ONE Saturday afternoon, Thora of Lidarende went out towards the Sound.
It was in hay-making time, and the mowers were on the hills, making
the hay into cocks for the evening. The fresh scent of hay was wafted
through the air. Lake Mjösen lay still and clear, so that Fru Thora
could see the stony bottom a long way out.
She turned up the avenue to the big parish school building, entered
the yard, and hastened up the steps, for there were others she must
manage to call on to-day.
Although the principal was occupied for the time being with some
pupils in dialect, his wife went and fetched him when she heard that
Fru Thora had come on an important errand; and soon they were all
three sitting round a table in the large, comfortable drawing-room,
with port wine in front of them.
Principal Heggen was a man of about fifty years of age, with a bald
head, a long brown beard, and spectacles. He had a fine, high
forehead, and nice eyes. He was well known for his kind disposition,
and as he was most unsuspecting, he loved many things. As regarded
religion, he was a warm advocate of a national Christianity.
"Yes, I've come on an important errand to-day," said Fru Thora,
sipping her glass.
Both the schoolmaster and his wife looked attentively at her. She
continued with a smile as she looked from the one to the other:
"It's in connection with recent events. It has been a sad time, and a
disgrace to the district."
"Yes," said Fru Heggen, shaking her head as she knitted.
"But we who sit here have got off fairly well. I only got sneered at a
little in the papers because I was rude enough to wish to take one of
their children for a time; and you, Heggen, have been found fault with
because you remained neutral." Fru Thora could not help laughing.
"Poor man!" said the schoolmaster, playing with his beard.
"Ye-es! It's hard on him, and we won't judge Wangen," said she, "but
as long as we live in an orderly community, I suppose we have the
right to some protection; and it doesn't do to go on as Wangen has
done."
Fru Heggen shook her head once more, said "No," and looked at her
husband.
"But the person who has suffered most during this time, dear friends,
is Norby; and I've come to propose that we make him some reparation in
one form or another."
Heggen rose, and left the table in order to fill himself a pipe, which
he slowly lighted, and then returned to the table and seated himself.
Out of doors the sun was beginning to set, and sent golden beams in to
them through the tree-tops in the garden.
"Well, what did you think of doing?" Heggen finally asked, while he
endeavoured to make his pipe draw.
Fru Thora coloured a little. She had expected that she would meet with
opposition here, so she had come here first. She braced herself, and
continued courageously:
"Well, we see what our great politicians, for instance, do when one of
their number has been exposed to unjust attacks. They give him a
banquet. And I think we might give a little festive entertainment for
Norby; it might be as simple as possible."
Heggen and his wife looked at one another.
"Ye-es," said he; but with a slightly embarrassed smile.
There was a short pause, which Fru Thora dared not allow to become too
long.
"With reference to the heart of the matter," she said, "you, too,
believe, do you not, that Norby was altogether in the right?"
"Yes," said Heggen, shaking his head a little. There seemed to be
something he would not say.
"Yes," said Fru Heggen, too; "he's said from the very first that
Wangen was guilty, and Heggen has a wonderful power of judgment in
such cases."
"Well, then," said Fru Thora, "I hope you won't let old disagreements
stand in the way this time. We ought really to begin to appreciate the
worth of others than those we always agree with."
"Oh dear yes!" said Heggen eagerly. "But who did you think of asking
to join?"
Fru Thora laid her pretty hand upon the table, as if to give more
emphasis to her words.
"All who wish to. The authorities, peasants--all without difference.
Wouldn't it be nice if government officers and country people for once
joined hands and said: 'One of our best men has been persecuted, and
his name sullied; here we are, and we will join hands and wash him
clean again.' An example should really be set to show that
Christianity and national feeling are not mere words, but that we
actually help a brother when he is in need."
"Has Norby taken it to heart?" asked Heggen, with a look of sympathy.
"I don't know; he is so proud, that man. He certainly doesn't
complain. But now, to-day, my brother in Bergen wrote to me and asked
if it were really true that Norby had defrauded the widow for whom
he's trustee! That's the way ill-natured remarks spread; and how much
wouldn't a man lose by such things!"
"Oh yes," sighed Fru Heggen; "there's always some one ready to repeat
an ill-natured thing."
"And there's one thing we must be all agreed about," continued Fru
Thora, "and that is that a better head of a family and master than
Norby is not to be found in the district. Where will you find any one
so good to his old servants and men?"
The schoolmaster thought it over, and the warm appreciation of Norby's
goodness to his farm-servants touched him and overcame his last
scruples.
