The Great Hunger Part 14

Puh!--only one more hill now, and here is the top at last. And there ahead lie the great uplands, with marsh and mound and gleaming tarns.

Ah, what a relief! What wonder that his step grows lighter and quicker?

Before he knows it he is singing aloud in mere gaiety of heart. Ah, dear G.o.d, what if after all it were not too late to be young!

A saeter. A little hut, standing on a patch of green, with split-stick fence and a long cow-house of rough planks--it must be a saeter! And listen--isn't that a girl singing? Peer slipped softly through the gate and stood listening against the wall of the byre. "Shap, shap, shap,"

went the streams of milk against the pail. It must be a fairy sitting milking in there. Then came the voice:

Oh, Sunday eve, oh, Sunday eve, Ever wast thou my dearest eve!

"Shap, shap, shap!" went the milk once more in the pail--and suddenly Peer joined in:

Oh bright, oh gentle Sunday eve-- Wilt ever be my dearest eve!

The milking stopped, a cowbell tinkled as the cow turned her inquiring face, and a girl's light-brown head of hair was thrust out of the doorway--soon followed by the girl herself, slender, eighteen, red-cheeked, fresh and smiling.

"Good evening," said Peer, stretching out his hand.

The girl looked at him for a moment, then cast a glance at her own clothes--as women will when they see a man who takes their fancy.

"An' who may you be?" she asked.

"Can you cook me some cream-porridge?"

"A' must finish milking first, then."

Here was a job that Peer could help with. He took off his knapsack, washed his hands, and was soon seated on a stool in the close sweet air of the shed, milking busily. Then he fetched water, and chopped some wood for the fire, the girl gazing at him all the time, no doubt wondering who this crazy person could be. When the porridge stood ready on the table, he insisted on her sitting down close to him and sharing the meal. They ate a little, and then laughed a little, and then chatted, and then ate and then laughed again. When he asked what he had to pay, the girl said: "Whatever you like"--and he gave her two crowns and then bent her head back and kissed her lips. "What's the man up to?"

he heard her gasp behind him as he pa.s.sed out; when he had gone a good way and turned to look back, there she was in the doorway, shading her eyes and watching him.

Whither away now? Well, he was pretty sure to reach some other inhabited place before night. This, he felt, was not his abiding-place. No, it was not here.

It was nearly midnight when he stood by the sh.o.r.e of a broad mountain lake, beneath a snow-flecked hill-side. Here were a couple of saeters, and across the lake, on a wooded island, stood a small frame house that looked like some city people's summer cottage. And see--over the lake, that still mirrored the evening red, a boat appeared moving towards the island, and two white-sleeved girls sat at the oars, singing as they rowed. A strange feeling came over him. Here--here he would stay.

In the saeter-hut stood an enormously fat woman, with a rope round her middle, evidently ready to go to bed. Could she put him up for the night? Why, yes, she supposed so--and she rolled off into another room.

And soon he was lying in a tiny chamber, in a bed with a mountainous mattress and a quilt. There was a fresh smell from the juniper twigs strewed about the newly-washed floor, and the cheeses, which stood in rows all round the shelf-lined walls. Ah! he had slept in many places and fashions--at sea in a Lofoten boat; on the swaying back of a camel; in tents out in the moonlit desert; and in palaces of the Arabian Nights, where dwarfs fanned him with palm-leaves to drive away the heat, and called him pasha. But here, at last, he had found a place where it was good to be. And he closed his eyes, and lay listening to the murmur of a little stream outside in the light summer night, till he fell asleep.

Late in the forenoon of the next day he was awakened by the entry of the old woman with coffee. Then a plunge into the blue-green water of the mountain lake, a short swim, and back to find grilled trout and new-baked waffles and thick cream for lunch.

Yes, said the old woman, if he could get along with the sort of victuals she could cook, he might stay here a few days and welcome. The bed was standing there empty, anyway.

Chapter III

So Peer stays on and goes fishing. He catches little; but time goes leisurely here, and the summer lies soft and warm over the brown and blue hillsides. He has soon learned that a merchant named Uthoug, from Ringeby, is living in the house on the island, with his wife and daughter. And what of it?

Often he would lie in his boat, smoking his pipe, and giving himself up to quiet dreams that came and pa.s.sed. A young girl in a white boat, moving over red waters in the evening--a secret meeting on an island--no one must know just yet. . . . Would it ever happen to him? Ah, no.

