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

“I’ve lost my place,” the girl at last got out between her sobs.

“No, surely not!” exclaimed Kalle, in changed tones. “But what for? Have you been stealing? Or been impudent?”

“No, but the master accused me of being too thick with his son.”

In a flash the mother’s eyes darted from the girl’s face to her figure, and she too burst into tears.

Kalle could see nothing, but he caught his wife’s action and understood. “Oh!” he said quietly. “Is that it?” The little man was like a big child in the way the different expressions came and went upon his good-natured face. At last the smile triumphed again. “Well, well, that’s capital!” he exclaimed, laughing. “Shouldn’t good children take the work off their parents’ shoulders as they grow up and are able to do it? Take off your things, Anna, and sit down. I expect you’re hungry, aren’t you? And it couldn’t have happened at a better time, as we’ve got to have the midwife anyhow!”

Lasse and Pelle drew their neckerchiefs up over their mouths after taking leave of everyone in the room, Kalle circling round them restlessly, and talking eagerly. “Come again soon, you two, and thanks for this visit and your present, Brother Lasse! Oh, yes!” he said suddenly at the outside door, and laughed delightedly; “it’ll be something grand⁠—brother-in-law to the farmer in a way! Oh, fie, Kalle Karlsson! You and I’ll be giving ourselves airs now!” He went a little way along the path with them, talking all the time. Lasse was quite melancholy over it.

Pelle knew quite well that what had happened to Anna was looked upon as a great disgrace, and could not understand how Uncle Kalle could seem so happy. “Ah, yes,” said Lasse, as they stumbled along among the stones. “Kalle’s just like what he always was! He laughs where others would cry.”

It was too dark to go across the fields, so they took the quarry road south to get down to the highroad. At the crossroads, the fourth arm of which led down to the village, stood the country-shop, which was also a hedge-alehouse.

As they approached the alehouse, they heard a great noise inside. Then the door burst open, and some men poured out, rolling the figure of a man before them on the ground. “The police have taken them by surprise!” said Lasse, and drew the boy with him out into the ploughed field, so as to get past without being seen. But at that moment someone placed a lamp in the window, and they were discovered.

“There’s the Stone Farm herdsman!” said a voice. “Hi, Lasse! Come here!” They went up and saw a man lying face downward on the ground, kicking; his hands were tied behind his back, and he could not keep his face out of the mud.

“Why, it’s Per Olsen!” exclaimed Lasse.

“Yes, of course!” said the shopkeeper. “Can’t you take him home with you? He’s not right in his head.”

Lasse looked hesitatingly at the boy, and then back again. “A raving man?” he said. “We two can’t alone.”

“Oh, his hands are tied. You’ve only got to hold the end of the rope and he’ll go along quietly with you,” said one of the men. They were quarrymen from the stone-quarry. “You’ll go with them quietly, won’t you?” he asked, giving the man a kick in the side with the toe of his wooden shoe.

“Oh dear! Oh dear!” groaned Per Olsen.

“What’s he done?” asked Lasse. “And why have you ill-used him so?”

“We had to thrash him a little, because he was going to chop off one of his thumbs. He tried it several times, the beast, and got it half off; and we had to beat him to make him stop.” And they showed Lasse the man’s thumb, which was bleeding. “Such an animal to begin cutting and hacking at himself because he’s drunk half a pint of gin! If he wanted to fight, there were men enough here without that!”

“It must be tied up, or he’ll bleed to death, poor fellow!” said Lasse, slowly drawing out his red pocket-handkerchief. It was his best handkerchief, and it had just been washed. The shopkeeper came with a bottle and poured spirit over the thumb, so that the cold should not get into it. The wounded man screamed and beat his face upon the ground.

“Won’t one of you come with us?” asked Lasse. But no one answered; they wanted to have nothing to do with it, in case it should come to the ears of the magistrate. “Well, then, we two must do it with God’s help,” he said, in a trembling voice, turning to Pelle. “But you can help him up at any rate, as you knocked him down.”

They lifted him up. His face was bruised and bleeding; in their eagerness to save his finger, they had handled him so roughly that he could scarcely stand.

“It’s Lasse and Pelle,” said the old man, trying to wipe his face. “You know us, don’t you, Per Olsen? We’ll go home with you if you’ll be good and not hurt us; we mean well by you, we two.”

Per Olsen stood and ground his teeth, trembling all over his body. “Oh dear, oh dear!” was all he said. There was white foam at the corners of his mouth.

Lasse gave Pelle the end of the rope to hold. “He’s grinding his teeth; the devil’s busy with him already,” he whispered. “But if he tries to do any harm, just you pull with all your might at the rope; and if the worst comes to the worst, we must jump over the ditch.”

They now set off homeward, Lasse holding Per Olsen under the arm, for he staggered and would have fallen at almost every step. He kept on murmuring to himself or grinding his teeth.

Pelle trudged behind, holding the rope. Cold shivers ran down his back, partly from fear, partly from secret satisfaction. He had now seen someone whom he knew to be doomed