Sometimes in the higher class of schools there reigns a spirit utterly
opposed to that prevalent in the town where the school is; and it is
even a rule that in certain matters the school exists under its own
independent influence. One single master can often keep the pupils to
his own way of thinking, just as it may depend on one or several of the
boys whether there is a chivalrous spirit among them or the opposite, a
spirit of obedience or one of rebellion; as a rule there is one who
leads them all. It is the same, too, as regards morality; the boys
become what they are according to the example set before them, and
oftenest it is one or more of themselves who have the power to set this
example.
Just at this time it was Anders Hegge, the _dux_ of the school, who
took the lead in everything. He was the cleverest and best-read boy the
school had seen since its foundation; he was to stay there a year
longer than was necessary, so as to lend to the school the glory of a
certain double first. The other boys were tremendously proud of him;
they told admiring tales of how he had been known to catch the masters
at fault, that he could choose what lessons he liked, and could come
and go whenever he pleased; he did his lessons, too, mostly alone. He
had a library, the shelves of which had long since covered the walls
and now stood out upon the floor; there was one long shelf on each side
of the sofa; it was so much talked about that the smaller boys were
allowed to go up and look at it all. And there, in the middle, in front
of the window, sat he smoking, in a long loose dressing-gown, a present
from a married sister, a velvet cap with gold tassel, a present from an
aunt (his mother's sister), and embroidered slippers, from another aunt
(his father's sister). He was quite a ladies' man, lived with his
mother, who was a widow, and five elderly female relatives paid for his
books and his clothes, and gave him pocket-money.
He was a tall, stout fellow, with marked, regular features, showing
descent from a good old family; the face would have been good-looking
enough, but his eyes were too prominent and had something at once
greedy and inquiring about them. It was the same with his well-made
figure; the effect would have been good but that he stooped so much,
just as if his back were too heavy for him, and his walk was uneven.
His hands and feet were neat, he was dainty and particular, and his
tastes in general were effeminate.
He never forgot anything that had once been told him, important or not
it made no difference; except, perhaps, he considered the trifling
things of most importance. Few things escaped him; he had a quiet way
of gaining the confidence of others, it was quite an art. He knew the
history of all the great families in the whole country and in foreign
countries as well; his greatest delight in life was to repeat these
stories, especially when they were scandalous ones, and to sit
listening greedily for new ones. If the masters had only known how the
air of the school was infected and corrupted by this much-admired piece
of goods, with the contents of its secret drawers, they would hardly
have kept him there another year; the whole school was critical and
doubting, full of slander and mean efforts to curry favor, and infected
by slanderous stories.
Ever eager for news, he was always to be found in his smoking-gear,
sitting among his books, and was there, too, when Edward came in that
evening to tell him that he knew now where Ole went to and what he did
with himself; so now he expected to get the reward! Anders got up and
begged him to wait till he fetched some beer that they might enjoy
themselves together.
The first glass was most delicious, a second little half glass equally
so, but not till then did Edward tell his news--how Ole went to nurse
the sick down in the fishing village.
Anders felt almost as small as Edward had done when he saw Ole's Bible
in his box; Edward laughed heartily at him. But very soon Anders began
to insinuate doubts; he suggested that Ole had invented all that so as
to screen himself; there must be something more under it all; peasant
boys, he said, were always so cunning, and to prove it he began telling
some rather good stories from school. Edward did not at all relish this
everlasting doubting, and to cut the matter short (for he was very
tired) he informed the other that his father knew and approved of it,
and even helped Ole with money. Of course when he heard that, Anders
could doubt no longer; and yet there might be more under it, peasant
boys were so very sly.
But this was too much for Edward; he started up from his seat and asked
if he thought any of them told lies?
Anders sipped his beer quite calmly, rolling his prominent eyes
cautiously around. "Lie" was a strange word to use; might he be allowed
to ask who were the sick people Ole went to see?
Edward was not prepared for this; he had intended to tell as much as
would justify his getting the reward, but not a word more. He got up
from his seat again. If Anders wouldn't believe him, he might leave it
alone, but he meant to have the reward.
