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

“Ah yes, you can say what you like, but all those I was young with are dead now, and many others that I’ve seen grow up. Every week someone that I know dies, and here am I still living, only to be a burden to others.”

Kalle brought in the old lady’s armchair from her room, and made her sit down. “What’s all that nonsense about?” he said reproachfully. “Why, you pay for yourself!”

“Pay! Oh dear! They get twenty krones a year for keeping me,” said the old woman to the company in general.

The coffee came in, and Kalle poured brandy into the cups of all the elder people. “Now, grandmother, you must cheer up!” he said, touching her cup with his. “Where the pot boils for twelve, it boils for the thirteenth as well. Your health, grandmother, and may you still live many years to be a burden to us, as you call it!”

“Yes, I know it so well, I know it so well,” said the old woman, rocking backward and forward. “You mean so well by it all. But with so little wish to live, it’s hard that I should take the food out of the others’ mouths. The cow eats, and the cat eats, the children eat, we all eat; and where are you, poor things, to get it all from!”

“Say ‘poor thing’ to him who has no head, and pity him who has two,” said Kalle gaily.

“How much land have you?” asked Lasse.

“Five acres; but it’s most of it rock.”

“Can you manage to feed the cow on it then?”

“Last year it was pretty bad. We had to pull the roof off the outhouse, and use it for fodder last winter; and it’s thrown us back a little. But dear me, it made the loft all the higher.” Kalle laughed. “And now there’ll always be more and more of the children getting able to keep themselves.”

“Don’t those who are grown up give a hand too?” asked Lasse.

“How can they? When you’re young, you can use what you’ve got yourself. They must take their pleasures while there’s time; they hadn’t many while they were children, and once they’re married and settled they’ll have something else to think about. Albert is good enough when he’s at home on a visit; last time he gave us ten krones and a krone to each of the children. But when they’re out, you know how the money goes if they don’t want to look mean beside their companions. Anna’s one of those who can spend all they get on clothes. She’s willing enough to do without, but she never has a farthing, and hardly a rag to her body, for all that she’s forever buying.”

“No, she’s the strangest creature,” said her mother. “She never can make anything do.”

The turn-up bedstead was shut to give room to sit round the table, and an old pack of cards was produced. Everyone was to play except the two smallest, who were really too little to grasp a card; Kalle wanted, indeed, to have them too, but it could not be managed. They played beggar-my-neighbor and Black Peter. Grandmother’s cards had to be read out to her.

The conversation still went on among the elder people.

“How do you like working for the farmer at Stone Farm?” asked Kalle.

“We don’t see much of the farmer himself; he’s pretty nearly always out, or sleeping after a night on the loose. But he’s nice enough in other ways; and it’s a house where they feed you properly.”

“Well, there are places where the food’s worse,” said Kalle, “but there can’t be many. Most of them, certainly, are better.”

“Are they really?” asked Lasse, in surprise. “Well, I don’t complain as far as the food’s concerned; but there’s a little too much for us two to do, and then it’s so miserable to hear that woman crying nearly the whole time. I wonder if he ill-treats her; they say not.”

“I’m sure he doesn’t,” said Kalle. “Even if he wanted to⁠—as you can very well understand he might⁠—he dursn’t. He’s afraid of her, for she’s possessed by a devil, you know.”

“They say she’s a werewolf at night,” said Lasse, looking as if he expected to see a ghost in one of the corners.

“She’s a poor body, who has her own troubles,” said Maria, “and every woman knows a little what that means. And the farmer’s not all kindness either, even if he doesn’t beat her. She feels his unfaithfulness more than she’d feel anything else.”

“Oh, you wives always take one another’s part,” said Kalle, “but other people have eyes too. What do you say, grandmother? You know that better than anyone else.”

“Well, I know something about it at any rate,” said the old woman. “I remember the time when Kongstrup came to the island as well as if it had been yesterday. He owned nothing more than the clothes he wore, but he was a fine gentleman for all that, and lived in Copenhagen.”

“What did he want over here?” asked Lasse.

“What did he want? To look for a young girl with money, I suppose. He wandered about on the heath here with his gun, but it wasn’t foxes he was after. She was fooling about on the heath too, admiring the wild scenery, and nonsense like that, and behaving half like a man, instead of being kept at home and taught to spin and make porridge; but she was the only daughter, and was allowed to go on just as she liked. And then she meets this spark from the town, and they become friends. He was a curate or a pope, or something of the sort, so you can’t wonder that the silly girl didn’t know what she was doing.”

“No, indeed!” said Lasse.

“There’s always been something all wrong with the women of that family,” the old woman continued. “They say one of them once gave herself to Satan, and since then he’s had a claim upon them and ill-treats them whenever