Chapter IV: Daybreak (7)

The house was thus transformed into a nursing home. It was a hard hit at their careless happiness, but they took it as it came. Neither of them demanded more of life than it was capable of.

Ellen was with the sick girl day and night until the worst was over; she neglected both Pelle and the children to give all her care to Johanna.

“You’ve got far too much to do,” said Pelle anxiously. “It’ll end in your being ill too. Do let us have help!” And as Ellen would not hear of it, he took the matter into his own hands, and got “Queen Theresa” to be out there during the day.

In the course of a few days Morten arranged his affairs, got rid of his flat, and moved out to them. “You won’t be able to run away from me, after all,” he said to Johanna, who was sitting up in bed listening to the carrying upstairs of his things. “When you’re well enough you shall be moved up into the big attic; and then we two shall live upstairs and be jolly again, won’t we?”

She made no answer, but flushed with pleasure.

Ellen now received from Morten the amount he usually spent in a month on food and house-rent. She was quite disconcerted. What was she to do with all that money? It was far too much! Well, they need no longer be anxious about their rent.

Johanna was soon so far recovered as to be able to get up for a little. The country air had a beneficial effect upon her nerves, and Ellen knew how to keep her in good spirits. Old Brun made her a present of a beautiful red and yellow reclining chair of basket work; and when the sun shone she was carried out onto the grass, where she lay and watched the children’s play, sometimes joining in the game from her chair, and ordering them hither and thither. Boy Comfort submitted to it good- naturedly, but Sister was a little more reserved. She did not like this stranger to call Pelle “father”; and when she was in a teasing mood she would stand a little way off and repeat again and again: “He’s not your father, for he’s mine!” until Ellen took her away.

Johanna mostly lay, however, gazing into space with an expression of the utmost weariness. For a moment her attention would be attracted by anything new, but then her eyes wandered away again. She was never well enough to walk about; even when she felt well, her legs would not support her. Brun came out to “Daybreak” every afternoon to see her. The old man was deeply affected by her sad fate, and had given up his usual holiday trip in order to keep himself acquainted with her condition. “We must do something for her,” he said to the doctor, who paid a daily visit at his request. “Is there nothing that can be done?”

The doctor shook his head. “She couldn’t be better off anywhere than she is here,” he said.

They were all fond of her, and did what they could to please her. Brun always brought something with him, expensive things, such as beautiful silk blankets that she could have over her when she lay out in the garden, and a splendid coral necklace. He got her everything that he could imagine she would like. Her eyes sparkled whenever she received anything new, and she put everything on. “Now I’m a princess in all her finery,” she whispered, smiling at him; but a moment after she had forgotten all about it. She was very fond of the old man, made him sit beside her, and called him “grandfather” with a mournful attempt at roguishness. She did not listen to what he told her, however, and when the little ones crept up and wanted him to come with them to play in the field, he could quite well go, for she did not notice it.

Alas! nothing could reconcile her child’s soul to her poor, maltreated body, neither love nor trinkets. It was as though it were weary of its covering and had soared as far out as possible, held captive by a thin thread that would easily wear through. She grew more transparent every day; it could be clearly seen now that she had the other children beside her. They ate and throve for her as well as themselves! When Ellen was not on the watch, Boy Comfort would come and eat up Johanna’s invalid food, though goodness knew he wasn’t starved! Johanna herself looked on calmly; it was all a matter of such indifference to her.

It was an unusually fine summer, dry and sunny, and they could nearly always be in the garden. They generally gathered there toward evening; Ellen and “Queen Theresa” had finished their house work, and sat by Johanna with their sewing, Brun kept them company with his cheerful talk, and Johanna lay and dozed with her face toward the garden gate. They laughed and joked with her to keep her in good spirits. Brun had promised her a trip to the South if she would make haste to use her legs, and told her about the sun down there and the delicious grapes and oranges that she would be allowed to pick herself. She answered everything with her sad smile, as though she knew all too well what awaited her. Her thick, dark hair overshadowed more and more her pale face; it was as if night were closing over her. She seemed to be dozing slowly out of existence, with her large eyes turned toward the garden gate.

Morten was often away on lecturing tours, sometimes for several days at a time. When at last he entered the gate, life flashed into her face. He was the only one who could recall her spirit to its surroundings; it was as though it only lingered on for him. She was no longer capricious with him. When she had the strength for it, she sat up and threw her arms round his neck; her tears flowed silently, and her longing found free vent. Ellen understood the child’s feelings, and signed to the others to leave the two together. Morten would then sit for hours beside her, telling her all that he had been doing; she never seemed to grow weary, but lay and listened to him with shining eyes, her transparent hand resting upon his arm. Every step he took interested her; sometimes a peculiar expression came into her eyes, and she fell suspiciously upon some detail or other. Her senses were morbidly keen; the very scent of strange people about him made her sullen and suspicious.

