny. She was also very fond of her coffee, and
always had a fire going in the tile-stove of her room, so that she
could make coffee for herself. She would often treat the children. But
their mother thought coffee was not good for little folk, and told them
one day they must never drink any of Granny’s coffee.
The next day, when the two youngest, Nana and Lovisa, came out of the
grandmother’s room, there was a strong odour of coffee about them.
“What did you have at Granny’s to-day?” their mother asked them.
“Gruel, Mummie dear,” said the two of them as with one mouth.
“What was that gruel made in?” questioned the mother.
“In the coffeepot, Mummie dear,” they answered as if they were speaking
a piece.
They said it so nicely and they were so little and naïve, that the
mother had to laugh in spite of herself.
VI
THE NECKAN
IN THE southern part of the parish there are tracts where the landscape
is more variform and far more beautiful than up north, round Mårbacka.
There the Fryken cuts into the land in deep bays--the one after the
other--along each of which lie shore-meadows, bordered by leafy woods,
and three or four fine old peasant homesteads. Jutting out between the
bays are rocky, wood-grown headlands so wild and inhospitable that no
one would think of clearing or building there.
One summer’s day Lisa Maja Wennervik had ridden down to Bössviken,
which is the most southerly bay, to order some of the fine pears
ripening there under the protecting hills. The Bössvik folk were very
friendly, and she had dropped in at several cottages, so that it was
rather late when she left for home.
But the girl was not afraid to ride back alone in the light summer
evening. She went slowly, that she might enjoy to the full the beauty
of the night; now riding up among the hills through dense woods, where
she fancied robbers or bears might spring out at any moment and tear
her off her horse; and now down dales of dewy fields, pretty birch
groves and light, shimmering streams. There was still a pale rosy glow
in the sky, which was reflected in the lake. She had never seen
anything lovelier than that night!