In one of the hundred houses of the fishing-village, where each is
exactly like the other in size and shape, where all have just as many
windows and as high chimneys, lived old Mattsson, the pilot.
In all the rooms of the fishing-village there is the same sort of
furniture, on all the window-sills stand the same kinds of flowers, in
all the corner-cupboards are the same collections of sea-shells and
coral, on all the walls hang the same pictures. And it is a fixed old
custom that all the inhabitants of the fishing-village live the same
life. Since Mattsson, the pilot, had grown old, he had conformed
carefully to the conditions and customs; his house, his rooms and his
mode of living were like everybody else’s.
On the wall over the bed old Mattsson had a picture of his mother. One
night he dreamed that the portrait stepped down from its frame, placed
itself in front of him and said with a loud voice: “You must marry,
Mattson.”
Old Mattsson then began to make clear to his mother that it was
impossible. He was seventy years old.—But his mother’s portrait merely
repeated with even greater emphasis: “You must marry, Mattsson.”
Old Mattsson had great respect for his mother’s portrait. It had been
his adviser on many debatable occasions, and he had always done well by
obeying it. But this time he did not quite understand its behavior. It
seemed to him as if the picture was acting in opposition to its already
acknowledged opinions. Although he was lying there and dreaming, he
remembered distinctly and clearly what had happened the first time he
wished to be married. Just as he was dressing as a bridegroom, the nail
gave way on which the picture hung and it fell to the floor. He
understood then that the portrait wished to warn him against the
marriage, but he did not obey it. He soon found that the portrait had
been right. His short married life was very unhappy.
The second time he dressed as a bridegroom the same thing happened. The
portrait fell to the ground as before, and he did not dare again to
disobey it. He ran away from bride and wedding and travelled round the
world several times before he dared come home again.—And now the
picture stepped down from the wall and commanded him to marry! However
good and obedient he was, he allowed himself to think that it was
making a fool of him.
But his mother’s portrait, which looked out with the grimmest face that
sharp winds and salt sea-foam could carve, stood solemnly as before.
And with a voice which had been exercised and strengthened for many
years by offering fish in the town marketplace, it repeated: “You must
marry, Mattsson.”
Old Mattsson then asked his mother’s portrait to consider what kind of
a community it was they lived in.
All the hundred houses of the fishing-village had pointed roofs and
whitewashed walls; all the boats of the fishing-village were of the
same build and rig. No one there ever did anything unusual. His mother
would have been the first to oppose such a marriage if she had been
alive. His mother had held by habits and customs. And it was not the
habit and custom of the fishing-village for old men of seventy years to
marry.
His mother’s picture stretched out her beringed hand and positively
commanded him to obey. There had always been something excessively
awe-inspiring in his mother when she came in her black silk dress with
many flounces. The big, shining gold brooch, the heavy, rattling gold
chain had always frightened him. If she had worn her market-clothes, in
a striped head-cloth and with an oil-cloth apron, covered with
fish-scales and fish eyes, he would not have been quite so overawed by
her. The end of it was that he promised to get married. And then his
mother’s portrait crept up into the frame again.
The next morning old Mattsson woke in great trouble. It never occurred
to him to disobey his mother’s portrait; it knew of course what was
best for him. But he shuddered nevertheless at the time that was now
coming.
The same day he made an offer of marriage to the plainest daughter of
the poorest fisherman, a little creature, whose head was drawn down
between her shoulders and who had a projecting under-jaw. The parents
said yes, and the day when he was to go to the town and publish the
bans was appointed.
The road from the fishing-village to the town passes over windy marshes
and swampy cow-pastures. It is two miles long, and there is a tradition
that the inhabitants of the fishing-village are so rich that they could
pave it with shining silver coins. It would give the road a strange
attraction. Glimmering like a fish’s belly, it would wind with its
white scales through clumps of sedge and pools filled with water-bugs
and melancholy bullfrogs. The daisies and almond-blossoms which adorn
that forsaken ground would be mirrored in the shining silver coins;
thistles would stretch out protecting thorns over them, and the wind
would find a ringing sounding-board when it played on the thatched roof
of the cow-barns and on telephone-wires.
Perhaps old Mattsson would have found some comfort if he could have set
his heavy sea boots on ringing silver, for it is certain that he for a
time had to go that way oftener than he liked.