Now it was not Anders Hegge's way to quarrel with anyone, and Edward
knew that well. Of course he would give Edward the book, but first he
must just listen to such a funny story about the sick people down in
the fishing village. The parish doctor and his wife had been to see his
mother yesterday, and someone had asked after Martha from the docks,
who had not been seen for so long, whether she was still laid up from
her fall in the winter? Yes, she was still laid up, but she was not in
any want, for, strange to say, people sent her all she needed, and Lars
brought in brandy to her every evening, and they had many a merry
carouse together. She would probably not be up again for some time to
come.
Edward got very red, and Anders noticed it directly; he suggested that
perhaps Martha was one of those whom Ole visited.
Yes she was.
His prominent eyes widened at this piece of news. Edward saw with what
eagerness he gulped it down and it made him feel as if he had been
devoured and swallowed up himself. But if there is a thing that
schoolboys cannot stand it is to be thought too confiding and innocent;
he hastened to free himself from the most insulting insinuation that he
was not able to see through Ole Tuft and his stupid ways; only fancy,
he actually read the Bible to Martha!
He read the Bible to her? Again those prominent eyes opened and
greedily drank it in, but he closed them at once, and was seized with
laughter; he regularly shouted with laughter--and Edward with him.
Yes, he read the Bible to Martha, he read to her about the Prodigal
Son, and then Edward repeated all that Martha had said. They laughed in
chorus and drank up the rest of the beer. All that was pleasant and
amusing in Anders showed itself when he laughed, although his laugh had
a grating sound down in the throat; still it incited one to more fun,
more mischief. So Edward had to tell all, and a little more than all.
As he ran home later with the grand book under his arm, he had a kind
of disgusted feeling. The effects of the beer were over, he was no
longer tempted to laugh, and his wounded pride was satisfied; but Ole's
trusting eyes seemed to meet him everywhere, as soon as he got out in
the air. He tried to put it from him, he was so dreadfully tired; he
would think no more about it this evening; but to-morrow--to-morrow he
would ask Anders not to speak about it.
But the next morning he overslept himself. He hurried on his clothes
and rushed off, eating his bread-and-butter as he went along, and
giving a rapid thought to "Les trois Mousquetaires," now his precious
property; he longed for the afternoon to be able to read it. In school
he stumbled through his lessons one by one, for he had learned nothing,
and on Saturdays there was always so much. He worked on until two hours
before the school closed; there was still to be French and Natural
History, but to neither of these classes did he belong--so away he flew
downstairs before any of the others.
Just as he stood outside the school gates he saw Anders coming from the
opposite side; he was going now to take his lesson in the upper class.
Edward thought at once of the preceding day, and he felt anxious as to
what Anders might take it into his head to tell; but at that very
moment he caught sight of a monster steamer, a wreck, coming slowly in
between the two piers, and all the people running by said there had
never been so large a ship in the harbour before. She dragged along,
hardly able to move, her masts gone, bulwarks all damaged, and the
propped-up funnel all white with salt water up to the very top; was
that another steamer towing her? Edward could not make out for the
pier. Everyone was running that way; he ran too!
Meanwhile Anders turned in at the school gate. Just as he opened it a
class was over, and all the boys rushed down the stairs as through a
long funnel, and out into the yard; it was a storm in a wizard's
belly, the very house shook; first came one short, sharp yell, the
first-comer's shout of delight; then a screaming of mingled voices high
and low, some cracked and breaking ones toning down the whole; then a
mighty shout from all together like a sea of fire shooting up to the
sky, then half quenched on one side, but flaring up again on the other,
then uniting in a broad glow over the whole yard.
Anders whistled softly as he came along; it was not like being in a sea
of fire; it was like sailing through dangerous rocks and reefs, tossed
about and dashed from one side, and tossed and dashed back again to the
other; but he had an object in view; he would try cautiously to reach
the stack of wood over by the neighbour's paling; there all was quiet,
and he could partially screen his body up among the wood.
When he had reached this point of vantage and had looked cautiously
round to see if it was safe, he gazed down on the crowd with delight;
he felt a pleasurable satisfaction in knowing that he could quiet this
uproar just with three or four words which he would whisper in the ear
of his nearest neighbour. They would act like oil upon a raging sea,
and the noise would cease as those few words were spread about.
Where was Ole? There he was, he and a big boy together; they had hold
of each other by the collar and were tumbling about; the bigger of the
two was trying to knock down the other, using his feet freely for many
a kick. Ole's heavy boots swung round, the iron heels shining in the
air; he shouted with laughter as his companion grew fiercer and wilder,
but could not get him down.
