Growth of the Soil, Knut Hamsun [best self help books to read txt] 📗

give me something for it, now,” she said, laughing. And at that he up and kissed her properly.

After that it was easier all round; Eleseus brightened up, and got on finely. They flirted and joked and laughed, and were excellent friends. “When you took my hand just now it was like a bit of swan’s down⁠—yours, I mean.”

“Oh, you’ll be going back to town again, and never come back here, I’ll be bound,” said Barbro.

“Do you think I’m that sort?” said Eleseus.

“Ah, I dare say there’s a somebody there you’re fond of.”

“No, there isn’t. Between you and me, I’m not engaged at all,” said he.

“Oh yes, you are; I know.”

“No, solemn fact, I’m not.”

They carried on like this quite a while; Eleseus was plainly in love. “I’ll write to you,” said he. “May I?”

“Yes,” said she.

“For I wouldn’t be mean enough if you didn’t care about it, you know.” And suddenly he was jealous, and asked: “I’ve heard say you’re promised to Axel here; is it true?”

“Axel?” she said scornfully, and he brightened up again. “I’ll see him farther!” But then she turned penitent, and added: “Alex, he’s good enough for me, though.⁠ ⁠… And he takes in a paper all for me to read, and gives me things now and again⁠—lots of things. I will say that.”

“Oh, of course,” Eleseus agreed. “He may be an excellent fellow in his way, but that’s not everything.⁠ ⁠…”

But the thought of Axel seemed to have made Barbro anxious; she got up, and said to Eleseus: “You’ll have to go now; I must see to the animals.”

Next Sunday Eleseus went down a good deal later than usual, and carried the letter himself. It was a letter! A whole week of excitement, all the trouble it had cost him to write, but here it was at last; he had managed to produce a letter: “To Fröken Barbro Bredesen. It is two or three times now I have had the inexpressible delight of seeing you again.⁠ ⁠…”

Coming so late as he did now, Barbro must at any rate have finished seeing to the animals, and might perhaps have gone to bed already. That wouldn’t matter⁠—quite the reverse, indeed.

But Barbro was up, sitting in the hut. She looked now as if she had suddenly lost all idea of being nice to him and making love⁠—Eleseus fancied Axel had perhaps got hold of her and warned her.

“Here’s the letter I promised you,” he said.

“Thank you,” said she, and opened it, and read it through without seeming much moved. “I wish I could write as nice a hand as that,” she said.

Eleseus was disappointed. What had he done⁠—what was the matter with her? And where was Axel? He was not there. Beginning to get tired of these foolish Sunday visits, perhaps, and preferred to stay away; or he might have had some business to keep him over, when he went down to the village the day before. Anyhow, he was not there.

“What d’you want to sit here in this stuffy old place for on a lovely evening?” asked Eleseus. “Come out for a walk.”

“I’m waiting for Axel,” she answered.

“Axel? Can’t you live without Axel, then?”

“Yes. But he’ll want something to eat when he comes back.”

Time went, time dribbled away, they came no nearer each other; Barbro was as cross and contrary as ever. He tried telling her again of his visit across the hills, and did not forget about the speech he had made: “ ’Twasn’t much I had to say, but all the same it brought out the tears from some of them.”

“Did it?” said she.

“And then one Sunday I went to church.”

“What news there?”

“News? Oh, nothing. Only to have a look round. Not much of a priest, as far as I know anything about it; no sort of manner, he had.”

Time went.

“What d’you think Axel’d say if he found you here this evening again?” said Barbro suddenly.

There was a thing to say! It was as if she had struck him. Had she forgotten all about last time? Hadn’t they agreed that he was to come this evening? Eleseus was deeply hurt, and murmured: “I can go, if you like. What have I done?” he asked then, his lips trembling. He was in distress, in trouble, that was plain to see.

“Done? Oh, you haven’t done anything.”

“Well, what’s the matter with you, anyway, this evening?”

“With me? Ha ha ha!⁠—But come to think of it, ’tis no wonder Axel should be angry.”

“I’ll go, then,” said Eleseus again. But she was still indifferent, not in the least afraid, caring nothing that he sat there struggling with his feelings. Fool of a woman!

And now he began to grow angry; he hinted his displeasure at first delicately: to the effect that she was a nice sort indeed, and a credit to her sex, huh! But when that produced no effect⁠—oh, he would have done better to endure it patiently, and say nothing. But he grew no better for that; he said: “If I’d known you were going to be like this, I’d never have come this evening at all.”

“Well, what if you hadn’t?” said she. “You’d have lost a chance of airing that cane of yours that you’re so fond of.”

Oh, Barbro, she had lived in Bergen, she knew how to jeer at a man; she had seen real walking-sticks, and could ask now what he wanted to go swinging a patched-up umbrella handle like that for. But he let her go on.

“I suppose now you’ll be wanting that photograph back you gave me,” he said. And if that didn’t move her, surely nothing would, for among folks in the wilds, there was nothing counted so mean as to take back a gift.

“That’s as it may be,” she answered evasively.

“Oh, you shall have it all right,” he answered bravely. “I’ll send it back at once, never fear. And now perhaps you’ll give me back my letter.” Eleseus rose to his feet.

Very well; she gave him back the letter. But now the tears came into her eyes