Chapter VII: Part III: A week passed in glory and gladness (2)

On the way over I got the money in readiness, held every farthing of it in my hand, bent down over the old woman's table as if I wanted something, clapped the money without further ado into her hands. I spoke not a word, turned on my heel, and went my way.

What a wonderful savour there was in feeling oneself an honest man once more! My empty pockets troubled me no longer; it was simply a delightful feeling to me to be cleaned out. When I weighed the whole matter thoroughly, this money had in reality cost me much secret anguish; I had really thought about it with dread and shuddering time upon time. I was no hardened soul; my honourable nature rebelled against such a low action. God be praised, I had raised myself in my own estimation again! "Do as I have done!" I said to myself, looking across the thronged market-place--"only just do as I have done!" I had gladdened a poor old cake vendor to such good purpose that she was perfectly dumbfounded. Tonight her children wouldn't go hungry to bed.... I buoyed myself up with these reflections and considered that I had behaved in a most exemplary manner. God be praised! The money was out of my hands now!

Tipsy and nervous, I wandered down the street, and swelled with satisfaction. The joy of being able to meet Ylajali cleanly and honourably, and of feeling I could look her in the face, ran away with me. I was not conscious of any pain. My head was clear and buoyant; it was as if it were a head of mere light that rested and gleamed on my shoulders. I felt inclined to play the wildest pranks, to do something astounding, to set the whole town in a ferment. All up through Graendsen I conducted myself like a madman. There was a buzzing in my ears, and intoxication ran riot in my brains. The whim seized me to go and tell my age to a commissionaire, who, by-the-way, had not addressed a word to me; to take hold of his hands, and gaze impressively in his face, and leave him again without any explanation. I distinguished every nuance in the voice and laughter of the passers-by, observed some little birds that hopped before me in the street, took to studying the expression of the paving-stones, and discovered all sorts of tokens and signs in them. Thus occupied, I arrive at length at Parliament Place. I stand all at once stock-still, and look at the droskes; the drivers are wandering about, chatting and laughing. The horses hang their heads and cower in the bitter weather. "Go ahead!" I say, giving myself a dig with my elbow. I went hurriedly over to the first vehicle, and got in. "Ullevoldsveien, No. 37," I called out, and we rolled off.

On the way the driver looked round, stooped and peeped several times into the trap, where I sat, sheltered underneath the hood. Had he, too, grown suspicious? There was no doubt of it; my miserable attire had attracted his attention.

"I want to meet a man," I called to him, in order to be beforehand with him, and I explained gravely that I must really meet this man. We stop outside 37, and I jump out, spring up the stairs right to the third storey, seize a bell, and pull it. It gives six or seven fearful peals inside.

A maid comes out and opens the door. I notice that she has round, gold drops in her ears, and black stuff buttons on her grey bodice. She looks at me with a frightened air.

I inquire for Kierulf--Joachim Kierulf, if I might add further--a wool-dealer; in short, not a man one could make a mistake about....

The girl shook her head. "No Kierulf lives here," said she.

She stared at me, and held the door ready to close it. She made no effort to find the man for me. She really looked as if she knew the person I inquired for, if she would only take the trouble to reflect a bit. The lazy jade! I got vexed, turned my back on her, and ran downstairs again.

"He wasn't there," I called to the driver.

"Wasn't he there?"

"No. Drive to Tomtegaden, No. 11." I was in a state of the most violent excitement, and imparted something of the same feeling to the driver. He evidently thought it was a matter of life and death, and he drove on, without further ado. He whipped up the horse sharply.

"What's the man's name?" he inquired, turning round on the box.

"Kierulf, a dealer in wool--Kierulf."

And the driver, too, thought this was a man one would not be likely to make any mistake about.

"Didn't he generally wear a light morning, coat?"

"What!" I cried; "a light morning-coat? Are you mad? Do you think it is a tea-cup I am inquiring about?" This light morning-coat came most inopportunely; it spoilt the whole man for me such as I had fancied him.

"What was it you said he was called?--Kierulf?"

"Of course," I replied. "Is there anything wonderful in that? The name doesn't disgrace any one."

"Hasn't he red hair?"

Well, it was quite possible that he had red hair, and now that the driver mentioned the matter, I was suddenly convinced that he was right. I felt grateful to the poor driver, and hastened to inform him that he had hit the man off to a T--he really was just as he described him,--and I remarked, in addition, that it would be a phenomenon to see such a man without red hair.

"It must be him I drove a couple of times," said the driver; "he had a knobbed stick."

This brought the man vividly before me, and I said, "Ha, ha! I suppose no one has ever yet seen the man without a knobbed stick in his hand, of that you can be certain, quite certain."

Yes, it was clear that it was the same man he had driven. He recognized him--and he drove so that the horse's shoes struck sparks as they touched the stones.

All through this phase of excitement I had not for one second lost my presence of mind. We pass a policeman, and I notice his number is 69. This number struck me with such vivid clearness that it penetrated like a splint into my brain--69--accurately 69. I wouldn't forget it.