He had not had “clean papers.” The bans could not be published. It came
from his having run away from his bride the last time. Some time passed
before the clergyman could write to the consistory about him and get
permission for him to contract a new marriage.
As long as this time of waiting lasted, old Mattsson came to the town
every week. He sat by the door of the pastor’s room and remained there
in silent expectation until all had spoken in turn. Then he rose and
asked if the clergyman had anything for him. No, he had nothing.
The pastor was amazed at the power that all-conquering love had
acquired over that old man. There he sat in a thick, knitted jersey,
high sea-boots and weather-beaten sou’wester with a sharp, clever face
and long, gray hair, and waited for permission to get married. The
clergyman thought it strange that the old fisherman should have been
seized by so eager a longing.
“You are in a hurry with this marriage, Mattsson,” said the clergyman.
“Oh yes, it is best to get it done soon.”
“Could you not just as well give up the whole thing? You are no longer
young, Mattsson.”
The clergyman must not be too surprised. He knew well enough that he
was too old, but he was obliged to be married. There was no help for
it.
So he came again week after week for a half year, until at last the
permission came.
During all that time old Mattsson was a persecuted man. Round the green
drying-place, where the brown fish-nets were hung out, along the
cemented walls by the harbor, at the fish-tables in the market, where
cod and crabs were sold, and far out in the sound among the shoals of
herring, raged a storm of wonder and laughter.
“So he is going to be married, he, Mattsson, who ran away from his own
wedding!”
Neither bride nor groom were spared.
But the worst thing for him was that no one could laugh more at the
whole thing than he himself. No one could find it more ridiculous. His
mother’s portrait was driving him mad.
It was the afternoon of the first time of asking. Old Mattsson, still
pursued by talk and wonderings, went out on the long breakwater as far
as the whitewashed lighthouse, in order to be alone. He found his
betrothed there. She sat and wept.
He asked her whether she would have liked some one else better. She sat
and pried little bits of mortar from the lighthouse wall and threw them
into the water, answering nothing at first.
“Was there nobody you liked?”
“Oh no, of course not.”
It is very beautiful out by the lighthouse. The clear water of the
sound laps about it. The low-lying shore, the little uniform houses of
the fishing-village, and the distant town are all shining in wonderful
beauty. Out of the soft mist that hovers on the western horizon a
fishing-boat comes gliding now and again. Tacking boldly, it steers
towards the harbor. The water roars gaily past its bow as it shoots in
through the narrow harbor entrance. The sail drops silently at the same
moment. The fishermen swing their hats in joyous greeting, and on the
bottom of the boat lies the glittering spoil.
A boat came into the harbor while old Mattsson stood out by the
lighthouse. A young man sitting at the tiller lifted his hat and nodded
to the girl. The old man saw that her eyes were shining.
“Well,” he thought, “have you fallen in love with the handsomest young
fellow in the fishing-village? Yes, you will never get him. You may
just as well marry me as wait for him.”
He saw that he could not escape his mother’s picture. If the girl had
cared for any one whom there was any possibility of getting, he would
have had a good motive to be rid of the whole business. But now it was
useless to set her free.
A fortnight later was the wedding, and a few days after came the big
November gale. One of the boats of the fishing-village was swept out
into the sound. It had neither rudder nor masts, so that it was quite
unmanageable. Old Mattsson and five others were on board, and they
drifted about without food for two days. When they were rescued, they
were in a state of exhaustion from hunger and cold. Everything in the
boat was covered with ice, and their wet clothes were stiff. Old
Mattsson was so chilled that he never was well again. He lay ill for
two years; then death came.
Many thought that it was strange that his idea of marrying came just
before the unlucky adventure, for the little woman he had got took good
care of him. What would he have done if he had been alone when lying so
helpless? The whole fishing-village acknowledged that he had never done
anything more sensible than marrying, and the little woman won great
consideration for the tenderness with which she took care of her
husband.
“She will have no trouble in marrying again,” people said.
Old Mattsson told his wife, every day while he lay ill, the story of
the portrait.
“You must take it when I am dead, just as you must take everything of
mine,” he said.
“Do not speak of such things.”
“And you must listen to my mother’s portrait when the young men propose
to you. Truly there is no one in the whole fishing-village who
understands getting married better than that picture.”