The Great Hunger Part 8

On his right lay a black-haired, yellow-faced dock labourer with a broken nose. His disease, whatever it might be, was clearly different from Peer's. He plagued the nurse with foul-mouthed complaints of the food, swearing he would report about it. On the other side lay an emaciated cobbler with a soft brown beard like the Christ pictures, and cheeks glowing with fever. He was dying of cancer. At right angles with him lay a man with the face and figure of a prophet--a Moses--all bushy white hair and beard; he was in the last stage of consumption, and his cough was like a riveting machine. "Huh!" he would groan, "if only I could get across to Germany there'd be a chance for me yet." Beside him was a fellow with short beard and piercing eyes, who was a little off his head, and imagined himself a corporal of the Guards. Often at night the others would be wakened by his springing upright in bed and calling out: "Attention!"

One man lay moaning and groaning all the time, turning from side to side of a body covered with sores. But one day he managed to swallow some of the alcohol they used as lotion, and after that lay singing and weeping alternately. And there was a red-bearded man with gla.s.ses, a commercial traveller; he had put a bullet into his head, but the doctors had managed to get it out again, and now he lay and praised the Lord for his miraculous deliverance.

It was strange to Peer to lie awake at night in this great room in the dim light of the night-lamp; it seemed as if beings from the land of the dead were stirring in those beds round about him. But in the daytime, when friends and relations of the patients came a-visiting, Peer could hardly keep from crying. The cobbler had a wife and a little girl who came and sat beside him, gazing at him as if they could never let him go. The prophet, too, had a wife, who wept inconsolably--and all the rest seemed to have some one or other to care for them. But where was Louise--why did Louise never come?

The man on the right had a sister, who came sweeping in, gorgeous in her trailing soiled silk dress. Her shoes were down at heel, but her hat was a wonder, with enormous plumes. "Hallo, Ugly! how goes it?" she said; and sat down and crossed her legs. Then the pair would talk mysteriously of people with strange names: "The Flea," "c.o.c.kroach," "The Galliot,"

"King Ring," and the like, evidently friends of theirs. One day she managed to bring in a small bottle of brandy, a present from "The Hedgehog," and smuggle it under the bedclothes. As soon as she had gone, and the coast was clear, Peer's neighbour drew out the bottle, managed to work the cork out, and offered him a drink. "Here's luck, sonny; do you good." No--Peer would rather not. Then followed a gurgling sound from the docker's bed, and soon he too was lying singing at the top of his voice.

At last one day Louise came. She was wearing her neat hat, and had a little bundle in her hand, and as she came in, looking round the room, the close air of the sick-ward seemed to turn her a little faint. But then she caught sight of Peer, and smiled, and came cautiously to him, holding out her hand. She was astonished to find him so changed. But as she sat down by his pillow she was still smiling, though her eyes were full of tears.

"So you've come at last, then?" said Peer.

"They wouldn't let me in before," she said with a sob. And then Peer learned that she had come there every single day, but only to be told that he was too ill to see visitors.

The man with the broken nose craned his head forward to get a better view of the modest young girl. And meanwhile she was pulling out of the bundle the offering she had brought--a bottle of lemonade and some oranges.

But it was a day or two later that something happened which Peer was often to remember in the days to come.

He had been dozing through the afternoon, and when he woke the lamp was lit, and a dull yellow half-light lay over the ward. The others seemed to be sleeping; all was very quiet, only the man with the sores was whimpering softly. Then the door opened, and Peer saw Louise glide in, softly and cautiously, with her violin-case under her arm. She did not come over to where her brother lay, but stood in the middle of the ward, and, taking out her violin, began to play the Easter hymn: "The mighty host in white array."*

* "Den store hvide Flok vi se."

The man with the sores ceased whimpering; the patients in the beds round about opened their eyes. The docker with the broken nose sat up in bed, and the cobbler, roused from his feverish dream, lifted himself on his elbow and whispered: "It is the Redeemer. I knew Thou wouldst come."

Then there was silence. Louise stood there with eyes fixed on her violin, playing her simple best. The consumptive raised his head and forgot to cough; the corporal slowly stiffened his body to attention; the commercial traveller folded his hands and stared before him. The simple tones of the hymn seemed to be giving new life to all these unfortunates; the light of it was in their faces. But to Peer, watching his sister as she stood there in the half-light, it seemed as if she grew to be one with the hymn itself, and that wings to soar were given her.

When she had finished, she came softly over to his bed, stroked his forehead with her swollen hand, then glided out and disappeared as silently as she had come.

For a long time all was silent in the dismal ward, until at last the dying cobbler murmured: "I thank Thee. I knew--I knew Thou wert not far away."

When Peer left the hospital, the doctor said he had better not begin work again at once; he should take a holiday in the country and pick up his strength. "Easy enough for you to talk," thought Peer, and a couple of days later he was at the workshop again.

