One of those who had lived the life of a pensioner at Ekeby was little
Ruster, who could transpose music and play the flute. He was of low
origin and poor, without home and without relations. Hard times came to
him when the company of pensioners were dispersed.
He then had no horse nor carriole, no fur coat nor red-painted
luncheon-basket. He had to go on foot from house to house and carry his
belongings tied in a blue striped cotton handkerchief. He buttoned his
coat all the way up to his chin, so that no one should need to know in
what condition his shirt and waistcoat were, and in its deep pockets he
kept his most precious possessions: his flute taken to pieces, his flat
brandy bottle and his music-pen.
His profession was to copy music, and if it bad been as in the old
days, there would have been no lack of work for him. But with every
passing year music was less practised in Värmland. The guitar, with its
mouldy, silken ribbon and its worn screws, and the dented horn, with
faded tassels and cord were put away in the lumber-room in the attic,
and the dust settled inches deep on the long, iron-bound violin boxes.
Yet the less little Ruster had to do with flute and music-pen, so much
the more must he turn to the brandy flask, and at last he became quite
a drunkard. It was a great pity.
He was still received at the manor-houses as an old friend, but there
were complaints when he came and joy when he went. There was an odor of
dirt and brandy about him, and if he had only a couple of glasses of
wine or one toddy, he grew confused and told unpleasant stories. He was
the torment of the hospitable houses.
One Christmas he came to Löfdala, where Liljekrona, the great
violinist, had his home. Liljekrona had also been one of the pensioners
of Ekeby, but after the death of the major’s wife, he returned to his
quiet farm and remained there. Ruster came to him a few days before
Christmas, in the midst of all the preparations, and asked for work.
Liljekrona gave him a little copying to keep him busy.
“You ought to have let him go immediately,” said his wife; “now he will
certainly take so long with that that we will be obliged to keep him
over Christmas.”
“He must be somewhere,” answered Liljekrona.
And he offered Ruster toddy and brandy, sat with him, and lived over
again with him the whole Ekeby time. But he was out of spirits and
disgusted by him, like every one else, although he would not let it be
seen, for old friendship and hospitality were sacred to him.
In Liljekrona’s house for three weeks now they had been preparing to
receive Christmas. They had been living in discomfort and bustle, had
sat up with dip-lights and torches till their eyes grew red, had been
frozen in the out-house with the salting of meat and in the brew-house
with the brewing of the beer. But both the mistress and the servants
gave themselves up to it all without grumbling.
When all the preparations were done and the holy evening come, a sweet
enchantment would sink down over them. Christmas would loosen all
tongues, so that jokes and jests, rhymes and merriment would flow of
themselves without effort. Every one’s feet would wish to twirl in the
dance, and from memory’s dark corners words and melodies would rise,
although no one could believe that they were there. And then every one
was so good, so good!
Now when Ruster came the whole household at Löfdala thought that
Christmas was spoiled. The mistress and the older children and the old
servants were all of the same opinion. Ruster caused them a suffocating
disgust. They were moreover afraid that when he and Liljekrona began to
rake up the old memories, the artist’s blood would flame up in the
great violinist and his home would lose him. Formerly he had not been
able to remain long sit home.
No one can describe how they loved their master on the farm, since they
had had him with them a couple of years. And what he had to give! How
much he was to his home, especially at Christmas! He did not take his
place on any sofa or rocking-stool, but on a high, narrow wooden bench
in the corner of the fireplace. When he was settled there he started
off on adventures. He travelled about the earth, climbed up to the
stars, and even higher. He played and talked by turns, and the whole
household gathered about him and listened. Life grew proud and
beautiful when the richness of that one soul shone on it.
Therefore they loved him as they loved Christmas time, pleasure, the
spring sun. And when little Ruster came, their Christmas peace was
destroyed. They had worked in vain if he was coming to tempt away their
master. It was unjust that the drunkard should sit at the Christmas
table in a happy house and spoil the Christmas pleasure.
On the forenoon of Christmas Eve little Ruster had his music written
out, and he said something about going, although of course he meant to
stay.
Liljekrona had been influenced by the general feeling, and therefore
said quite lukewarmly and indifferently that Ruster had better stay
where he was over Christmas.
