IV.

Two weeks had passed since Maurice's arrival at the farm. Elsie was

sitting on the topmost step of the store-house stairs, intent upon

some kind of coarse knitting-work, whose bag-like convexity remotely

suggested a stocking. Some straggling rays of the late afternoon sun

had got tangled in the loose locks on her forehead, which shone with a

golden translucence. At the foot of the stairs stood her father,

polishing with a woollen rag the tarnished silver of an ancient

harness. At this moment Fern was seen entering the yard at the

opposite side, and with his usual brisk step approaching the

store-house. Elsie, looking up from her knitting, saw at once that

there was something unusual in his manner--something which in another

man you might have called agitation, but which with him was but an

intenser degree of self-command.

"Good-evening," he said, as he stopped in front of her father. "I have

something I wish to speak with you about."

"Speak on, young man," answered Tharald, rubbing away imperturbably at

one of the blinders. "Elsie isn't likely to blab, even if what you say

is worth blabbing."

"It is a more serious affair than you think," continued Fern,

thrusting his peaked staff deep into the sod. "If the glacier goes on

advancing at this rate, your farm is doomed within a year."

The old peasant raised his grizzly head, scratched with provoking

deliberation the fringe of beard which lined his face like a frame,

and stared with a look of supercilious scorn at his informant.

"If our fare don't suit you," he growled, "you needn't stay. We

shan't try to keep you."

"I had no thought of myself," retorted Fern, calmly; for he had by

this time grown somewhat accustomed to his host's disagreeable ways.

"You will no doubt have observed that the glacier has, within the last

thirty years, sent out a new branch to the westward, and if this

branch continues to progress at its present rate, nothing short of a

miracle can save you. During the first week after my arrival it

advanced fifteen feet, as I have ascertained by accurate measurements,

and during the last seven days it has shot forward nineteen feet more.

If next winter should bring a heavy fall of snow, the nether edge may

break off, without the slightest warning, and an avalanche may sweep

down upon you, carrying houses, barns, and the very soil down into the

fjord. I sincerely hope that you will heed my words, and take your

precautions while it is yet time. Science is not to be trifled with;

it has a power of prophecy surer than that of Ezekiel or Daniel."

"The devil take both you and your science!" cried the old man, now

thoroughly aroused. "If you hadn't been poking about up there, and

digging your sneezing-horn in everywhere, the glacier would have kept

quiet, as it has done before, as far back as man's memory goes. I knew

at once that mischief was brewing when you and your black Satan came

here with your pocket-furnaces, and your long-legged gazing-tubes, and

all the rest of your new-fangled deviltry. If you don't hurry up and

get out of my house this very day, I will whip you off the farm like a

dog."

Tharald would probably have continued this pleasing harangue for an

indefinite period (for excitement acted as a powerful stimulus to his

imagination), had he not just then felt the grasp of a hand upon his

arm, and seen a pair of blue eyes, full of tearful appeal, raised to

his.

"Get away, daughter," he grumbled, with that shade of gruffness which

is but the transition to absolute surrender. "I am not talking to

you."

"Oh, father," cried the girl, still clinging to his arm, "it is very

wrong in you to talk to him in that way. You know very well that he

would never do us any harm. You know he cannot move anything as large

as the glacier."

"The devil only knows what he can't do," muttered Tharald, with a

little explosive grunt, which might be interpreted as a qualified

concession. The fact was, he was rather ashamed of his senseless

violence, but did not feel it to be consistent with his dignity to

admit unconditionally that he had been in the wrong.

"These learned chaps are not to be trusted, child," he went on, in a

tone of serious remonstrance. "It isn't safe to have one of them

fellows running about loose. I heard of one up in the West Parish

last summer, who was staying with Lars Norby. He was running about

with a bag and a hammer, and poking his nose into every nook and

cranny of the rocks. And all the while he stayed there, the devil ran

riot on the farm. Three cows slinked, the bay mare followed suit, and

the chickens took the cramps, and died as fast as they were hatched.

There was no luck in anything. I tell you, my lass, the Almighty

doesn't like to have anybody peeping into His hand, and telling Him

when to trump and when to throw a low card. That is the long and short

of it. If we don't ship this fellow, smooth-faced and nice as he may

be, we shall have a run of bad luck here, such as you never saw the

like of before."

In the meanwhile, Maurice, not wishing to overhear the conversation,

had entered the house, and father and daughter were left to continue

their parley in private. There was really, as Elsie thought, some

plausibility in the old man's prognostications, and the situation

began to assume a very puzzling aspect to her mind. She admitted that

scientists, viewed as a genus, were objectionable; but insisted that

Fern, to whose personal charms she was keenly alive, was an exception

to the rule. She felt confident that so good a man as he could never

have tried to pry into the secrets of God Almighty. Tharald yielded

grumblingly, inch by inch, and thus saved his dignity, although his

daughter, in the end, prevailed. She obtained his permission to

request the guest to remain, and not interpret too literally the

rather hasty words he had used. Thus a compromise was effected. Fern

suspended his packing, and resumed his objectionable attitude toward

the mysteries of creation.

About a week after this occurrence, Maurice was walking along the

beach, watching some peasant lads who were spearing trout in a brook

near by. The sun had just dipped below the western mountain peaks, and

a cool, bluish twilight, which seemed the essence of atmospheric

purity, purged of all accessory effects, filled the broad, placid

valley, and made it a luxury to breathe. The torches of the fishermen

flitted back and forth between the slender stems of the birches, and

now and then sent up a great glare of light among the foliage, which

shone with a ghostly grayish green. The majestic repose of this scene

sank deeply into Fern's mind; dim yearnings awoke in him, and a

strange sense of kinship with these mountains, fjords, and glaciers

rose from some unknown depth of his soul. He seemed suddenly to love

them. Whenever he thought of Norway in later years, the impression of

this night revived within him. After a long ramble over the sand, he

chanced upon a low, turf-thatched cottage lying quite apart from the

inhabited districts of the valley. The sheen of the fire upon the

hearth-stone fell through the open door and out upon the white beach,

and illuminated faintly the middle portion of a long fishing-net,

which was suspended on stakes, for drying. Feeling a little tired, he

seated himself on a log near the door, and gazed out upon the gleaming

glaciers in the distance.