Then Anders bent his head down to the boy who stood nearest him:
"Now I know what Ole Tuft does in the evenings!"
"Oh, rubbish!"
"But I do know."
"Who found it out?"
"Edward Kallem."
"Edward Kallem? And has he got the book?" asked the other, hurriedly.
"Of course he has."
"No, really? So Edward Kallem has----!"
"Edward Kallem? What about him?" put in a third, and the one who had
just heard the news repeated the story. A fourth boy, a fifth, a sixth,
all rushed away, crying out: "Edward Kallem has won the prize, lads!
Anders Hegge knows what Ole Tuft does in the evenings." Wherever they
went the noise stopped instantaneously; all of them wanted to hear the
news, and rushed across to Anders Hegge.
Hardly had a fourth part of them reached him before the remaining
three-fourths, losing interest in their games, followed suit. What in
all the world was the matter over by the wood-stack? why were they all
running there? They crowded round Anders, and climbed up on the wood as
many of them as could find room. "What's the matter?" "Edward Kallem
has won the prize." "Edward Kallem?" And the noise began again,
everyone asking, everyone answering--all except Ole Tuft, who remained
standing just where his companion had left him.
There was a dead silence as Anders Hegge told the story; and he had a
right to tell it, for he had paid for it. He told it well, in a short,
dry sort of way that gave an air of double meaning to everything; he
told them first where Ole went to and what he did; how he changed the
straw in Martha's bed, moved and lifted her, cooked for her, and
fetched medicine for her from the apothecary. Then he told them _why_
Ole did all this; he wished to be a missionary, and was practising for
it down at Martha's; he read the Bible to her and made her cry; then,
as soon as Ole had gone, Lars, the washerman, came in with the brandy
bottle, and he and Martha had a grand carouse together on the top of
the Bible reading.
At first the boys stood as quiet as mice; they had never heard the like
before. They looked upon it as a sort of game, and from the way it had
been told it could hardly be understood otherwise; but never before had
they heard of anyone playing at being missionary and Bible-reader; it
was funny, but it was something else besides--something they could not
quite make out. As nobody laughed, Anders continued. And what made Ole
do all this? Because he was ambitious and wanted to become an apostle,
which was more than to be either king, emperor, or pope; Ole had told
Edward Kallem that himself. But, in order to become an apostle, he had
to find out "God's ways," and those ways began down at Martha's; there
he meant to learn how to work miracles, to wrestle with the heathen and
the wild beasts and poisonous snakes, and to calm a cyclone. Then there
was a roar. But just at that moment the school-bell rang, and, shouting
with laughter, the boys had only time to run past Ole back to their
lessons again.
Once before in his young life had Ole Tuft gazed down into a bottomless
abyss. It was on a winter's day, as he stood by his father's grave and
heard the dull sound of the frozen earth falling upon the coffin; the
air was thick with driving mist, and the sea was black as pitch.
Whenever he was in trouble his thoughts flew back to that day; and now
it seemed as if he were standing there again, and heard the mournful
church bells toll. Just as the noise on the stairs and along the
passages had ceased, the last stray loiterer gone in, the last door
been shut--complete quiet suddenly--then, through this empty silence,
he heard a bell, ding-dong, and in fancy saw himself at the little
pine-wood church by the shore. How they creaked and rustled in the
wind, those long-armed, leafless birches by the wall, and the ancient
fir-tree at the gate; the clanging of the bells, harsh and shrill,
floating in the air, and the dull thud of the earth on the coffin, made
a life-long impression on him; and his mother's ceaseless weeping--she
had kept it all back until now, had made no sound, neither by the sick
man's bedside, nor even when he was carried away in his coffin; but
now, suddenly, the tears gushed forth--ah, so bitterly.... O father,
mother! Mother, father! And he, too, burst into tears.
This was sufficient reason for his not following the other boys in; he
would never go back to school again. He could not face any of them
after what had happened, he would have to leave the town; in a couple
of hours it would be known everywhere, they would all be asking
questions, and staring and laughing at him. And now, too, all his hopes
and intentions for the future had been profaned; what was the use of
studying any more; nor would he go to any other town, only home, home,
home.