“The poor, poor child! She loves him!” said Ellen one day to Pelle, and suddenly burst into tears. “And there she lies dying!” Her own happiness made her so fully conscious of the child’s condition.

“But dearest Ellen!” exclaimed Pelle in protest. “Don’t you think I can see? That’s of course why she’s always been so strange to him. How sad it is!”

The child’s sad fate cast a shadow over the others, but the sun rose high in the heavens and became still stronger.

“Pelle,” said Ellen, stroking his hair, “the light nights will soon be over!”

Morten continued obstinately to believe that little Johanna would recover, but every one else could see distinctly what the end was to be. Her life oozed away with the departing summer. She became gentler and more manageable every day. The hatred in her was extinguished; she accepted all their kindness with a tired smile. Through her spoiled being there radiated a strange charm, bearing the stamp of death, which seemed to unfold itself the more as she drew nearer to the grave.

Later in the autumn her nature changed. Suddenly, when Pelle or Morten approached, her eyes would fill with horror and she would open her mouth to cry out; but when she recognized them, she nestled down in their arms, crying pitifully. She could no longer go into the garden, but always kept her bed. She could not bear the noise of the children; it tortured her and carried her thoughts back to the narrow streets: they had to keep out of doors all day. Delirious attacks became more frequent, and her thin, languid voice became once more rough and hoarse. She lay fighting with boys and roughs and high hats, defended herself with nicknames and abusive epithets, and snarled at every one, until she at last gave in and asked for brandy, and lay crying softly to herself. Old Brun never dared show himself at her bedside; she took him for an old chamberlain that the street-boys had set onto her, and received him with coarse demands.

This insight into the child’s terrible existence among the timber-stacks affected them all. It seemed as if the malignity of life would not relax its hold on this innocent victim, but would persecute her as long as life remained, and made all their love useless. Morten stayed with her during the days in which she fought her battle with death; he sat watching her from a corner, only venturing nearer when she dozed. Ellen was the only one who had the strength to meet it. She was with Johanna night and day, and tried to make death easier for her by her unwearying care; and when the fits came over the child, she held her in her arms and sought to calm her with a mother’s love.

She had never been in a death-chamber before, but did not quail; and the child died upon her breast.

Johanna’s death had completely paralyzed Morten. As long as he possibly could he had clung to the belief that her life might be saved; if not, it would be so unreasonably unjust; and when her hopeless condition became apparent to him, he collapsed. He did nothing, but wandered about dully, spoke to no one and ate very little. It was as though he had received a blow on the head from a heavy hand.

After the funeral he and Pelle walked home together while the others drove. Pelle talked of indifferent matters in order to draw Morten’s thoughts away from the child, but Morten did not listen to him.

“My dear fellow, you can’t go on like this,” said Pelle suddenly, putting his arm through Morten’s. “You’ve accompanied the poor child along the road as far as you could, and the living have some claim on you too.”

Morten raised his head. “What does it matter whether I write a few pages more or less?” he said wearily.

“Your pen was given you to defend the defenceless with; you mustn’t give up,” said Pelle.

Morten laughed bitterly. “And haven’t I pleaded the cause of the children as well as I could, and been innocent enough to believe that there, at any rate, it was only necessary to open people’s eyes in order to touch their hearts? And what has been gained? The addition, at the most, of one more volume to the so-called good literature. Men are practical beings; you can with the greatest ease get them to shed theater tears; they’re quite fond of sitting in the stalls and weeping with the unfortunate man; but woe to him if they meet him again in the street! The warmest words that have ever been spoken to me about my descriptions of children were from an old gentleman whom I afterward found to be trying to get hold of little children.”

“But what are you going to do?” said Pelle, looking at him with concern.

“Yes, what am I going to do—tell me that! You’re right in saying I’m indifferent, but can one go on taking part in a battle that doesn’t even spare the children? Do you remember my little sister Karen, who had to drown herself? How many thousand children are there not standing behind her and Johanna! They call this the children’s century, and the children’s blood is crying out from the earth! They’re happy when they can steal away. Fancy if Johanna had lived on with her burden! The shadows of childhood stretch over the whole of life.”