Little Ruster was inflammable and proud. He twirled his moustache and
shook back the black artist’s hair that stood like a dark cloud over
his head. What did Liljekrona mean? Should he stay because he had
nowhere else to go? Oh, only think how they stood and waited for him in
the big ironworks in the parish of Bro! The guest-room was in order,
the glass of welcome filled. He was in great haste. He only did not
know to which he ought to go first.
“Very well,” answered Liljekrona, “you may go if you will.”
After dinner little Ruster borrowed horse and sleigh, coat and furs.
The stable-boy from Löfdala was to take him to some place in Bro and
drive quickly back, for it threatened snow.
No one believed that he was expected, or that there was a single place
in the neighborhood where he was welcome. But they were so anxious to
be rid of him that they put the thought aside and let him depart. “He
wished it himself,” they said; and then they thought that now they
would be glad.
But when they gathered in the dining room at five o’clock to drink tea
and to dance round the Christmas-tree, Liljekrona was silent and out of
spirits. He did not seat himself on the bench; he touched neither tea
nor punch; he could not remember any polka; the violin was out of
order. Those who could play and dance had to do it without him.
Then his wife grew uneasy; the children were discontented, everything
in the house went wrong. It was the most lamentable Christmas Eve.
The porridge turned sour; the candles sputtered; the wood smoked; the
wind stirred up the snow and blew bitter cold into the rooms. The
stable-boy who had driven Ruster did not come home. The cook wept; the
maids scolded.
Finally Liljekrona remembered that no sheaves had been put out for the
sparrows, and he complained aloud of all the women about him who
abandoned old customs and were new-fangled and heartless. They
understood well enough that what tormented him was remorse that he had
let little Ruster go away from his home on Christmas Eve.
After a while he went to his room, shut the door and began to play as
he had not played since he had ceased roaming. It was full of hate and
scorn, full of longing and revolt. You thought to bind me, but you must
forge new fetters. You thought to make me as small-minded as
yourselves, but I turn to larger things, to the open. Commonplace
people, slaves of the home, hold me prisoner if it is in your power!
When his wife heard the music, she said: “Tomorrow he is gone, if God
does not work a miracle in the night. Our inhospitableness has brought
on just what we thought we could avoid.”
In the meantime little Ruster drove about in the snowstorm. He went
from one house to the other and asked if there was any work for him to
do, but he was not received anywhere. They did not even ask him to get
out of the sledge. Some had their houses full of guests, others were
going away on Christmas Day. “Drive to the next neighbor,” they all
said.
He could come and spoil the pleasure of an ordinary day, but not of
Christmas Eve. Christmas Eve came but once a year, and the children had
been rejoicing in the thought of it all the autumn. They could not put
that man at a table where there were children. Formerly they had been
glad to see him, but not since he had become a drunkard. Where should
they put the fellow, moreover? The servants’ room was too plain and the
guest-room too fine.
So little Ruster had to drive from house to house in the blinding snow.
His wet moustache hung limply down over his mouth; his eyes were
bloodshot and blurred, but the brandy was blown out of his brain. He
began to wonder and to be amazed. Was it possible, was it possible that
no one wished to receive him?
Then all at once he saw himself. He saw how miserable and degraded he
was, and he understood that he was odious to people. “It is the end of
me,” he thought. “No more copying of music, no more flute-playing. No
one on earth needs me; no one has compassion on me.”
The storm whirled and played, tore apart the drifts and piled them up
again, took a pillar of snow in its arms and danced out into the plain,
lifted one flake up to the clouds and chased another down into a ditch.
“It is so, it is so,” said little Ruster; “while one dances and whirls
it is play, but when one must be buried in the drift and forgotten, it
is sorrow and grief.” But down they all have to go, and now it was his
turn. To think that he had now come to the end!
He no longer asked where the man was driving him; he thought that he
was driving in the land of death.
Little Ruster made no offerings to the gods that night. He did not
curse flute-playing or the life of a pensioner; he did not think that
it had been better for him if he had ploughed the earth or sewn shoes.
But he mourned that he was now a worn-out instrument, which pleasure
could no longer use. He complained of no one, for he knew that when the
horn is cracked and the guitar will not stay in tune, they must go. He
became all at once a very humble man. He understood that it was the end
of him, on this Christmas Eve. Hunger and cold would destroy him, for
he understood nothing, was good for nothing and had no friends.