I leant back in the vehicle, a prey to the wildest fancies; crouched under the hood so that no one could see me. I moved my lips and commenced to I talk idiotically to myself. Madness rages through my brain, and I let it rage. I am fully conscious that I am succumbing to influences over which I have no control. I begin to laugh, silently, passionately, without a trace of cause, still merry and intoxicated from the couple of glasses of ale I have drunk. Little by little my excitement abates, my calm returns more and more to me. I feel the cold in my sore finger, and I stick it down inside my collar to warm it a little. At length we reach Tomtegaden. The driver pulls up.

I alight, without any haste, absently, listlessly, with my head heavy. I go through a gateway and come into a yard across which I pass. I come to a door which I open and pass through; I find myself in a lobby, a sort of anteroom, with two windows. There are two boxes in it, one on top of the other, in one corner, and against the wall an old, painted sofa-bed over which a rug is spread. To the right, in the next room, I hear voices and the cry of a child, and above me, on the second floor, the sound of an iron plate being hammered. All this I notice the moment as I enter.

I step quietly across the room to the opposite door without any haste, without any thought of flight; open it, too, and come out in Vognmansgaden. I look up at the house through which I have passed. "Refreshment and lodgings for travellers."

It is not my intention to escape, to steal away from the driver who is waiting for me. I go very coolly down Vognmansgaden, without fear of being conscious of doing any wrong. Kierulf, this dealer in wool, who has spooked in my brain so long--this creature in whose existence I believe, and whom it was of vital importance that I should meet--had vanished from my memory; was wiped out with many other mad whims which came and went in turns. I recalled him no longer, except as a reminiscence--a phantom.

In measure, as I walked on, I become more and more sober; felt languid and weary, and dragged my legs after me. The snow still fell in great moist flakes. At last I reached Gronland; far out, near the church, I sat down to rest on a seat. All the passers-by looked at me with much astonishment. I fell a-thinking.

Thou good God, what a miserable plight I have come to! I was so heartily tired and weary of all my miserable life that I did not find it worth the trouble of fighting any longer to preserve it. Adversity had gained the upper hand; it had been too strong for me. I had become so strangely poverty-stricken and broken, a mere shadow of what I once had been; my shoulders were sunken right down on one side, and I had contracted a habit of stooping forward fearfully as I walked, in order to spare my chest what little I could. I had examined my body a few days ago, one noon up in my room, and I had stood and cried over it the whole time. I had worn the same shirt for many weeks, and it was quite stiff with stale sweat, and had chafed my skin. A little blood and water ran out of the sore place; it did not hurt much, but it was very tiresome to have this tender place in the middle of my stomach. I had no remedy for it, and it wouldn't heal of its own accord. I washed it, dried it carefully, and put on the same shirt. There was no help for it, it....

I sit there on the bench and ponder over all this, and am sad enough. I loathe myself. My very hands seem distasteful to me; the loose, almost coarse, expression of the backs of them pains me, disgusts me. I feel myself rudely affected by the sight of my lean fingers. I hate the whole of my gaunt, shrunken body, and shrink from bearing it, from feeling it envelop me. Lord, if the whole thing would come to an end now, I would heartily, gladly die!

Completely worsted, soiled, defiled, and debased in my own estimation, I rose mechanically and commenced to turn my steps homewards. On the way I passed a door, upon which the following was to be read on a plate--"Winding-sheets to be had at Miss Andersen's, door to the right." Old memories! I muttered, as my thoughts flew back to my former room in Hammersborg. The little rocking-chair, the newspapers near the door, the lighthouse director's announcement, and Fabian Olsen, the baker's new-baked bread. Ah yes; times were better with me then than now; one night I had written a tale for ten shillings, now I couldn't write anything. My head grew light as soon as ever I attempted it. Yes, I would put an end to it now; and I went on and on.

As I got nearer and nearer to the provision shop, I had the half-conscious feeling of approaching a danger, but I determined to stick to my purpose; I would give myself up. I ran quickly up the steps. At the door I met a little girl who was carrying a cup in her hands, and I slipped past her and opened the door. The shop boy and I stand face to face alone for the second time.

"Well!" he exclaims; "fearfully bad weather now, isn't it?" What did this going round the bush signify? Why didn't he seize me at once? I got furious, and cried:

"Oh, I haven't come to prate about the weather."

This violent preliminary takes him aback; his little huckster brain fails him. It has never even occurred to him that I have cheated him of five shillings.

"Don't you know, then, that I have swindled you?" I query impatiently, and I breathe quickly with the excitement; I tremble and am ready to use force if he doesn't come to the point.

But the poor man has no misgivings.

Well, bless my soul, what stupid creatures one has to mix with in this world! I abuse him, explain to him every detail as to how it had all happened, show him where the fact was accomplished, where the money had lain; how I had gathered it up in my hand and closed my fingers over it--and he takes it all in and does nothing. He shifts uneasily from one foot to the other, listens for footsteps in the next room, make signs to hush me, to try and make me speak lower, and says at last:

"It was a mean enough thing of you to do!"