But if he stood there much longer one of them would be sent down to
fetch him; he ought to get away at once. But not home to his aunt, or
he would have to tell her everything; and not out by the big gates and
down the principal street, for there were so many people who would see
how he was crying. No, he must make his way to the little hiding-place
that Josephine had made for him, and through which she helped him out
every afternoon, so that the other boys might not see him.
The wood-stacks stood next to the neighbour's paling; but to the right
leaned up against a shed into which Ole went. He loosened two boards in
the wall nearest the wood-stack, crept through, and closed them behind
him. This performance could not have been carried out if there had not
been on the other side an open space, made by an impediment of nature,
in the shape of a large stone, taller than the boy, but which stood at
a little distance from the wall. If the stone had not been there, the
two stacks of wood would have touched each other and barred the way;
but as it was, there was plenty of room at both ends of the stone as
well as on the top of it. The children had made themselves little rooms
here, one on each side of the stone. The most comfortable one was at
the back; there they had a board to sit on, and when that was fastened
at both ends in the stacks, they could pass each other in crossing it.
They had laid some planks overhead, and then wood on the top of that,
so that nobody might suspect anything; it had been quite a piece of
work for the children. It was not very light, certainly, but then that
made it all the cosier. Here she would tell him tales of Spain, and he
would tell her of missionaries' adventures; she told of bull-fights,
but he of fights with tigers, lions, and snakes, of terrible cyclones
and water-spouts, of savage monkeys and man-eaters. And by degrees his
stories had eclipsed hers; they were more exciting, and then there was
an object in them; she had only her recollections to look back to, but
he threw himself heart and soul into all his imagination could scrape
together. He drew such vivid, glowing pictures, till at last she was
fascinated too! At first she felt her way with a few cautious questions
as to whether women could be missionaries too? But he did not know; he
thought it was only work for men, though they might possibly be allowed
to be missionaries' wives. Then she asked if missionaries ever married.
He, taking it up as a dogmatic question, answered that he had once
heard his father speak on the subject; it was at a meeting when someone
had had doubts as to this missionary-marriage question, for St. Paul
was the first missionary, and the greatest, too, and he certainly had
not been married, and even gloried in that fact; but his father had
replied that St. Paul believed that Christ was so soon to come again so
he had to hurry as quickly as possible from place to place to tell that
to the people so that they might be in readiness. But nowadays
missionaries always lived in the same place, and therefore might be
allowed to marry. He had even read about missionaries' wives who kept
schools for the little black children. They had not advanced further
than that, but it was easy to see she often thought about it by the
questions she asked: If it were true that black children ate snails?
She did not like the idea of that at all.
In this dim light, with their two heads, brown and fair, bent close
together over their tales of adventures, they had in fancy sat under
palm-trees amid swarms of black children, all so good and clean and
converted, and there were tame tiger-cubs playing on the sand at their
feet; friendly, good-natured monkeys waited upon them, elephants
conveyed them carefully about, and all the food they needed hung in
plenty on the trees.
And now Ole came for the last time to say farewell to this little
Paradise.
Just as he raised himself to climb over the stone, he remembered that
it was Saturday, and her lessons were always over on Saturdays by
eleven o'clock (she took private lessons), and that she often used to
sit behind the stacks during the boys' free quarter-hour. Suppose she
were sitting there, and had heard all? Up he clambered onto the stone
in greatest haste, and there she sat, down on the board, and looked at
him! At the sight of her and as their eyes met he began sobbing again.
"I want to ... go ... home," stammered he, "and never ... never come
back again," and he came sliding down to her. She received him with
open arms and hastened to give him her pocket-handkerchief to stuff
into his mouth that his crying might not be heard. She had a good
deal of knowledge as to school and play-ground ways, and knew that
some one would soon be sent to look for him. He gave in, as he always
did, to her superior guidance in matters of good behaviour and
manners; he thought she was reminding him of that everlasting use of the
pocket-handkerchief, so he began alternately to blow his nose and to cry.