The sledge stops, and suddenly it is light about him, and he hears
friendly voices, and there is some one who is helping him into a warm
room, and some one who is pouring warm tea into him. His coat is pulled
off him, and several people cry that he is welcome, and warm hands rub
life into his benumbed fingers.
He was so confused by it all that he did not come to his senses for
nearly a quarter of an hour. He could not possibly comprehend that he
had come back to Löfdala. He had not been at all conscious that the
stable-boy had grown tired of driving about in the storm and had turned
home.
Nor did he understand why he was now so well received in Liljekrona’s
house. He could not know that Liljekrona’s wife understood what a weary
journey he had made that Christmas Eve, when he had been turned away
from every door where he had knocked. She felt such compassion on him
that she forgot her own troubles.
Liljekrona went on with the wild playing up in his room; he did not
know that Ruster had come. The latter sat meanwhile in the dining-room
with the wife and the children. The servants, who used also to be there
on Christmas Eve, had moved out into the kitchen away from their
mistress’s trouble.
The mistress of the house lost no time in setting Ruster to work. “You
hear, I suppose,” she said, “that Liljekrona does nothing but play all
the evening, and I must attend to setting the table and the food. The
children are quite forsaken. You must look after these two smallest.”
Children were the kind of people with whom little Ruster had had least
intercourse. He had met them neither in the bachelor’s wing nor in the
campaign tent, neither in wayside inns nor on the highways. He was
almost shy of them, and did not know what he ought to say that was fine
enough for them.
He took out his flute and taught them how to finger the stops and
holes. There was one of four years and one of six. They had a lesson on
the flute and were deeply interested in it. “This is A,” he said, “and
this is C,” and then he blew the notes. Then the young people wished to
know what kind of an A and C it was that was to be played.
Ruster took out his score and made a few notes.
“No,” they said, “that is not right.” And they ran away for an A B C
book.
Little Ruster began to hear their alphabet. They knew it and they did
not know it. What they knew was not very much. Ruster grew eager; he
lifted the little boys up, each on one of his knees, and began to teach
them. Liljekrona’s wife went out and in and listened quite in
amazement. It sounded like a game, and the children were laughing the
whole time, but they learned.
Ruster kept on for a while, but he was absent from what he was doing.
He was turning over the old thoughts from out in the storm. It was good
and pleasant, but nevertheless it was the end of him. He was worn .out.
He ought to be thrown away. And all of a sudden he put his hands before
his face and began to weep.
Liljekrona’s wife came quickly up to him.
“Ruster,” she said, “I can understand that you think that all is over
for you. You cannot make a living with your music, and you are
destroying yourself with brandy. But it is not the end, Ruster.”
“Yes,” sobbed the little flute-player.
“Do you see that to sit as to-night with the children, that would be
something for you? If you would teach children to read and write, you
would be welcomed everywhere. That is no less important an instrument
on which to play, Ruster, than flute and violin. Look at them, Ruster!”
She placed the two children in front of him, and he looked up, blinking
as if he had looked at the sun. It seemed as if his little, blurred
eyes could not meet those of the children, which were big, clear and
innocent.
“Look at them, Ruster!” repeated Liljekrona’s wife.
“I dare not,” said Ruster, for it was like a purgatory to look through
the beautiful child eyes to the unspotted beauty of their souls.
Liljekrona’s wife laughed loud and joyously. “Then you must accustom
yourself to them, Ruster. You can stay in my house as schoolmaster this
year.”
Liljekrona heard his wife laugh and came out of his room.
“What is it?” he said. “What is it?”
“Nothing,” she answered, “but that Ruster has come again, and that I
have engaged him as schoolmaster for our little boys.”
Liljekrona was quite amazed. “Do you dare?” he said, “do you dare? Has
he promised to give up—”
“No,” said the wife; “Ruster has promised nothing. But there is much
about which he must be careful when he has to look little children in
the eyes every day. If it had not been Christmas, perhaps I would not
have ventured; but when our Lord dared to place a little child who was
his own son among us sinners, so can I also dare to let my little
children try to save a human soul.”
Liljekrona could not speak, but every feature and wrinkle in his face
twitched and twisted as always when he heard anything noble.
Then he kissed his wife’s hand as gently as a child who asks for
forgiveness and cried aloud: “All the children must come and kiss their
mother’s hand.”
They did so, and then they had a happy Christmas in Liljekrona’s house.