"No; hold on," I explained in my desire to contradict him--to aggravate him. It wasn't quite so mean as he imagined it to be, in his huckster head. Naturally, I didn't keep the money; that could never have entered my head. I, for my part, scorned to derive any benefit from it--that was opposed to my thoroughly honest nature.

"What did you do with it, then?"

"I gave it away to a poor old woman--every farthing of it." He must understand that that was the sort of person I was; I didn't forget the poor so....

He stands and thinks over this a while, becomes manifestly very dubious as to how far I am an honest man or not. At last he says:

"Oughtn't you rather to have brought it back again?"

"Now, listen here," I reply; "I didn't want to get you into trouble in any way; but that is the thanks one gets for being generous. Here I stand and explain the whole thing to you, and you simply, instead of being ashamed as a dog, make no effort to settle the dispute with me. Therefore I wash my hands of you, and as for the rest, I say, 'The devil take you!' Good-day."

I left, slamming the door behind me. But when I got home to my room, into the melancholy hole, wet through from the soft snow, trembling in my knees from the day's wanderings, I dismounted instantly from my high horse, and sank together once more.

I regretted my attack upon the poor shop-boy, wept, clutched myself by the throat to punish myself for my miserable trick, and behaved like a lunatic. He had naturally been in the most deadly terror for the sake of his situation; he had not dared to make any fuss about the five shillings that were lost to the business, and I had taken advantage of his fear, had tortured him with my violent address, stabbed him with every loud word that I had roared out. And the master himself had perhaps been sitting inside the inner room, almost within an ace of feeling called upon to come out and inquire what was the row. No, there was no longer any limit to the low things I might be tempted to do.

Well, why hadn't I been locked up? then it would have come to an end. I would almost have stretched out my wrists for the handcuffs. I would not have offered the slightest resistance; on the contrary, I would have assisted them. Lord of Heaven and Earth! one day of my life for one happy second again! My whole life for a mess of lentils! Hear me only this once!...

I lay down in the wet clothes I had on, with a vague idea that I might die during the night. And I used my last strength to tidy up my bed a little, so that it might appear a little orderly about me in the morning. I folded my hands and chose my position.

All at once I remember Ylajali. To think that I could have forgotten her the entire evening through! And light forces its way ever so faintly into my spirit again--a little ray of sunshine that makes me so blessedly warm; and gradually more sun comes, a rare, silken, balmy light that caresses me with soothing loveliness. And the sun grows stronger and stronger, burns sharply in my temples, seethes fiercely and glowingly in my emaciated brain. And at last, a maddening pyre of rays flames up before my eyes; a heaven and earth in conflagration men and beasts of fire, mountains of fire, devils of fire, an abyss, a wilderness, a hurricane, a universe in brazen ignition, a smoking, smouldering day of doom!

And I saw and heard no more....

* * * * *

I woke in a sweat the next morning, moist all over, my whole body bathed in dampness. The fever had laid violent hands on me. At first I had no clear idea of what had happened to me; I looked about me in amazement, felt a complete transformation of my being, absolutely failed to recognize myself again. I felt along my own arms and down my legs, was struck with astonishment that the window was where it was, and not in the opposite wall; and I could hear the tramp of the horses' feet in the yard below as if it came from above me. I felt rather sick, too--qualmish.

My hair clung wet and cold about my forehead. I raised myself on my elbow and looked at the pillow; damp hair lay on it, too, in patches. My feet had swelled up in my shoes during the night, but they caused me no pain, only I could not move my toes much, they were too stiff.

As the afternoon closed in, and it had already begun to grow a little dusk, I got up out of bed and commenced to move about the room a little. I felt my way with short, careful steps, taking care to keep my balance and spare my feet as much as possible. I did not suffer much, and I did not cry; neither was I, taking all into consideration, sad. On the contrary, I was blissfully content. It did not strike me just then that anything could be otherwise than it was.

Then I went out.

The only thing that troubled me a little, in spite of the nausea that the thought of food inspired in me, was hunger. I commenced to be sensible of a shameless appetite again; a ravenous lust of food, which grew steadily worse and worse. It gnawed unmercifully in my breast; carrying on a silent, mysterious work in there. It was as if a score of diminutive gnome-like insects set their heads on one side and gnawed for a little, then laid their heads on the other side and gnawed a little more, then lay quite still for a moment's space, and then began afresh, boring noiselessly in, and without any haste, and left empty spaces everywhere after them as they went on....

I was not ill, but faint; I broke into a sweat. I thought of going to the market-place to rest a while, but the way was long and wearisome; at last I had almost reached it. I stood at the corner of the market and Market Street; the sweat ran down into my eyes and blinded me, and I had just stopped in order to wipe it away a little. I did not notice the place I was standing in; in fact, I did not think about it; the noise around me was something frightful.