While he was sitting thus, he was startled at the sound of a voice,

deep, distinct, and sepulchral, which seemed to proceed from within

the cottage.

"I see a book sealed with seven seals," the voice was saying. "Two of

them are already broken, and when the third shall be broken--then it

is all black--a great calamity will happen."

"Pray don't say that, Gurid," prayed another voice, with a touching,

child-like appeal in it (and he instantly recognized it as Elsie's).

"God is so very strong, you know, and He can certainly wipe away that

black spot, and make it all bright again. And I don't know that I have

done anything very wrong of late; and father, I know, is really very

good, too, even if he does say some hard things at times. But he

doesn't mean anything by it--and I am sure--"

"Be silent, child!" interrupted the first voice. "Thou dost not

understand, and it is well for thee that thou dost not. For it is

written, 'He shall visit the sins of the fathers upon the children,

even unto the third and fourth generation.'"

"How terrible!"

"Hush! Now I see a man--he is tall and beautiful--has dark hair and

rather a dark face."

"Pray don't say anything more. I don't want to know. Is he to break

the seals?"

"Then there is water--water--a long, long journey."

Maurice had listened to this conversation with feelings of mingled

amusement and pity, very much as he would have listened to a duet,

representing the usual mixture of gypsy and misguided innocence, in an

old-fashioned opera. That he was playing the eavesdropper had never

entered his mind. The scene seemed too utterly remote and unreal to

come within the pale of moral canons. But suddenly the aspect of

affairs underwent a revolution, as if the misguided young lady in the

opera had turned out to be his sister, and he himself under obligation

to interfere in her behalf. For at that moment there came an intense,

hurried whisper, to which he would fain have closed his ears:

"And does he care for me as I do for him?"

He sprang up, his ears tingling with shame, and hurried down the

beach. Presently it occurred to him, however, that it was not quite

chivalrous in him to leave little Elsie there alone with the

dark-minded sibyl. Who knew but that she might need his help? He

paused, and was about to retrace his steps, when he heard some one

approaching, whom he instinctively knew to be Elsie. As she came

nearer, the moon, which hung transfixed upon the flaming spear of a

glacier peak, revealed a distressed little face, through whose

transparent surface you might watch the play of emotions within, as

one watches the doings of tiny insects and fishes in an aquarium.

"What have they been doing to my little girl?" asked Fern, with a

voice full of paternal tenderness. "She has been crying, poor little

thing."

He may have been imprudent in addressing a girl of seventeen in this

tender fashion; but the truth was, her short skirts and the two long

braids of yellow hair were in his mind associated with that age toward

which you may, without offence, assume the rôle of a well-meaning

protector, and where even a kiss need not necessarily be resented. So

far from feeling flattered by the unwished-for recollection of Elsie's

feeling for him, he was rather disposed to view it as a pathological

phenomenon,--as a sort of malady, of which he would like to cure her.

It is not to be denied, however, that if this was his intention, the

course he was about to pursue was open to criticism. But it must be

borne in mind that Fern was no expert on questions of the

heart,--that he had had no blighting experiences yielding him an

unwholesome harvest of premature wisdom.

For a long while they walked on in silence, holding each other's hands

like two children, and the sound of their footsteps upon the crisp,

crunching sand was singularly exaggerated by the great stillness

around them.

"And whom is it you have been visiting so late in the night, Elsie?"

he asked, at last, glancing furtively into her face.

"Hush, you mustn't talk about her," answered she, in a timid whisper.

"It was Gurid Sibyl, and she knows a great many things which nobody

else knows except God."

"I am sorry you have resort to such impostors. You know the Bible says

it is wrong to consult sibyls and fortune-tellers."

"No, I didn't know it. But you mustn't speak ill of her, or she will

sow disease in your blood and you will never see another healthy day.

She did that to Nils Saetren because he mocked her, and he has been a

cripple ever since."

"Pshaw, I am not afraid of her. She may frighten children--"

"Hush! Oh, don't!" cried the girl, in tones of distress, laying her

hand gently over his mouth. "I wouldn't for the world have anything

evil happen to you."

"Well well, you foolish child," he answered, laughing. "If it grieves

you, I will say nothing more about it. But I must disapprove of your

superstition all the same."

"Oh, no; don't think ill of me," she begged piteously, her eyes

filling with tears.

"No no, I will not. Only don't cry. It always makes me feel awkward to

see a woman cry."

She brushed her tears away and put on a resolute little pout, which

was meant to be resigned if not cheerful.

Fifteen minutes later they were standing at the foot of the stairs

leading up to his room. The large house was dark and silent. Everybody

was asleep. Thinking the opportunity favorable for giving her a bit of

parting advice, Maurice seized hold of both her arms and looked her

gravely in the eyes. She, however, misinterpreting the gesture, very

innocently put up her lips, thinking that he intended to kiss her. The

sweet, child-like trustfulness of the act touched him; hardly knowing

what he did, he stooped over her and kissed her. As their eyes again

met, a deep, radiant contentment shone from her countenance. It was

not a mere momentary brightening of the features, such as he had often

noticed in her before, but something inexpressibly tender, soul-felt,

and absolute. It was as if that kiss had suddenly transformed the

child into a woman.