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

think of it, and my heart will suddenly contract as if it would send the blood out through my throat. Do you know what the devilish part of corporal punishment is? It’s not the bodily pain that they inflict upon the culprit; it’s his inner man they thrash⁠—his soul. While I lay there brooding over my mutilated spirit, left to lick my wounds like a wounded animal, I realized that I had been in an encounter with the evil conscience of Society, the victim of their hatred of those who suffer.”

“Do you remember what gave occasion to the punishment?” Morten asked, as he wiped the perspiration from his forehead.

“It was some little thing or other⁠—I think I called out. The solitude and the terrible silence got upon my nerves, and I suppose I shouted to make a little life in the horrible emptiness. I don’t remember very clearly, but I think that was my crime.”

“You’d have been the better anyhow for a kind word from a friend.” Morten was still thinking of his despised letters.

“Yes, but the atmosphere of a cell is not suited for friendly relations with the outside world. You get to hate all who are at liberty⁠—those who mean well by you too⁠—and you chop off even the little bit of branch you’re sitting on. Perhaps I should never have got into touch with life again if it hadn’t been for the mice in my cell. I used to put crumbs of bread down the grating for them, and when I lay there half dead and brooding, they ran squeaking over my hand. It was a caress anyhow, even if it wasn’t from fellow-men.”

Morten lived in a small two-roomed flat in the attics. While they sat talking, a sound came now and then from the other room, and each time a nervous look came into Morten’s face, and he glanced in annoyance at the closed door. Gradually he became quite restless and his attention was fixed on these sounds. Pelle wondered at it, but asked no questions.

Suddenly there came the sound of a chair being overturned. Morten rose quickly and went in, shutting the door carefully behind him. Pelle heard low voices⁠—Morten’s admonishing, and a thin, refractory, girlish voice. “He’s got a girl hidden in there,” thought Pelle. “I’d better be off.”

He rose and looked out of the large attic window. How everything had changed since he first came to the capital and looked out over it from Morten’s old lodging! In those days he had had dreams of conquering it, and had carried out his plan too; and now he could begin from the beginning! An entirely new city lay spread out beneath him. Where he had once run about among wharves and coal-bunkers, there now stood a row of palatial buildings with a fine boulevard. And everything outside was new; a large workingmen’s district had sprung up where there had once been timber-yards or water. Below him engines were drawing rows of trucks filled with ballast across the site for the new goods-station yard; and on the opposite side of the harbor a new residential and business quarter had grown up on the Iceland Quay. And behind it all lay the water and the green land of Amager. Morten had had the sense to select a high branch for himself like the nightingales.

He had got together a good number of books again, and on his writing-table stood photographs of well-known men with autograph inscriptions. To all appearances he seemed to make his way in the world of books. Pelle took down some of Morten’s own works, and turned over their leaves with interest. He seemed to hear Morten’s earnest voice behind the printed words. He would begin to read him now!

Morten came in. “You’re not going, are you?” he asked, drawing his hand across his forehead. “Do stay a little while and we’ll have a good talk. You can’t think how I’ve missed you!” He looked tired.

“I’m looking forward tremendously to reading your books,” said Pelle enthusiastically. “What a lot you’ve written! You haven’t given that up.”

“Perhaps solitude’s taught you too to like books,” said Morten, looking at him. “If so, you’ve made some good friends in there, Pelle. All that there isn’t worth much; it’s only preliminary work. It’s a new world ours, you must remember.”

“I don’t think The Working Man cares much about you.”

“No, not much,” answered Morten slowly.

“They say you only write in the upper-class papers.”

“If I didn’t I should starve. They don’t grudge me my food, at any rate! Our own press still has no use for skirmishers, but only for men who march to order!”

“And it’s very difficult for you to subordinate yourself to anyone,” said Pelle, smiling.

“I have a responsibility to those above me,” answered Morten proudly. “If I give the blind man eyes to see into the future, I can’t let myself be led by him. Now and then The Working Man gets hold of one of my contributions to the upper-class press: that’s all the connection I have with my own side. My food I have to get from the other side of the boundary, and lay my eggs there: they’re pretty hard conditions. You can’t think how often I’ve worried over not being able to speak to my own people except in roundabout ways. Well, it doesn’t matter! I can afford to wait. There’s no way of avoiding the son of my father, and in the meantime I’m doing work among the upper classes. I bring the misery into the life of the happily-situated, and disturb their quiet enjoyment. The upper classes must be prepared for the revolution too.”

“Can they stand your representations?” asked Pelle, in surprise.

“Yes, the upper classes are just as tolerant as the common people were before they rose: it’s an outcome of culture. Sometimes they’re almost too tolerant; you can’t quite vouch for their words. When there’s something they don’t like, they always get out of it by looking at