Suddenly a call rings out, a cold, sharp warning. I hear this cry--hear it quite well, and I start nervously to one side, stepping as quickly as my bad foot allows me to. A monster of a bread-van brushes past me, and the wheel grazes my coat; I might perhaps have been a little quicker if I had exerted myself. Well, there was no help for it; one foot pained me, a couple of toes were crunched. I felt that they, as it were, curled up in my shoes.

The driver reins in his horse with all his might. He turns round on the van and inquires in a fright how it fares with me. Oh! it might have been worse, far worse.... It was perhaps not so dangerous.... I didn't think any bones were broken. Oh, pray....

I rushed over as quickly as I could to a seat; all these people who stopped and stared at me abashed me. After all, it was no mortal blow; comparatively speaking, I had got off luckily enough, as misfortune was bound to come in my way. The worst thing was that my shoe was crushed to pieces; the sole was torn loose at the toe. I help up my foot, and saw blood inside the gap. Well, it wasn't intentional on either side; it was not the man's purpose to make things worse for me than they were; he looked much concerned about it. It was quite certain that if I had begged him for a piece of bread out of his cart he would have given it to me. He would certainly have given it to me gladly. God bless him in return, wherever he is!...

I was terribly hungry, and I did not know what to do with myself and my shameless appetite. I writhed from side to side on the seat, and bowed my chest right down to my knees; I was almost distracted. When it got dark I jogged along to the Town Hall--God knows how I got there--and sat on the edge of the balustrade. I tore a pocket out of my coat and took to chewing it; not with any defined object, but with dour mien and unseeing eyes, staring straight into space. I could hear a group of little children playing around near me, and perceive, in an instinctive sort of way, some pedestrians pass me by; otherwise I observed nothing.

All at once, it enters my head to go to one of the meat bazaars underneath me, and beg a piece of raw meat. I go straight along the balustrade to the other side of the bazaar buildings, and descend the steps. When I had nearly reached the stalls on the lower floor, I called up the archway leading to the stairs, and made a threatening backward gesture, as if I were talking to a dog up there, and boldly addressed the first butcher I met.

"Ah, will you be kind enough to give me a bone for my dog?" I said; "only a bone. There needn't be anything on it; it's just to give him something to carry in his mouth."

I got the bone, a capital little bone, on which there still remained a morsel of meat, and hid it under my coat. I thanked the man so heartily that he looked at me in amazement.

"Oh, no need of thanks," said he.

"Oh yes; don't say that," I mumbled; "it is kindly done of you," and I ascended the steps again.

My heart was throbbing violently in my breast. I sneaked into one of the passages, where the forges are, as far in as I could go, and stopped outside a dilapidated door leading to a back-yard. There was no light to be seen anywhere, only blessed darkness all around me; and I began to gnaw at the bone.

It had no taste; a rank smell of blood oozed from it, and I was forced to vomit almost immediately. I tried anew. If I could only keep it down, it would, in spite of all, have some effect. It was simply a matter of forcing it to remain down there. But I vomited again. I grew wild, bit angrily into the meat, tore off a morsel, and gulped it down by sheer strength of will; and yet it was of no use. Just as soon as the little fragments of meat became warm in my stomach up they came again, worse luck. I clenched my hands in frenzy, burst into tears from sheer helplessness, and gnawed away as one possessed. I cried, so that the bone got wet and dirty with my tears, vomited, cursed and groaned again, cried as if my heart would break, and vomited anew. I consigned all the powers that be to the lowermost torture in the loudest voice.

Quiet--not a soul about--no light, no noise; I am in a state of the most fearful excitement; I breathe hardly and audibly, and I cry with gnashing teeth, each time that the morsel of meat, which might satisfy me a little, comes up. As I find that, in spite of all my efforts, it avails me naught, I cast the bone at the door. I am filled with the most impotent hate; shriek, and menace with my fists towards Heaven; yell God's name hoarsely, and bend my fingers like claws, with ill-suppressed fury....

I tell you, you Heaven's Holy Baal, you don't exist; but that, if you did, I would curse you so that your Heaven would quiver with the fire of hell! I tell you, I have offered you my service, and you repulsed me; and I turn my back on you for all eternity, because you did not know your time of visitation! I tell you that I am about to die, and yet I mock you! You Heaven God and Apis! with death staring me in the face--I tell you, I would rather be a bondsman in hell than a freedman in your mansions! I tell you, I am filled with a blissful contempt for your divine paltriness; and I choose the abyss of destruction for a perpetual resort, where the devils Judas and Pharaoh are cast down!