But his ways with his sister were more considerate than before, and he searched about until he had found her a place as seamstress, and saved her from her heavy floor-scrubbing.

And soon Louise began to notice with delight that her hands were much less red and swollen than they had been; they were actually getting soft and pretty by degrees.

Next winter she sat at home in the evenings while he read, and made herself a dress and cloak and trimmed a new hat, so that Peer soon had quite an elegant young lady to walk out with. But when men turned round to look at her as she pa.s.sed, he would scowl and clench his fists. At last one day this was too much for Louise, and she rebelled. "Now, Peer, I tell you plainly I won't go out with you if you go on like that."

"All right, my girl," he growled. "I'll look after you, though, never fear. We're not going to have mother's story over again with you."

"Well, but, after all, I'm a grown-up-girl, and you can't prevent people looking at me, idiot!"

Klaus Brock had been entered at the Technical College that autumn, and went about now with the College badge in his cap, and sported a walking-stick and a cigarette. He had grown into a big, broad-shouldered fellow, and walked with a little swing in his step; a thick shock of black hair fell over his forehead, and he had a way of looking about him as if to say: "Anything the matter? All right, I'm ready!"

One evening he came in and asked Louise to go with him to the theatre.

The young girl blushed red with joy, and Peer could not refuse; but he was waiting for them outside the yard gate when they came back. On a Sunday soon after Klaus was there again, asking her to come out for a drive. This time she did not even look to Peer for leave, but said "yes"

at once. "Just you wait," said Peer to himself. And when she came back that evening he read her a terrific lecture.

Soon he could not help seeing that the girl was going about with half-shut eyes, dreaming dreams of which she would never speak to him. And as the days went on her hands grew whiter, and she moved more lightly, as if to the rhythm of unheard music. Always as she went about the room on her household tasks she was crooning some song; it seemed that there was some joy in her soul that must find an outlet.

One Sat.u.r.day in the late spring she had just come home, and was getting the supper, when Peer came tramping in, dressed in his best and carrying a parcel.

"Hi, girl! Here you are! We're going to have a rare old feast to-night."

"Why--what is it all about?"

"I've pa.s.sed my entrance exam for the Technical--hurrah! Next autumn--next autumn--I'll be a student!"

"Oh, splendid! I AM so glad!" And she dried her hand and grasped his.

"Here you are--sausages, anchovies--and here's a bottle of brandy--the first I ever bought in my life. Klaus is coming up later on to have a gla.s.s of toddy. And here's cheese. We'll make things hum to-night."

Klaus came, and the two youths drank toddy and smoked and made speeches, and Louise played patriotic songs on her violin, and Klaus gazed at her and asked for "more--more."

When he left, Peer went with him, and as the two walked down the street, Klaus took his friend's arm, and pointed to the pale moon riding high above the fjord, and vowed never to give him up, till he stood at the very top of the tree--never, never! Besides, he was a Socialist now, he said, and meant to raise a revolt against all cla.s.s distinctions. And Louise--Louise was the most glorious girl in all the world--and now--and now--Peer might just as well know it sooner as later--they were as good as engaged to be married, he and Louise.

Peer pushed him away, and stood staring at him. "Go home now, and go to bed," he said.

"Ha! You think I'm not man enough to defy my people--to defy the whole world!"

"Good-night," said Peer.

Next morning, as Louise lay in bed--she had asked to have her breakfast there for once in a way--she suddenly began to laugh. "What ARE you about now?" she asked teasingly.

"Shaving," said Peer, beginning operations.

"Shaving! Are you so desperate to be grand to-day that you must sc.r.a.pe all your skin off? You know there's nothing else to shave."

"You hold your tongue. Little do you know what I've got in front of me to-day."

"What can it be? You're not going courting an old widow with twelve children, are you?"

"If you want to know, I'm going to that schoolmaster fellow, and going to wring my savings-bank book out of him."

Louise sat up at this. "My great goodness!" she said.

Yes; he had been working himself up to this for a year or more, and now he was going to do it. To-day he would show what he was made of--whether he was a snivelling child, or a man that could stand up to any dressing-gown in the world. He was shaving for the first time--quite true. And the reason was that it was no ordinary day, but a great occasion.

His toilet over, he put on his best hat with a flourish, and set out.

Louise stayed at home all the morning, waiting for his return. And at last she heard him on the stairs.

"Puh!" he said, and stood still in the middle of the room.

"Well? Did you get it?"

He laughed, wiped his forehead, and drew a green-covered book from his coat-pocket. "Here we are, my girl--there's fifty crowns a month for three years. It's going to be a bit of a pinch, with fees and books, and living and clothes into the bargain. But we'll do it. Father was one of the right sort, I don't care what they say."