One of Life's Slaves Part 20

Silla had never before been to anything of the kind, the most she had ever done was to stand outside among the longing crowd, who had to content themselves with looking at the coloured lamps and listening to the music. Now at last there was a chance for her too.

Oh, if she dared!

She was restless the whole morning, and had two round red spots of colour on her cheeks.

At dinner-time her mother came up tired and out of breath from the town.

She had had to promise the Antonisens to stand at their cake-stall on the market-place through the fair-week and help sell. It was hardly-earned money in the cold there and in the middle of all that shouting and bawling; but she would do her duty, and not swerve from it when there was a penny to earn. It would not be closed and packed up before midnight, so she must stay down there these few nights.

There was a buzzing and singing in Silla's ears; it was as if the door were opening to her of itself. She could go now if she liked.

She was almost frightened.

As she was taking some washing home in the afternoon, down the street, young Veyergang suddenly brushed close by her.

She almost screamed; then he had come back!

She dared not look up, and felt herself turn red, but had a momentary impression that he smiled and looked steadily at her and then nodded.

She knew the delicate scent of his cigar, and had a feeling that his clothes creaked, as it were, when he moved--a peculiarity which was connected with the romantic ideas of distinguished gentlemen that Kristofa had awakened in her.

It was he, she was quite sure now, who had given them the tickets.

Her heart beat and fluttered within her like a disturbed and frightened bird.

She went home in a reverie, so that at last Mrs. Holman had to ask if she were out of her mind.

She stole a glance into the looking-gla.s.s over the drawers.

Her eyes, were they so very black? The freckles were still there. There was a cure for freckles--but there were _not_ so many as there looked to be; the old gla.s.s was so full of spots and holes in the quicksilver.

Mrs. Holman, to her surprise, saw Silla standing and rubbing, breathing on and polishing the mirror. Her daughter must have been seized with a new zeal.

On the evening of the third day of the fair, Nikolai strolled up to the factory district by lamplight.

He had been fairing on his own account, and had bought a workbox as a surprise for Silla--one with looking-gla.s.s inside the lid--and this afternoon he had put some mounting and a nice lock upon it.

He could surely in some way succeed in meeting her and showing it to her--so easily and with such a spring the lock went! And scissors and needle case he had put inside. She should have the key in her own keeping, and he would keep the box.

He had tied it in a handkerchief and put two cakes on the top, so that the person who could guess that it was anything but a workman's bundle that he was carrying would be more than clever.

He pa.s.sed close beneath his mother's windows where there was a light, and peeped in to see if Silla might happen to be standing at the counter, and then strolled about indifferently up and down the streets.

It was so strangely deserted and empty here this evening.

And, look as he would through the gate and the paling, it was not possible for him to discover a light in Mrs. Holman's window.

After having exhausted every artifice, he stationed himself on the watch for a long time where the roads crossed and one went up to the Valsets'

cottage.

But fortune did not favour him this evening; he remained standing there with his workbox.

It was dark all down the street except near the lamp-post.

There was somebody! There she was!

He hurried up.

No, it was that Jakobina Silla had been so much with in the summer.

There would at any rate be no harm in asking her.

"Isn't Mrs. Holman at home this evening?" he asked, taking off his cap.

"No; she's down at the fair, helping sell."

The inference flashed with a pa.s.sionate joy upon Nikolai; then he would be able to go in and see Silla.

"And so, when the cat's away the mice will play," continued Jakobina. It was pretty well known that the smith came there for Silla's sake, and her vexation at her three friends having got tickets, and not her, filled her with spiteful gaiety. "Silla has taken a little trip into the town, too!" she added, laughing.

"Silla!"

"Yes, why shouldn't she? Mrs. Holman is sitting in the cold down there at a stall, kicking and stamping her feet; why shouldn't her daughter do the same at the fair ball?"--Jakobina was great at saying witty things--"especially when she perhaps has some one who will both dance with her and treat her," she said, letting off another shot, as Nikolai seemed to be struck dumb.

"Who's put that lie into your head, girl?"

"If I'm lying, so's Kristofa; and that Silla went down with her and Gunda a couple of hours ago I saw with my own eyes. The one I mean can afford to give fair-tickets to either three or six. But perhaps they were going to a prayer-meeting," she added, winking with one eye.

"What nonsense are you talking! You'd better take care what you say!" he exclaimed angrily.

"Ha, ha!" she laughed; "you're not such a stranger to him--he's almost related. We're so grand, we are! We heard enough of that from your mother last summer, when she got him to pay for that fine black dress, and they wouldn't let her have credit for any more sewing materials for her shop."

Nikolai had heard enough.

His mother had wrung his very blood from him, and then--deceived him in spite of it.

He suddenly saw her before him in the cold light of indifference.

She had never been a mother to him, had never cared a pin's head about him! All this about a mother had only been something he had imagined.

He made a movement with his hands as if he were done with her. The one she cared about, and had a mother's feeling for, was this--

He did not know whether he had thought the name himself, or whether Jakobina had said it; but it rang in his ears like the stroke of a hammer on a shining anvil, as he rushed down:

"Ludvig Veyergang!"

He had robbed him of his mother from his earliest childhood. Was he going to drag Silla away from him too?