I tell you your Heaven is full of the kingdom of the earth's most crass-headed idiots and poverty-stricken in spirit! I tell you, you have filled your Heaven with the grossest and most cherished harlots from here below, who have bent their knees piteously before you at their hour of death! I tell you, you have used force against me, and you know not, you omniscient nullity, that I never bend in opposition! I tell you, all my life, every cell in my body, every power of my soul, gasps to mock you--you Gracious Monster on High. I tell you, I would, if I could, breathe it into every human soul, every flower, every leaf, every dewdrop in the garden! I tell you, I would scoff you on the day of doom, and curse the teeth out of my mouth for the sake of your Deity's boundless miserableness! I tell you from this hour I renounce all thy works and all thy pomps! I will execrate my thought if it dwell on you again, and tear out my lips if they ever utter your name! I tell you, if you exist, my last word in life or in death--I bid you farewell, for all time and eternity--I bid you farewell with heart and reins. I bid you the last irrevocable farewell, and I am silent, and turn my back on you and go my way.... Quiet.

I tremble with excitement and exhaustion, and stand on the same spot, still whispering oaths and abusive epithets, hiccoughing after the violent crying fit, broken down and apathetic after my frenzied outburst of rage. I stand there for maybe an hour, hiccough and whisper, and hold on to the door. Then I hear voices--a conversation between two men who are coming down the passage. I slink away from the door, drag myself along the walls of the houses, and come out again into the light streets. As I jog along Young's Hill my brain begins to work in a most peculiar direction. It occurs to me that the wretched hovels down at the corner of the market-place, the stores for loose materials, the old booths for second-hand clothes, are really a disgrace to the place--they spoilt the whole appearance of the market, and were a blot on the town, Fie! away with the rubbish! And I turned over in my mind as I walked on what it would cost to remove the Geographical Survey down there--that handsome building which had always attracted me so much each time I passed it. It would perhaps not be possible to undertake a removal of that kind under two or three hundred pounds. A pretty sum--three hundred pounds! One must admit, a tidy enough little sum for pocket-money! Ha, ha! just to make a start with, eh? and I nodded my head, and conceded that it was a tidy enough bit of pocket-money to make a start with. I was still trembling over my whole body, and hiccoughed now and then violently after my cry. I had a feeling that there was not much life left in me--that I was really singing my last verse. It was almost a matter of indifference to me; it did not trouble me in the least. On the contrary, I wended my way down town, down to the wharf, farther and farther away from my room. I would, for that matter, have willingly laid myself down flat in the street to die. My sufferings were rendering me more and more callous. My sore foot throbbed violently; I had a sensation as if the pain was creeping up through my whole leg. But not even that caused me any particular distress. I had endured worse sensations.

In this manner, I reached the railway wharf. There was no traffic, no noise--only here and there a person to be seen, a labourer or sailor slinking round with their hands in their pockets. I took notice of a lame man, who looked sharply at me as we passed one another. I stopped him instinctively, touched my hat, and inquired if he knew if the Nun had sailed. Someway, I couldn't help snapping my fingers right under the man's nose, and saying, "Ay, by Jove, the _Nun_; yes, the _Nun_!" which I had totally forgotten. All the same, the thought of her had been smouldering in me. I had carried it about unconsciously.

Yes, bless me, the Nun had sailed.

He couldn't tell me where she had sailed to?

The man reflects, stands on his long leg, keeps the other up in the air; it dangles a little.

"No," he replies. "Do you know what cargo she was taking in here?"

"No," I answer. But by this time I had already lost interest in the _Nun_, and I asked the man how far it might be to Holmestrand, reckoned in good old geographical miles.

"To Holmestrand? I should think..."

"Or to Voeblungsnaess?"

"What was I going to say? I should think to Holmestrand..."

"Oh, never mind; I have just remembered it," I interrupted him again. "You wouldn't perhaps be so kind as to give me a small bit of tobacco--only just a tiny scrap?"

I received the tobacco, thanked the man heartily, and went on. I made no use of the tobacco; I put it into my pocket. He still kept his eye on me--perhaps I had aroused his suspicions in some other way or another. Whether I stood still or walked on, I felt his suspicious look following me. I had no mind to be persecuted by this creature. I turn round, and, dragging myself back to him, say:

"Binder"--only this one word, "Binder!" no more. I looked fixedly at him as I say it, indeed I was conscious of staring fearfully at him. It was as if I saw him with my entire body instead of only with my eyes. I stare for a while after I give utterance to this word, and then I jog along again to the railway square. The man does not utter a syllable, he only keeps his gaze fixed upon me.

"Binder!" I stood suddenly still. Yes, wasn't that just what I had a feeling of the moment I met the old chap; a feeling that I had met him before! One bright morning up in Graendsen, when I pawned my waistcoat. It seemed to me an eternity since that day.

Whilst I stand and ponder over this, I lean and support myself against a house wall at the corner of the railway square and Harbour Street. Suddenly, I start quickly and make an effort to crawl away. As I do not succeed in it, I stare case-hardened ahead of me and fling all shame to the winds. There is no help for it. I am standing face to face with the "Commandor." I get devil-may-care--brazen. I take yet a step farther from the wall in order to make him notice me. I do not do it to awake his compassion, but to mortify myself, place myself, as it were, on the pillory. I could have flung myself down in the street and begged him to walk over me, tread on my face. I don't even bid him good-evening.