She seized hold of the back of his neck with one of her small but
coarse girl's hands, with the other she grasped his hands with the
handkerchief and forced it right into his mouth, at the same time
shaking her dark-haired head warningly in his face. Then it dawned upon
him! And it was high time too; for he heard his name called down in the
yard, again and again on all sides. His whole body shook and trembled
with his efforts to stifle his sobs; but he kept them down bravely,
waiting till the boy who had been sent down to look for him had gone
rushing back again. He began anew: "I ... want to ... go ... home," and
a fresh burst of tears followed, he couldn't help it. So he gave her
back her pocket-handkerchief with a nod and got up to pull away the
wood in front of the hole in the neighbour's fence, sobbing bitterly
all the time and half-alarmed at his own grief. Hardly had he pulled
the wood aside before he disappeared into the hole; the seat of his
trousers, polished and shiny from daily contact with the school
benches, and the iron heels of his boots crept farther and farther in,
till at last they vanished; he stood upright on the other side, pushed
himself between the paling and the shed, and on past some old wood-work
which lay there rotting, from there he sprang across to the back door,
and not until he stood outside on free ground in a narrow road, did he
remember that he had forgotten to say good-bye to Josephine and had
never even thanked her! This addition to all his other troubles made
him turn and flee from the town, and he never stopped before he, by
roundabout ways, had reached the high road. It was almost as if it were
his property, this well-known road by the shore.
Josephine stood still a moment gazing after the vanishing heels; but
she did not wait long. She hopped upon the stone and slid down to the
wall, pushed the boards aside, crept through and closed them again
carefully behind her. Soon after she was seen at the apothecary's
without her hat; she asked after her brother, first down in the shop
where she knew he liked to be, but he was not there and he had not been
in either to leave his bundle of books. Upstairs she went through all
the rooms, but he was not there; then looking out of the window she saw
the great foreign steamer and ten or twelve small boats around it; of
course he would be there! Away she flew to the pier, unfastened their
own little white-painted boat and pushed off.
She rowed until the perspiration streamed down her face, rowed and
looked about her until she reached the wreck, the great green monster
lying there groaning under the pumps. From afar she could see Edward up
on the captain's bridge, with his books under his arm, talking to his
friend Mo, the pilot.
As soon as she was within call she shouted his name; he heard her, he
and all the others; they saw a brown-haired girl, without hat, red and
heated with rowing, standing up in the boat, leaning on her oars, and
staring up at the captain's bridge; they did not think much of it,
though, and forgot her quickly. But Edward felt a sharp pang; something
out of the common must have happened, and it did not take him long to
get down from the captain's bridge on to the deck, across the deck and
down the steamer's side, climbing over the other boats and up into
hers, exclaiming, as he pushed off: "What's the matter?" He put his
books down in the bottom of the boat, took the oars from her and sat
down repeating: "What's the matter?"
With streaming hair, breathless and red she stood and looked at him as
he turned the boat; then she moved back to a farther bench. Here she
unfastened the other pair of oars and sat down behind him. He did not
like to question her a third time so he rowed on silently--and then,
keeping her oars on the surface of the water meanwhile, she began:
"What have you done to Ole Tuft?"
He turned pale, then red; he too stopped rowing.
"It's all up with him now at school; he has gone home, and he'll never
come back any more."
"Oh, that's a lie!"--but his voice failed him, he felt she was speaking
the truth. He plunged the oars into the water with all his strength and
rowed with might and main.
"Indeed you had better row hard," though she herself began backing her
oars; "you had better hurry after him even if you have to walk all the
way to Store Tuft; if you don't, it will be a bad look-out for you both
at school and at home with father. What a mean wretch you are!"
"Oh, you hold your tongue!"
"No, I shan't! and if you don't go after him at once and bring him home
with you again, I'll tell father, and the head master too, I will!"
"It's you who are the mean wretch with all your gossiping and
story-telling."
"You should have heard how Anders Hegge went on, and the whole school,
and how they laughed at Ole, every one of them; and he poor fellow, he
cried as if his heart would break, and then ran right away home. Oh,
fie! fie! For shame! If you don't bring him back with you it will be
bad for you."
"You stupid! Don't you see I am rowing as hard as I can?"
His finger-nails were quite white and his face streaming and he bent
double each time to take a longer pull at the oars. Without another
word she moved over to the bench nearest him and rowed with all her
might.
As he stood up when they were nearing the pier and stretched out his
hand to prevent the boat bumping against it, he said: "I have had no
lunch to-day, and now I shall get no dinner either; have you any money
with you that I might buy myself some biscuits?"
"Yes, a few pence I have;" she laid down her oars and looked in her
pocket for the money.
"You take my books!" shouted he as he rushed up the street. Shortly
after he too was out on the high road.