The sun goes down, there come sounds of cow-bells nearing the saeters, the musical cries and calls of the saeter-girls, the lowing of the cattle. The mountains stand silent in the distance, their snow-clad tops grown golden; the stream slides rippling by, murmuring on through the luminous nights.

Then at last came the day of all days.

He had gone out for a long tramp at random over the hills, making his way by compa.s.s, and noting landmarks to guide him back. Here was a marsh covered with cloud-berries--the taste brought back his own childhood. He wandered on up a pale-brown ridge flecked with red heather--and what was that ahead? Smoke? He made towards it. Yes, it was smoke. A ptarmigan fluttered out in front of him, with a brood of tiny youngsters at her heels--Lord, what a shave!--he stopped short to avoid treading on them.

The smoke meant someone near--possibly a camp of Lapps. Let's go and see.

He topped the last mound, and there was the fire just below. Two girls jumped to their feet; there was a bright coffee-kettle on the fire, and on the moss-covered ground close by bread and b.u.t.ter and sandwiches laid out on a paper tablecloth.

Peer stopped short in surprise. The girls gazed at him for a moment, and he at them, all three with a hesitating smile.

At last Peer lifted his hat and asked the way to Rustad saeter. It took them some time to explain this, and then they asked him the time. He told them exactly to the minute, and then showed them his watch so that they might see for themselves. All this took more time. Meanwhile, they had inspected each other, and found no reason to part company just yet.

One of the girls was tall, slender of figure, with a warm-coloured oval face and dark brown hair. Her eyebrows were thick and met above the nose, delightful to look at. She wore a blue serge dress, with the skirt kilted up a little, leaving her ankles visible. The other was a blonde, smaller of stature, and with a melancholy face, though she smiled constantly. "Oh," she said suddenly, "have you a pocket-knife by any chance?"

"Oh yes!" Peer was just moving off, but gladly seized the opportunity to stay a while.

"We've a tin of sardines here, and nothing to open it with," said the dark one.

"Let me try," said Peer. As luck would have it, he managed to cut himself a little, and the two girls tumbled over each other to tie up the wound. It ended, of course, with their asking him to join their coffee-party.

"My name is Merle Uthoug," said the dark one, with a curtsy.

"Oh, then, it's your father who has the place on the island in the lake?"

"My name's only Mork--Thea Mork. My father is a lawyer, and we have a little cottage farther up the lake," said the blonde.

Peer was about to introduce himself, when the dark girl interrupted: "Oh, we know you already," she said. "We've seen you out rowing on the lake so often. And we had to find out who you were. We have a good pair of gla.s.ses . . ."

"Merle!" broke in her companion warningly.

". . . and then, yesterday, we sent one of the maids over reconnoitring, to make inquiries and bring us a full report."

"Merle! How can you say such things?"

It was a cheery little feast. Ah! how young they were, these two girls, and how they laughed at a joke, and what quant.i.ties of bread and b.u.t.ter and coffee they all three disposed of! Merle now and again would give their companion a sidelong glance, while Thea laughed at all the wild things her friend said, and scolded her, and looked anxiously at Peer.

And now the sun was nearing the shoulder of a hill far in the west, and evening was falling. They packed up their things, and Peer was loaded up with a big bag of cloud-berries on his back, and a tin pail to carry in his hand. "Give him some more," said Merle. "It'll do him good to work for a change."

"Merle, you really are too bad!"

"Here you are," said the girl, and slid the handle of a basket into his other hand.

Then they set out down the hill. Merle sang and yodelled as they went; then Peer sang, and then they all three sang together. And when they came to a heather-tussock or a puddle, they did not trouble to go round, but just jumped over it, and then gave another jump for the fun of the thing.

They pa.s.sed the saeter and went on down to the water's edge, and Peer proposed to row them home. And so they rowed across. And the whole time they sat talking and laughing together as if they had known each other for years.

The boat touched land just below the cottage, and a broad-shouldered man with a grey beard and a straw hat came down to meet them. "Oh, father, are you back again?" cried Merle, and, springing ash.o.r.e, she flung her arms round his neck. The two exchanged some whispered words, and the father glanced at Peer. Then, taking off his hat, he came towards him and said politely, "It was very kind of you to help the girls down."