"Well, I'm quite willing to join," he said. "But who is to make the
speech?" he thought to himself.
"Yes," said Fru Thora, taking another sip of wine. "But you aren't
going to be let off so easily. You will have to make the speech. No
one can do it so well."
"I?" said Heggen, his brow flushing; but he finally agreed. If a few
words were to be said in honour of Fru Norby, perhaps Fru Thora of
Lidarende might attempt them.
When she left, she felt relieved and happy at having succeeded here.
Now the rest would be easily managed; and she hastened down the avenue
as briskly as a young girl, while the last rays of the sun fell
through the leaves upon her light dress.
With no suspicion of Fru Thora's plan, Knut Norby was sitting that day
hard at work with his accounts. He had at last fallen again into his
old ways. He had wasted so much time on all that nonsense with Wangen
that there must be an end of this; he must set to work and make up for
what he had lost.
His hair had grown a little greyer during the last few months, and he
was pale and tired; it had been rather trying, the way things had gone
on.
When he had finished and gone out on to the steps with his pipe in his
mouth, Ingeborg came up to him, and told him, with tears in his eyes,
that the old dairymaid was dead.
Norby put his pipe in his waistcoat pocket and went across with her to
the little cottage. The two old farm men were sitting by the bed in
the little room, looking straight before them, with their large coarse
hands folded between their knees. The eyes of the one who had been
engaged over and over again to the dairymaid were wet.
Norby, too, stood and looked at the old dead servant with trembling
lips.
That afternoon he went up over the hills to the little cottage where
Lars Kleven's widow sat sorrowful. When he entered--he had to stoop
under the ceiling--the old woman was sitting by her spinning-wheel.
She rose in alarm, thinking, "He's come to take the cottage from me
after all."
"How are you?" asked Norby, sitting down with his stick between his
knees.
"Thank God, I can't complain of my health," she said timidly, "but I'm
dreading the winter."
"Well, the dairymaid's leaving us now," said the old man, "and her
little room will be empty. If you can be satisfied with it, you can
move into it for the rest of your days. I think they clean it to-day,
so it'll be ready to-morrow. And your cow and fowls--yes--you can
bring them with you. There's room enough."
The old woman folded her hands and gazed at him in amazement for a
little while, before she sank down and burst into tears. But at that
Norby left; he did not like tears.
As he trudged homewards he had no feeling of having done anything
good; he had only moved a thing into its proper place. It is true her
husband had let himself be tempted by Wangen and his people, but he,
poor fellow, lay in his grave now, and there was nothing more to be
said about that.
On the hill he sat down and looked out over the valley, which lay
bathed in the last gleams of sunshine, with long, blue shadows over
the lake. He sat there for some time, his hands resting upon his
stick.
He felt as if he had come into a haven after a long storm. They had
been evil days and sleepless nights; but one could not expect to have
things always go well. They had tried every possible way to injure
him--lies and slander, newspaper vulgarity, riots at his farm,
and--influencing Einar. Well, well, the boy should never hear the
slightest allusion to that matter.
But there was one thing that the old man could hardly help laughing
at, and that was that at one time he had really thought that his own
hands were not quite clean. He smiled now and shook his head; it was
too funny. He remembered, too, now, that at that dinner in town Wangen
had asked him to stand surety. But that they had then gone to the
Grand and signed----? It was incredible audacity to say such a thing!
It was what his wife always said--he was often too kind-hearted,
especially in good company; and because he was kind-hearted, he had
believed that if Wangen could go and say he had stood surety there
must be something in it. He did not know then what a scoundrel the
fellow was.
And now at last there would be peace in the district again, and labour
conditions would be decent once more. Perhaps some people believed
some of the calumnies about him. Well, let them believe them! He lived
on his farm, and cared for no one.
But it was hard on Wangen's wife. They said she had taken to her bed
after the trial.
When Norby got home he found Fru Thora of Lidarende in the
drawing-room. She had come to say that half the district, with the
authorities at their head, had subscribed to a dinner in his honour.
"Nonsense!" he said, laughing; for at first he would not believe it at
all, but when she asked what day would suit him, he sighed and
considered. It must be true then.
In a little while he answered: "Well--I can't go to any sort of
entertainment as long as some one is lying dead here."
Marit Norby looked at him in surprise, but understood at once that it
would be useless to dispute the matter.
When Fru Thora went away she was almost disappointed because the old
man had not been more touched by the dinner. "It's possible to be too
proud," she thought.