Pelle the Conqueror, Martin Andersen Nexø [best fantasy books to read .TXT] 📗

much detail precisely why they had taken the field. The “Great Power” was at his tricks again. He had been refractory all day, and the provost had given the order to keep an eye on him. And quite rightly, for in his cups he had met Shipowner Monsen, on Church Hill, and had fallen upon him with blows and words of abuse: “So you take the widow’s bread out of her mouth, do you? You told her the Three Sisters was damaged at sea, and you took over her shares for next to nothing, did you? Out of pure compassion, eh, you scoundrel? And there was nothing the matter with the ship except that she had done only too well and made a big profit, eh? So you did the poor widow a kindness, eh?” A scoundrel, he called him and at every question he struck him a blow, so that he rolled on the ground. “We are all witnesses, and now he must go to prison. A poor stonecutter oughtn’t to go about playing the judge. Come and help us catch him, Due⁠—you are pretty strong!”

“It’s nothing to do with me,” said Due.

“You do best to keep your fingers out of it,” said one of the men derisively; “you might get to know the feel of his fist.” And they went on, laughing contemptuously.

“They won’t be so pleased with their errand when they’ve done,” said Due, laughing. “That’s why they’ve got a nice drop stowed away⁠—under their belts. To give them courage. The strong man’s a swine, but I’d rather not be the one he goes for.”

“Suppose they don’t get him at all!” said Pelle eagerly.

Due laughed. “They’ll time it so that they are where he isn’t. But why don’t he stick to his work and leave his fool’s tricks alone? He could have a good drink and sleep it off at home⁠—he’s only a poor devil, he ought to leave it to the great people to drink themselves silly!”

But Pelle took another view of the affair. The poor man of course ought to go quietly along the street and take his hat off to everybody; and if anybody greeted him in return he’d be quite proud, and tell it to his wife as quite an event, as they were going to bed. “The clerk raised his hat to me today⁠—yes, that he did!” But Stonecutter Jörgensen looked neither to right nor to left when he was sober, and in his cups he trampled everybody underfoot.

Pelle by no means agreed with the pitiful opinions of the town. In the country, whence he came, strength was regarded as everything, and here was a man who could have taken strong Erik himself and put him in his pocket. He roamed about in secret, furtively measuring his wrists, and lifted objects which were much too heavy for him; he would by no means have objected to be like the “Great Power,” who, as a single individual, kept the whole town in a state of breathless excitement, whether he was in one of his raging moods or whether he lay like one dead. The thought that he was the comrade of Jens and Morten made him quite giddy, and he could not understand why they bowed themselves so completely to the judgment of the town, as no one could cast it in their teeth that they were on the parish, but only that their father was a powerful fellow.

Jens shrank from continually hearing his father’s name on all lips, and avoided looking people in the eyes, but in Morten’s open glance he saw no trace of this nameless grief.

One evening, when matters were quite at their worst, they took Pelle home with them. They lived in the east, by the great clay-pit, where the refuse of the town was cast away. Their mother was busy warming the supper in the oven, and in the chimney-corner sat a shrivelled old grandmother, knitting. It was a poverty-stricken home.

“I really thought that was father,” said the woman, shivering. “Has any of you heard of him?”

The boys related what they had heard; someone had seen him here, another there. “People are only too glad to keep us informed,” said Jens bitterly.

“Now it’s the fourth evening that I’ve warmed up his supper to no purpose,” the mother continued. “Formerly he used to take care to look in at home, however much they were after him⁠—but he may come yet.”

She tried to smile hopefully, but suddenly threw her apron in front of her eyes and burst into tears. Jens went about with hanging head, not knowing what he ought to do; Morten put his arm behind the weary back and spoke soothingly: “Come, come; it isn’t worse than it has often been!” And he stroked the projecting shoulder-blades.

“No, but I did feel so glad that it was over. A whole year almost he never broke out, but took his food quietly when he came home from work, and then crawled into bed. All that time he broke nothing; he just slept and slept; at last I believed he had become weak-minded, and I was glad for him, for he had peace from those terrible ideas. I believed he had quieted down after all his disgraces, and would take life as it came; as the rest of his comrades do. And now he’s broken out again as audacious as possible, and it’s all begun over again!” She wept desolately.

The old woman sat by the stove, her shifting glance wandering from one to another; she was like a crafty bird of prey sitting in a cage. Then her voice began, passionless and uninflected:

“You’re a great donkey; now it’s the fourth evening you’ve made pancakes for your vagabond; you’re always at him, kissing and petting him! I wouldn’t sweeten my husband’s sleep if he had behaved so scandalously to his wife and family; he could go to bed and get up again hungry, and dry too, for all I cared; then