“Yes, and so does the sunshine of childhood!” exclaimed Pelle. “That’s why we mustn’t fail the poor little ones. We shall need a race with warm hearts.”

“That’s just what I’ve thought,” said Morten sadly. “Do you know, Pelle, I _loved_ that child who came to me from the very lowest depth. She was everything to me; misery has never come so cruelly near to me before. It was a beautiful dream of mine—a foolish dream—that she would live. I was going to coax life and happiness into her again, and then I would have written a book about all that triumphs. I don’t know whether you understand me—about misery that becomes health and happiness beneath the sunshine of kindness. She was that; life could hardly be brought lower! But did you notice how much beauty and delicacy there was after all buried beneath the sewer-mud in her? I had looked forward to bringing it out, freed from all want and ugliness, and showing the world how beautiful we are down here when the mud is scraped off us. Perhaps it might have induced them to act justly. That’s what I dreamed, but it’s a bitter lot to have the unfortunates appointed to be one’s beloved. My only love is irretrievably dead, and now I cannot write about anything that triumphs. What have I to do with that?”

“I think it’s Victor Hugo who says that the heart is the only bird that carries its cage,” said Pelle, “but your heart refuses to take it when there is most use for it.”

“Oh, no!” said Morten with a little more energy. “I shan’t desert you; but this has been a hard blow for me. If only I had a little more of your clear faith! Well, I must be glad that I have you yourself,” he added, holding out his hand to Pelle with a bright smile.

The librarian came across the fields to meet them. “It’s taken you two Dioseuri a long time,” he said, looking at them attentively. “Ellen’s waiting with the dinner.”

The three men walked together up the bare stubblefield toward the house. “The best of the summer’s over now,” said Brun, looking about with a sigh. “The wheel has turned on one more cog!”

“Death isn’t the worst thing that can happen to one,” answered Morten, who was still in a morbid mood.

“That’s the sort of thing one says while one’s young and prosperous—and doesn’t mean seriously. To-morrow life will have taken you and your sorrow into its service again. But I have never been young until now that I’ve learned to know you two, so I count every fleeting hour like a miser—and envy you who can walk so quickly,” he added with a smile.

They walked up more slowly, and as they followed the hedge up toward the house they heard a faint whimpering in the garden. In a hole in an empty bed, which the two children had dug with their spades, sat Boy Comfort, and Sister was busy covering him with earth; it was already up to his neck. He was making no resistance, but only whimpered a little when the mould began to get near his mouth.

Pelle gave the alarm and leaped the hedge, and Ellen at the same moment came running out. “You might have suffocated little brother!” she said with consternation, taking the boy in her arms.

“I was only planting him,” said Anna, offended at having her work destroyed. “He wanted to be, and of course he’d come up again in the spring!” The two children wanted a little brother, and had agreed that Boy Comfort should sacrifice himself.

“You mustn’t do such things,” said Ellen quietly. “You’ll get a little brother in the spring anyhow.” And she looked at Pelle with a loving glance.

XV

Work went on steadily in the cooperative works. It made no great stir; in the Movement they had almost forgotten that it existed at all. It was a long and difficult road that Pelle had set out on, but he did not for a moment doubt that it led to the end he had in view, and he set about it seriously. Never had his respiration been so slow.

At present he was gaining experience. He and Peter Dreyer had trained a staff of good workmen, who knew what was at stake, and did not allow themselves to be upset even if a foreign element entered. The business increased steadily and required new men; but Pelle had no difficulty with the new forces; the undertaking was so strong that it swallowed them and remodelled them.

The manufacturers at any rate remembered his existence, and tried to injure him at every opportunity. This pleased him, for it established the fact that he was a danger to them. Through their connections they closed credit, and when this did not lead to anything, because he had Brun’s fortune to back him up, they boycotted him with regard to materials by forcing the leather-merchants not to sell to him. He then had to import his materials from abroad. It gave him a little extra trouble, and now it was necessary to have everything in order, so that they should not come to a standstill for want of anything.

One day an article was lacking in a new consignment, and the whole thing was about to come to a standstill. He managed to obtain it by stratagem, but he was angry. “I should like to hit those leather-merchants back,” he said to Brun. “If we happen to be in want of anything, we’re obliged to get it by cunning. Don’t you think we might take the shop next door, and set up a leather business? It would be a blow to the others, and then we should always have what we want to use. We shouldn’t get rich on it, so I think the small masters in out-of-the-way corners would be glad to have us.”

Brun had no objection to making a little more war to the knife. There was too little happening for his taste!