Perhaps the "Commandor" guesses that something is amiss with me. He slackens his pace a little, and I say, in order to stop him, "I would have called upon you long ago with something, but nothing has come yet!"

"Indeed?" he replies in an interrogative tone. "You haven't got it finished, then?"

"No, it didn't get finished."

My eyes by this time are filled with tears at his friendliness, and I cough with a bitter effort to regain my composure. The "Commandor" tweaks his nose and looks at me.

"Have you anything to live on in the meantime?" he questions.

"No," I reply. "I haven't that either; I haven't eaten anything today, but...."

"The Lord preserve you, man, it will never do for you to go and starve yourself to death," he exclaims, feeling in his pocket.

This causes a feeling of shame to awake in me, and I stagger over to the wall and hold on to it. I see him finger in his purse, and he hands me half-a-sovereign.

He makes no fuss about it, simply gives me half-a-sovereign, reiterating at the same time that it would never do to let me starve to death. I stammered an objection and did not take it all at once. It is shameful of me to ... it was really too much....

"Hurry up," he says, looking at his watch. "I have been waiting for the train; I hear it coming now."

I took the money; I was dumb with joy, and never said a word; I didn't even thank him once.

"It isn't worth while feeling put out about it," said the "Commandor" at last. "I know you can write for it."

And so off he went.

When he had gone a few steps, I remembered all at once that I had not thanked him for this great assistance. I tried to overtake him, but could not get on quickly enough; my legs failed me, and I came near tumbling on my face. He went farther and farther away from me. I gave up the attempt; thought of calling after him, but dared not; and when after all I did muster up courage enough and called once or twice, he was already at too great a distance, and my voice had become too weak.

I was left standing on the pavement, gazing after him. I wept quietly and silently. "I never saw the like!" I said to myself. "He gave me half-a-sovereign." I walked back and placed myself where he had stood, imitated all his movements held the half-sovereign up to my moistened eyes, inspected it on both sides, and began to swear--to swear at the top of my voice, that there was no manner of doubt that what I held in my hand was half-a-sovereign. An hour after, maybe--a very long hour, for it had grown very silent all around me--I stood, singularly enough, outside No. 11 Tomtegaden. After I had stood and collected my wits for a moment and wondered thereat, I went through the door for the second time, right into the "Entertainment and lodgings for travellers." Here I asked for shelter and was immediately supplied with a bed.

* * * * *

Tuesday.

Sunshine and quiet--a strangely bright day. The snow had disappeared. There was life and joy, and glad faces, smiles, and laughter everywhere. The fountains threw up sprays of water in jets, golden-tinted from the sun-light, azure from the sky....

At noon I left my lodgings in Tomtegaden, where I still lived and found fairly comfortable, and set out for town. I was in the merriest humour, and lazied about the whole afternoon through the most frequented streets and looked at the people. Even before seven o'clock I took a turn up St. Olav's Place and took a furtive look up at the window of No. 2. In an hour I would see her. I went about the whole time in a state of tremulous, delicious dread. What would happen? What should I say when she came down the stairs? Good-evening? or only smile? I concluded to let it rest with the smile. Of course I would bow profoundly to her.

I stole away, a little ashamed to be there so early, wandered up Carl Johann for a while, and kept my eyes on University Street. When the clocks struck eight I walked once more towards St. Olav's Place. On the way it struck me that perhaps I might arrive a few minutes too late, and I quickened my pace as much as I could. My foot was very sore, otherwise nothing ailed me.

I took up my place at the fountain and drew breath. I stood there a long while and gazed up at the window of No. 2, but she did not come. Well, I would wait; I was in no hurry. She might be delayed, and I waited on. It couldn't well be that I had dreamt the whole thing! Had my first meeting with her only existed in imagination the night I lay in delirium? I began in perplexity to think over it, and wasn't at all sure.

"Hem!" came from behind me. I heard this, and I also heard light steps near me, but I did not turn round, I only stared up at the wide staircase before me.

"Good-evening," came then. I forget to smile; I don't even take off my hat at first, I am so taken aback to see her come this way.

"Have you been waiting long?" she asks. She is breathing a little quickly after her walk.

"No, not at all; I only came a little while ago," I reply. "And besides, would it matter if I had waited long? I expected, by-the-way, that you would come from another direction."

"I accompanied mamma to some people. Mamma is spending the evening with them."

"Oh, indeed," I say.

We had begun to walk on involuntarily. A policeman is standing at the corner, looking at us.

"But, after all, where are we going to?" she asks, and stops.

"Wherever you wish; only where _you_ wish."

"Ugh, yes! but it's such a bore to have to decide oneself."

A pause.

Then I say, merely for the sake of saying something:

"I see it's dark up in your windows."

"Yes, it is," she replies gaily; "the servant has an evening off, too, so I am all alone at home."

We both stand and look up at the windows of No. 2 as if neither of us had seen them before.

"Can't we go up to your place, then?" I say; "I shall sit down at the door the whole time if you like."

