Читать книгу Pelle the Conqueror — Complete - Martin Andersen Nexø - Страница 12

Then there were little things that had belonged to Bengta herself, cheap finery that all had its happy memory of fairs and holidays, which he recalled in his muttered reverie.

Pelle liked this subdued murmur that he did not need to listen to or answer, and that was so pleasant to doze off in. He lay looking out sleepily at the bright sky, tired and with a vague feeling of something unpleasant that was past.

Suddenly he started. He had heard the door of the cow-stable open, and steps upon the long foddering-passage. It was the pupil. He recognized the hated step at once.

He thrilled with delight. Now that fellow would be made to understand that he mustn’t do anything to boys with fathers who could hold a man out at arm’s length and scold! oh, much worse than the bailiff. He sat up and looked eagerly at his father.

“Lasse!” came a voice from the end of the tables.

The old man growled sullenly, stirred uneasily, but did not rise.

“Las-se!” came again, after a little, impatiently and in a tone of command.

“Yes,” said Lasse slowly, rising and going out.

“Can’t you answer when you’re called, you old Swedish rascal? Are you deaf?”

“Oh, I can answer well enough,” said Lasse, in a trembling voice. “But Mr. Pupil oughtn’t to—I’m a father, let me tell you—and a father’s heart——”

“You may be a monthly nurse for all I care, but you’ve got to answer when you’re called, or else I’ll get the bailiff to give you a talking-to. Do you understand?”

“Yes, oh yes!—Mr. Pupil must excuse me, but I didn’t hear.”

“Well, will you please remember that Aspasia’s not to go out to pasture to-morrow.”

“Is she going to calve?”

“Yes, of course! Did you think she was going to foal?”

Lasse laughed, as in duty bound, and followed the pupil back through the stable. Now it would come, thought Pelle, and sat listening intently; but he only heard his father make another excuse, close the half-door, and come back with slow, tottering steps. Then he burst into tears, and crept far in under the quilt.

Lasse went about for some time, grumbling to himself, and at last came and gently drew the quilt down from the boy’s head. But Pelle buried his face in the clothes, and when his father turned it up toward him, he met a despairing, uncomprehending gaze that made his own wander restlessly round the room.

“Yes,” he said, with an attempt at being cross. “It’s all very well for you to cry! But when you don’t know where Aspasia stands, you’ve got to be civil, I’m thinking.”

“I know Aspasia quite well,” sobbed the boy. “She’s the third from the door here.”

Lasse was going to give a cross answer, but broke down, touched and disarmed by the boy’s grief. He surrendered unconditionally, stooped down until his forehead touched the boy’s, and said helplessly, “Yes, Lasse’s a poor thing—old and poor! Any one can make a fool of him. He can’t be angry any more, and there’s no strength in his fist, so what’s the good of clenching it! He has to put up with everything, and let himself be hustled about—and say thank you into the bargain—that’s how it is with old Lasse. But you must remember that it’s for your sake he lets himself be put upon. If it wasn’t for you, he’d shoulder his pack and go—old though he is. But you can grow on where your father rusts. And now you must leave off crying!” And he dried the boy’s wet eyes with the quilt.

Pelle did not understand his father’s words, but they quieted him nevertheless, and he soon fell asleep; but for a long time he sobbed as he lay.

Lasse sat still upon the edge of the bed and watched the boy as he slept, and when he had become quieter, crept away through the stable and out. It had been a poor Sunday, and now he would go and see if any of the men were at home and had visitors, for then there would be spirits going round. Lasse could not find it in his heart to take any of his wages to buy a dram with; that money would have quite enough to do to buy bare necessaries.

On one of the beds lay a man asleep, fully dressed, and with his boots on. He was dead drunk. All the others were out, so Lasse had to give up all thoughts of a dram, and went across to the basement to see if there was any gaiety going among the maids. He was not at all averse to enjoyment of one sort or another, now that he was free and his own master as he had been in the days of his youth.

Up by the dairy stood the three farm-laborers’ wives who used to do the milking for the girls on Sunday evening. They were thick-set, small, and bent with toil. They were all talking together and spoke of illnesses and other sad things in plaintive tones. Lasse at once felt a desire to join them, for the subject found an echo in his being like the tones of a well-known song, and he could join in the refrain with the experience of a lifetime. But he resisted the temptation, and went past them down the basement steps. “Ah, yes, death will come to us all!” said one of the women, and Lasse said the words after her to himself as he went down.

Down there Karna was sitting mending Gustav’s moleskin trousers, while Gustav lay upon the bench asleep with his cap over his face. He had put his feet up on Karna’s lap, without so much as taking off his shoes; and she had accommodated her lap, so that they should not slide off.

Lasse sat down beside her and tried to make himself agreeable. He wanted some one to be nice to him. But Karna was unapproachable; those dirty feet had quite turned her head. And either Lasse had forgotten how to do it, or he was wanting in assurance, for every time he attempted a pleasant speech, she turned it off.

“We might have such a comfortable time, we two elderly folk,” he said hopelessly.

“Yes, and I could contribute what was wanting,” said Gustav, peeping out from under his cap. Insolent puppy, lying there and boasting of his seventeen years! Lasse had a good mind to go for him then and there and chance yet one more trial of strength. But he contented himself with sitting and looking at him until his red, lashless eyes grew watery. Then he got up.

“Well, well, I see you want young people this evening!” he said bitterly to Karna. “But you can’t get rid of your years, all the same! Perhaps you’ll only get the spoon to lick after the others.”

He went across to the cow-stable and began to talk to the three farm-laborers’ wives, who were still speaking of illness and misery and death, as if nothing else existed in the world. Lasse nodded and said: “Yes, yes, that’s true.” He could heartily endorse it all, and could add much to what they said. It brought warmth to his old body, and made him feel quite comfortable—so easy in his joints.

But when he lay on his back in bed, all the sad thoughts came back and he could not sleep. Generally he slept like a log as soon as he lay down, but to-day was Sunday, and he was tormented with the thought that life had passed him by. He had promised himself so much from the island, and it was nothing but worry and toil and trouble—nothing else at all.

“Yes, Lasse’s old!” he suddenly said aloud, and he kept on repeating the words with a little variation until he fell asleep: “He’s old, poor man—and played out! Ah, so old!” Those words expressed it all.

He was awakened again by singing and shouting up on the high-road.

“And now the boy you gave me

With the black and curly hair,

He is no longer little,

No longer, no longer,

But a fine, tall strapping youth.”

It was some of the men and girls of the farm on their way home from some entertainment. When they turned into the farm road they became silent. It was just beginning to grow light; it must have been about two o’clock.