The new business opened in October. Pelle would have had Peter Dreyer to be at the head of it, but he refused. “I’m sure I’m not suited for buying and selling,” he said gloomily, so Pelle took one of the young workmen from the workshop into the business, and kept an eye upon it himself.

It at once put a little more life into things; there was always plenty of material. They now produced much more than they were able to sell in the shop, and Pelle’s leather shop made the small masters independent of private capital. Many of them sold a little factory foot-wear in addition to doing repairs, and these now took their goods from him. Out in the provinces his boots and shoes had already gained a footing in many places; it had come about naturally, in the ordinary sequence of things. The manufacturers followed them up there too, wherever they could; but the consequence was that the workmen patronized them and forced them in again to the shops of which they themselves were the customers. A battle began to rage over Pelle’s boots and shoes.

He knew, however, that it was only the beginning. It would soon come to a great conflict, and were his foundations sufficiently strong for that? The manufacturers were establishing a shop opposite his, where the goods were to be sold cheap in order to ruin his sales, and one day they put the prices very much down on everything, so as to extinguish him altogether.

“Let them!” said Brun. “People will be able to get shoes cheap!” Pelle was troubled, however, at this fresh attack. Even if they held out, it might well exhaust their economic strength.

The misfortune was that they were too isolated; they were as yet like men washed up onto an open shore; they had nothing to fall back upon. The employers had long since discovered that they were just as international as the workmen, and had adopted Pelle’s old organization idea. It was not always easy, either, to get materials from abroad; he noticed the connection. Until he had got the tanners to start a cooperative business, he ran the risk of having his feet knocked away from under him at any moment. And in the first place he must have the great army of workmen on his side; that was whither everything pointed.

One day he found himself once more after many years on the lecturer’s platform, giving his first lecture on cooperation. It was very strange to stand once more before his own people and feel their faces turned toward him. At present they looked upon him as one who had come from abroad with new ideas, or perhaps only a new invention; but he meant to win them! Their very slowness promised well when once it was overcome. He knew them again; they were difficult to get started, but once started could hardly be stopped again. If his idea got proper hold of these men with their huge organizations and firm discipline, it would be insuperable. He entered with heart and soul into the agitation, and gave a lecture every week in a political or trade association.

“Pelle, how busy you are!” said Ellen, when he came home. Her condition filled him with happiness; it was like a seal upon their new union. She had withdrawn a little more into herself, and over her face and figure there was thrown a touch of dreamy gentleness. She met him at the gate now a little helpless and remote—a young mother, to be touched with careful hands. He saw her thriving from day to day, and had a happy feeling that things were growing for him on all sides.

They did not see much of Morten. He was passing through a crisis, and preferred to be by himself. He was always complaining that he could not get on with his work. Everything he began, no matter how small, stuck fast.

“That’s because you don’t believe in it any longer,” said Pelle. “He who doubts in his work cuts through the branch upon which he is himself sitting.”

Morten listened to him with an expression of weariness. “It’s much more than that,” he said, “for it’s the men themselves I doubt, Pelle. I feel cold and haven’t been able to find out why; but now I know. It’s because men have no heart. Everything growing is dependent upon warmth, but the whole of our culture is built upon coldness, and that’s why it’s so cold here.”

“The poor people have a heart though,” said Pelle. “It’s that and not common sense that keeps them up. If they hadn’t they’d have gone to ruin long ago—simply become animals. Why haven’t they, with all their misery? Why does the very sewer give birth to bright beings?”

“Yes, the poor people warm one another, but they’re blue with cold all the same! And shouldn’t one rather wish that they had no heart to be burdened with in a community that’s frozen to the very bottom? I envy those who can look at misery from a historical point of view and comfort themselves with the future. I think myself that the good will some day conquer, but it’s nevertheless fearfully unreasonable that millions shall first go joyless to the grave in the battle to overcome a folly. I’m an irreconcilable, that’s what it is! My mind has arranged itself for other conditions, and therefore I suffer under those that exist. Even so ordinary a thing as to receive money causes me suffering. It’s mine, but I can’t help following it back in my thoughts. What want has been caused by its passing into my hands? How much distress and weeping may be associated with it? And when I pay it out again I’m always troubled to think that those who’ve helped me get too little—my washerwoman and the others. They can scarcely live, and the fault is mine among others! Then my thoughts set about finding out the others’ wants and I get no peace; every time I put a bit of bread into my mouth, or see the stores in the shops, I can’t help thinking of those who are starving. I suffer terribly through not being able to alter conditions of which the folly is so apparent. It’s of no use for me to put it down to morbidness, for it’s not that; it’s a forestalling in myself. We must all go that way some day, if the oppressed do not rise before then and turn the point upward. You see I’m condemned to live in all the others’ miseries, and my own life has not been exactly rich in sunshine. Think of my childhood, how joyless it was! I haven’t your fund to draw from, Pelle, remember that!”