But then I trembled with emotion, and regretted greatly that I had perhaps been too forward. Supposing she were to get angry, and leave me. Suppose I were never to see her again. Ah, that miserable attire of mine! I waited despairingly for her reply.

"You shall certainly not sit down by the door," she says. She says it right down tenderly, and says accurately these words: "You shall certainly not sit down by the door."

We went up.

Out on the lobby, where it was dark, she took hold of my hand, and led me on. There was no necessity for my being so quiet, she said, I could very well talk. We entered. Whilst she lit the candle--it was not a lamp she lit, but a candle--whilst she lit the candle, she said, with a little laugh:

"But now you mustn't look at me. Ugh! I am so ashamed, but I will never do it again."

"What will you never do again?"

"I will never ... ugh ... no ... good gracious ... I will never kiss you again!"

"Won't you?" I said, and we both laughed. I stretched out my arms to her, and she glided away; slipped round to the other side of the table. We stood a while and gazed at one another; the candle stood right between us.

"Try and catch me," she said; and with much laughter I tried to seize hold of her. Whilst she sprang about, she loosened her veil, and took off her hat; her sparkling eyes hung on mine, and watched my movements. I made a fresh sortie, and tripped on the carpet and fell, my sore foot refusing to bear me up any longer. I rose in extreme confusion.

"Lord, how red you did get!" she said. "Well it was awfully awkward of you."

"Yes, it was," I agreed, and we began the chase afresh.

"It seems to me you limp."

"Yes; perhaps I do--just a little--only just a little, for that matter."

"Last time you had a sore finger, now you have got a sore foot; it is awful the number of afflictions you have."

"Ah, yes. I was run over slightly, a few days ago."

"Run over! Tipsy again? Why, good heavens! what a life you lead, young man!" and she threatened me with her forefinger, and tried to appear grave. "Well, let us sit down, then; no, not down there by the door; you are far too reserved! Come here--you there, and I here--so, that's it ... ugh, it's such a bore with reticent people! One has to say and do everything oneself; one gets no help to do anything. Now, for example, you might just as well put your arm over the back of my chair; you could easily have thought of that much out of your own head, couldn't you? But if I say anything like that, you open your eyes as wide as if you couldn't believe what was being said. Yes, it is really true; I have noticed it several times; you are doing it now, too; but you needn't try to persuade me that you are always so modest; it is only when you don't dare to be otherwise than quiet. You were daring enough the day you were tipsy--when you followed me straight home and worried me with your witticisms. 'You are losing your book, madam; you are quite certainly losing your book, madam!' Ha, ha, ha! it was really shameless of you."

I sat dejectedly and looked at her; my heart beat violently, my blood raced quickly through my veins, there was a singular sense of enjoyment in it!

"Why don't you say something?"

"What a darling you are," I cried. "I am simply sitting here getting thoroughly fascinated by you--here this very moment thoroughly fascinated.... There is no help for it.... You are the most extraordinary creature that ... sometimes your eyes gleam so, that I never saw their match; they look like flowers ... eh? No, well, no, perhaps, not like flowers, either, but ... I am so desperately in love with you, and it is so preposterous ... for, great Scott! there is naturally not an atom of a chance for me.... What is your name? Now, you really must tell me what you are called."

"No; what is _your_ name? Gracious, I was nearly forgetting that again! I thought about it all yesterday, that I meant to ask you--yes, that is to say, not _all_ yesterday, but--"

"Do you know what I named you? I named you Ylajali. How do you like that? It has a gliding sound...."

"Ylajali?"

"Yes."

"Is that a foreign language?"

"Humph--no, it isn't that either!"

"Well, it isn't ugly!"

After a long discussion we told one another our names. She seated herself close to my side on the sofa, and shoved the chair away with her foot, and we began to chatter afresh.

"You are shaved this evening, too," she said; look on the whole a little better than the last time--that is to say, only just a scrap better. Don't imagine ... no; the last time you were really shabby, and you had a dirty rag round your finger into the bargain; and in that state you absolutely wanted me to go to some place, and take wine with you--thanks, not me!"

"So it was, after all, because of my miserable appearance that you would not go with me?" I said.

"No," she replied and looked down. "No; God knows it wasn't. I didn't even think about it."

"Listen," said I; "you are evidently sitting here labouring under the delusion that I can dress and live exactly as I choose, aren't you? And that is just what I can't do; I am very, very poor."

She looked at me. "Are you?" she queried.

"Yes, worse luck, I am."

After an interval.

"Well, gracious, so am I, too," she said, with a cheerful movement of her head.

Every one of her words intoxicated me, fell on my heart like drops of wine. She enchanted me with the trick she had of putting her head a little on one side, and listening when I said anything, and I could feel her breath brush my face.

"Do you know," I said, "that ... but, now, you mustn't get angry--when I went to bed last night I settled this arm for you ... so ... as if you lay on it ... and then I went to sleep."

"Did you? That was lovely!" A pause. "But of course it could only be from a distance that you would venture to do such a thing, for otherwise...."