No, there had not been much sunshine on Morten’s path, and now he cowered and shivered with cold.

One evening, however, he rushed into the sitting-room, waving a sheet of paper. “I’ve received a legacy,” he cried. “Tomorrow morning I shall start for the South.”

“But you’ll have to arrange your affairs first,” said Pelle.

“Arrange?” Morten laughed. “Oh, no! You’re always ready to start on a journey. All my life I’ve been ready for a tour round the world at an hour’s notice!” He walked to and fro, rubbing his hands. “Ah, now I shall drink the sunshine—let myself be baked through and through! I think it’ll be good for my chest to hop over a winter.”

“How far are you going?” asked Ellen, with shining eyes.

“To Southern Italy and Spain. I want to go to a place where the cold doesn’t pull off the coats of thousands while it helps you on with your furs. And then I want to see people who haven’t had a share in the blessings of mechanical culture, but upon whom the sun has shone to make up for it—sunshine-beings like little Johanna and her mother and grandmother, but who’ve been allowed to live. Oh, how nice it’ll be to see for once poor people who aren’t cold!”

“Just let him get off as quickly as possible,” said Ellen, when Morten had gone up to pack; “for if he once gets the poor into his mind, it’ll all come to nothing. I expect I shall put a few of your socks and a little underclothing into his trunk; he’s got no change. If only he’ll see that his things go to the wash, and that they don’t ruin them with chlorine!”

“Don’t you think you’d better look after him a little while he’s packing?” asked Pelle. “Or else I’m afraid he’ll not take what he’ll really want. Morten would sometimes forget his own head.”

Ellen went upstairs with the things she had looked out. It was fortunate that she did so, for Morten had packed his trunk quite full of books, and laid the necessary things aside. When she took everything out and began all over again, he fidgeted about and was quite unhappy; it had been arranged so nicely, the fiction all together in one place, the proletariat writings in another; he could have put his hand in and taken out anything he wanted. But Ellen had no mercy. Everything had to be emptied onto the floor, and he had to bring every stitch of clothing he possessed and lay them on chairs, whence she selected the necessary garments. At each one that was placed in the trunk, Morten protested meekly: it really could not be worth while to take socks with him, nor yet several changes of linen; you simply bought them as you required them. Indeed? Could it not? But it was worth while lugging about a big trunk full of useless books like any colporteur, was it?

Ellen was on her knees before the trunk, and was getting on with her task. Pelle came up and stood leaning against the door-jamb, looking at them. “That’s right! Just give him a coating of paint that will last till he gets home again!” he said, laughing. “He may need it badly.”

Morten sat upon a chair looking crestfallen. “Thank goodness, I’m not married!” he said. “I really begin to be sorry for you, Pelle.” It was evident that he was enjoying being looked after.

“Yes, now you can see what a domestic affliction I have to bear,” Pelle answered gravely.

Ellen let them talk. The trunk was now cram full, and she had the satisfaction of knowing that he would not be going about like a tramp. There were only his toilet articles left now; even those he had forgotten. She drew a huge volume out of the pocket for these articles inside the lid of the trunk to make room for his washing things; but at that Morten sprang forward. “I _must_ have that with me, whatever else is left out,” he said with determination. It was Victor Hugo’s “Les Misérables,” Morten’s Bible.

Ellen opened it at the title-page to see if it really was so necessary to travel about with such a monster; it was as big as a loaf.

“There’s no room for it,” she declared, and quietly laid it on one side, “that’s to say if you want things to wash yourself with; and you’re sure to meet plenty of unhappy people wherever you go, for there’s always enough of them everywhere.”

“Then perhaps Madam will not permit me to take my writing things with me?” questioned Morten, in a tone of supplication.

“Oh, yes!” answered Ellen, laughing, “and you may use them too, to do something beautiful—that’s to say if it’s us poor people you’re writing for. There’s sorrow and misery enough!”

“When the sun’s shone properly upon me, I’ll come home and write you a book about it,” said Morten seriously.

The following day was Sunday. Morten was up early and went out to the churchyard. He was gone a long time, and they waited breakfast for him. “He’s coming now!” cried Lasse Frederik, who had been up to the hill farm for milk. “I saw him down in the field.”

“Then we can put the eggs on,” said Ellen to Sister, who helped her a little in the kitchen.

Morten was in a solemn mood. “The roses on Johanna’s grave have been picked again,” he said. “I can’t imagine how any one can have the heart to rob the dead; they are really the poorest of us all.”

“I’m glad to hear you say that!” exclaimed Pelle. “A month ago you thought the dead were the only ones who were well off.”

“You’re a rock!” said Morten, smiling and putting his hands on the other’s shoulders. “If everything else were to change, we should always know where you were to be found.”

“Come to table!” cried Ellen, “but at once, or the surprise will be cold.” She stood waiting with a covered dish in her hand.

“Why, I believe you’ve got new-laid eggs there!” exclaimed Pelle, in astonishment.

“Yes, the hens have begun to lay again the last few days. It must be in Morten’s honor.”

“No, it’s in honor of the fine weather, and because they’re allowed to run about anywhere now,” said Lasse Frederik.

Morten laughed. “Lasse Frederik’s an incorrigible realist,” he said. “Life needs no adornment for him.”

Ellen looked well after Morten. “Now you must make a good breakfast,” she said. “You can’t be sure you’ll get proper food out there in foreign countries.” She was thinking with horror of the messes her lodgers in the “Palace” had put together.

The carriage was at the door, the trunk was put up beside the driver, and Morten and Pelle got into the carriage, not before it was time either. They started at a good pace, Lasse Frederik and Sister each standing on a step all the way down to the main road. Up at the gable window Ellen stood and waved, holding Boy Comfort by the hand.

“It must be strange to go away from everything,” said Pelle.

“Yes, it might be strange for you,” answered Morten, taking a last look at Pelle’s home. “But I’m not going away from anything; on the contrary, I’m going to meet things.”

“It’ll be strange at any rate not having you walking about overhead any more, especially for Ellen and the children. But I suppose we shall hear from you?”

“Oh, yes! and you’ll let me hear how your business gets on, won’t you?”

The train started. Pelle felt his heart contract as he stood and gazed after it, feeling as though it were taking part of him with it. It had always been a dream of his to go out and see a little of the world; ever since “Garibaldi” had appeared in the little workshop at home in the provincial town he had looked forward to it. Now Morten was going, but he himself would never get away; he must be content with the “journey abroad” he had had. For a moment Pelle stood looking along the lines where the train had disappeared, with his thoughts far away in melancholy dreams; then he woke up and discovered that without intending it he had been feeling his home a clog upon his feet. And there were Ellen and the children at home watching for his coming, while he stood here and dreamed himself away from them! They would do nothing until he came, for Sunday was his day, the only day they really had him. He hurried out and jumped onto a tram.

As he leaped over the ditch into the field at the tramway terminus, he caught sight of Brun a little farther along the path. The old librarian was toiling up the hill, his asthma making him pause every now and then. “He’s on his way to us!” said Pelle to himself, touched at the thought; it had not struck him before how toilsome this walk over ploughed fields and along bad roads must be for the old man; and yet he did it several times in the week to come out and see them.

“Well, here I am again!” said Brun. “I only hope you’re not getting tired of me.”

“There’s no danger of that!” answered Pelle, taking his arm to help him up the hill. “The children are quite silly about you!”

“Yes, the children—I’m safe enough with them, and with you too, Pelle; but your wife makes me a little uncertain.”

“Ellen’s rather reserved, but it’s only her manner; she’s very fond of you,” said Pelle warmly. “Any one who takes the children on his knee wins Ellen’s heart.”

“Do you really think so? I’ve always despised woman because she lacks personality—until I got to know your wife. She’s an exceptional wife you’ve got, Pelle; hers is a strong nature, so strong that she makes me uncertain. Couldn’t you get her to leave off calling me Mr. Brun?”

“I’ll tell her,” said Pelle, laughing; “but I’m not sure it’ll be of any use.”

“This _Mr. Brun_ is beginning to be an intolerable person, let me tell you; and in your house I should like to get away from him. Just imagine what it means to be burdened all your life with a gentleman like that, who doesn’t stand in close relationship to anybody at all. Others are called ‘Father,’ ‘Grandfather’—something or other human; but all conditions of life dispose of me with a ‘Mr. Brun’! ‘Thank you, Mr. Brun!’ ‘Many thanks, Mr. Brun!’” The old man had worked himself up, and made the name a caricature.

“These are bad roads out here,” he said suddenly, stopping to take breath. “It’s incomprehensible that these fields should be allowed to lie here just outside the town—that speculation hasn’t got hold of them.”