"Don't you believe I could do it otherwise?"

"No, I don't believe it."

"Ah, from me you may expect everything," I said, and I put my arm around her waist.

"Can I?" was all she said.

It annoyed me, almost wounded me, that she should look upon me as being so utterly inoffensive. I braced myself up, steeled my heart, and seized her hand; but she withdrew it softly, and moved a little away from me. That just put an end to my courage again; I felt ashamed, and looked out through the window. I was, in spite of all, in far too wretched a condition; I must, above all, not try to imagine myself any one in particular. It would have been another matter if I had met her during the time that I still looked like a respectable human being--in my old, well-off days when I had sufficient to make an appearance; and I felt fearfully downcast!

"There now, one can see!" she said, "now one can just see one can snub you with just the tiniest frown--make you look sheepish by just moving a little away from you" ... she laughed, tantalizingly, roguishly, with tightly-closed eyes, as if she could not stand being looked at, either.

"Well, upon my soul!" I blurted out, "now you shall just see," and I flung my arms violently around her shoulders. I was mortified. Was the girl out of her senses? Did she think I was totally inexperienced! Ha! Then I would, by the living.... No one should say of me that I was backward on that score. The creature was possessed by the devil himself! If it were only a matter of going at it, well....

She sat quite quietly, and still kept her eyes closed; neither of us spoke. I crushed her fiercely to me, pressed her body greedily against my breast, and she spoke never a word. I heard her heart's beat, both hers and mine; they sounded like hurrying hoofbeats.

I kissed her.

I no longer knew myself. I uttered some nonsense, that she laughed at, whispered pet names into her mouth, caressed her cheek, kissed her many times....

She winds her arms about my neck, quite slowly, tenderly, the breath of her pink quivering nostrils fans me right in the face; she strokes down my shoulders with her left hand, and says, "What a lot of loose hair there is."

"Yes," I reply.

"What can be the reason that your hair falls out so?"

"Don't know."

"Ah, of course, because you drink too much, and perhaps ... fie, I won't say it. You ought to be ashamed. No, I wouldn't have believed that of you! To think that you, who are so young, already should lose your hair! Now, do please just tell me what sort of way you really spend your life--I am certain it is dreadful! But only the truth, do you hear; no evasions. Anyway, I shall see by you if you hide anything--there, tell now!"

"Yes; but let me kiss you first, then."

"Are you mad?... Humph, ... I want to hear what kind of a man you are.... Ah, I am sure it is dreadful."

It hurt me that she should believe the worst of me; I was afraid of thrusting her away entirely, and I could not endure the misgivings she had as to my way of life. I would clear myself in her eyes, make myself worthy of her, show her that she was sitting at the side of a person almost angelically disposed. Why, bless me, I could count my falls up to date on my fingers. I related--related all--and I only related truth. I made out nothing any worse than it was; it was not my intention to rouse her compassion. I told her also that I had stolen five shillings one evening.

She sat and listened, with open mouth, pale, frightened, her shining eyes completely bewildered. I desired to make it good again, to disperse the sad impression I had made, and I pulled myself up.

"Well, it is all over now!" I said; "there can be no talk of such a thing happening again; I am saved now...."

But she was much dispirited. "The Lord preserve me!" was all she said, then kept silent. She repeated this at short intervals, and kept silent after each "the Lord preserve me."

I began to jest, caught hold of her, tried to tickle her, lifted her up to my breast. I was irritated not a little--indeed, downright hurt. Was I more unworthy in her eyes now, than if I had myself been instrumental in causing the falling out of my hair? Would she have thought more of me if I had made myself out to be a _roué_?... No nonsense now;... it was just a matter of going at it; and if it was only just a matter of going at it, so, by the living...

"No;... what do you want?" she queried, and she added these distressing words, "I can't be sure that you are not insane!"

I checked myself involuntarily, and I said: "You don't mean that!"

"Indeed, God knows I do! you look so strangely. And the forenoon you followed me--after all, you weren't tipsy that time?"

"No; but I wasn't hungry then, either; I had just eaten...."

"Yes; but that made it so much the worse."

"Would you rather I had been tipsy?"

"Yes ... ugh ... I am afraid of you! Lord, can't you let me be now!"

I considered a moment. No, I couldn't let her be.... I happened, as if inadvertently, to knock over the light, so that it went out. She made a despairing struggle--gave vent at last to a little whimper.

"No, not that! If you like, you may rather kiss me, oh, dear, kind...."

I stopped instantly. Her words sounded so terrified, so helpless, I was struck to the heart. She meant to offer me a compensation by giving me leave to kiss her! How charming, how charmingly naïve. I could have fallen down and knelt before her.

"But, dear pretty one," I said, completely bewildered, "I don't understand.... I really can't conceive what sort of a game this is...."

She rose, lit the candle again with trembling hands. I leant back on the sofa and did nothing. What would happen now? I was in reality very ill at ease.

She cast a look over at the clock on the wall, and started.