“I suppose it’s because of the boggy ground down there,” said Pelle. “They’ve begun to fill it in, however, at the north end, I see.”

Brun peered in that direction with some interest, but gave it up, shaking his head.

“No, I can’t see so far without glasses; that’s another of the blessings bestowed by books. Yes, it is! Old people in the country only make use of spectacles when they want to look at a book, but I have to resort to them when I want to find my way about the world: that makes a great difference. It’s the fault of the streets and those stupid books that I’m shortsighted; you don’t get any outlook if you don’t live in the country. The town shuts up all your senses, and the books take you away from life; so I’m thinking of moving out too.”

“Is that wise now just before the winter? It wouldn’t do for you to go in and out in all kinds of weather.”

“Then I’ll give up the library,” answered Brun. “I shan’t miss it much; I’ve spent enough of my life there. Fancy, Pelle! it occurred to me last night that I’d helped to catalogue most of the literature of the world, but haven’t even seen a baby dressed! What right have people like me to have an opinion?”

“I can’t understand that,” said Pelle. “Books have given me so much help.”

“Yes, because you had the real thing. If I were young, I would go out and set to work with my hands. I’ve missed more through never having worked with my body till I was hot and tired, than you have through not knowing the great classic writers. I’m discovering my own poverty, Pelle; and I would willingly exchange everything for a place as grandfather by a cozy fireside.”

The children came running across the field. “Have you got anything for us to-day?” they cried from a long distance.

“Yes, but not until we get into the warmth. I daren’t unbutton my coat out here because of my cough.”

“Well, but you walk so slowly,” said Boy Comfort. “Is it because you’re so old?”

“Yes, that’s it,” answered the old man, laughing. “You must exercise a little patience.”

Patience, however, was a thing of which the children possessed little, and they seized hold of his coat and pulled him along. He was quite out of breath when they reached the house.

Ellen looked severely at the children, but said nothing. She helped Brun off with his coat and neckerchief, and after seeing him comfortably seated in the sitting-room, went out into the kitchen. Pelle guessed there was something she wanted to say to him, and followed her.

“Pelle,” she said gravely, “the children are much too free with Mr. Brun. I can’t think how you can let them do it.”

“Well, but he likes it, Ellen, or of course I should stop them. It’s just what he likes. And do you know what I think he would like still better? If you would ask him to live with us.”

“That I’ll never do!” declared Ellen decidedly. “It would look so extraordinary of me.”

“But if he wants a home, and likes us? He’s got no friends but us.”

No—no, Ellen could not understand that all the same, with the little they had to offer. And Brun, who could afford to pay for all the comforts that could be had for money! “If he came, I should have to have new table-linen at any rate, and good carpets on the floors, and lots of other things.”

“You can have them too,” said Pelle. “Of course we’ll have everything as nice as we can, though Brun’s quite as easily pleased as we are.”

That might be so, but Ellen was the mistress of the house, and there were things she could not let go. “If Mr. Brun would like to live with us, he shall be made comfortable,” she said; “but it’s funny he doesn’t propose it himself, for he can do it much better than we can.”

“No, it must come from us—from _you,_ Ellen. He’s a little afraid of you.”

“Of me?” exclaimed Ellen, in dismay. “And I who would—why, there’s no one I’d sooner be kind to! Then I’ll say it, Pelle, but not just now.” She put up her hands to her face, which was glowing with pleasure and confusion at the thought that her little home was worth so much.

Pelle went back to the sitting-room. Brun was sitting on the sofa with Boy Comfort on his knee. “He’s a regular little urchin!” he said. “But he’s not at all like his mother. He’s got your features all through.”

“Ellen isn’t his mother,” said Pelle, in a low voice.

“Oh, isn’t she! It’s funny that he should have those three wrinkles in his forehead like you; they’re like the wave-lines in the countenance of Denmark. You both look as if you were always angry.”

“So we were at that time,” said Pelle.

“Talking of anger”—Brun went on—“I applied to the police authorities yesterday, and got them to promise to give up their persecution of Peter Dreyer, on condition that he ceases his agitation among the soldiers.”

“We shall never get him to agree to that; it would be the same thing as requiring him to swear away his rights as a man. He has taught himself, by a great effort, to use parliamentary expressions, and nobody’ll ever get him to do more. In the matter of the Cause itself he’ll never yield, and there I agree with him. If you mayn’t even fight the existing conditions with spiritual weapons, there’ll be an end of everything.”

“Yes, that’s true,” said Brun, “only I’m sorry for him. The police keep him in a perpetual state of inflammation. He can’t have any pleasure in life.”

XVI

Pelle was always hoping that Peter Dreyer would acquire a calmer view of life. It was his intention to start a cooperative business in the course of the spring at Aarhus too, and Peter was appointed to start it. But his spirit seemed incurable; every time he calmed down a little, conditions roused him to antagonism again. This time it was the increase of unemployment that touched him.

The senseless persecution, moreover, kept him in a state of perpetual irritation. Even when he was left alone, as now, he had the feeling that they were wondering how they could get him to blunder—apparently closed their eyes in order to come down upon him with all the more force. He never knew whether he was bought or sold.

The business was now so large that they had to move the actual factory into the back building, and take the whole of the basement for the repairing workshop. Peter Dreyer managed this workshop, and there was no fault to find with his management; he was energetic and vigilant. He was not capable, however, of managing work on a large scale, for his mind was in constant oscillation. In spite of his abilities he was burning to no purpose.

“He might drop his agitation and take up something more useful,” said Brun, one evening when he and Pelle sat discussing the matter. “Nothing’s accomplished by violence anyhow! And he’s only running his head against a brick wall himself!”

“You didn’t think so some time ago,” said Pelle. It was Brun’s pamphlets on the rights of the individual that had first roused Peter Dreyer’s attention.

“No, I know that. I once thought that the whole thing must be smashed to pieces in order that a new world might arise out of chaos. I didn’t know you, and I didn’t think my own class too good to be tossed aside; they were only hindering the development. But you’ve converted me. I was a little too quick to condemn your slowness; you have more connectedness in you than I. Our little business in there has proved to me that the common people are wise to admit their heritage from and debt to the upper class. I’m sorry to see Peter running off the track; he’s one of your more talented men. Couldn’t we get him out here? He could have one of my rooms. I think he needs a few more comforts.”

“You’d better propose it to him yourself,” said Pelle.

The next day Brun went into town with Pelle and proposed it, but Peter Dreyer declined with thanks. “I’ve no right to your comforts as long as there are twenty thousand men that have neither food nor firing,” he said, dismissing the subject. “But you’re an anarchist, of course,” he added scornfully, “and a millionaire, from what I hear; so the unemployed have nothing to fear!” He had been disappointed on becoming personally acquainted with the old philosopher, and never disguised his ill-will.

“I think you know that I _have_ already placed my fortune at the disposal of the poor,” said Brun, in an offended tone, “and my manner of doing so will, I hope, some day justify itself. If I were to divide what I possess to-day among the unemployed, it would have evaporated like dew by to-morrow, so tremendous, unfortunately, is the want now.”

Peter Dreyer shrugged his shoulders. The more reason was there, he thought, to help.

“Would you have us sacrifice our great plan of making all want unnecessary, for one meal of food to the needy?” asked Pelle.

Yes, Peter saw only the want of to-day; it was such a terrible reality to him that the future must take care of itself.

A change had taken place in him, and he seemed quite to have given up the development.

“He sees too much,” said Pelle to Brun, “and now his heart has dominated his reason. We’d better leave him alone; we shan’t in any case get him to admit anything, and we only irritate him. It’s impossible to live with all that he always has before his eyes, and yet keep your head clear; you must either shut your eyes and harden yourself, or let yourself be broken to pieces.”

Peter Dreyer’s heart was the obstruction. He often had to stop in the middle of his work and gasp for breath. “I’m suffocated!” he would say.

There were many like him. The ever-increasing unemployment began to spread panic in men’s minds. It was no longer only the young, hot-headed men who lost patience. Out of the great compact mass of organization, in which it had hitherto been impossible to distinguish the individual beings, simple-minded men suddenly emerged and made themselves ridiculous by bearing the truth of the age upon their lips. Poor people, who understood nothing of the laws of life, nevertheless awakened, disappointed, out of the drowsiness into which the rhythm had lulled them, and stirred impatiently. Nothing happened except that one picked trade after another left them to become middle-class.

The Movement had hitherto been the fixed point of departure; from it came everything that was of any importance, and the light fell from it over the day. But now suddenly a germ was developed in the simplest of them, and they put a note of interrogation after the party-cry. To everything the answer was: When the Movement is victorious, things will be otherwise. But how could they be otherwise when no change had taken place even now when they had the power? A little improvement, perhaps, but no change. It had become the regular refrain, whenever a woman gave birth to a child in secret, or a man stole, or beat his wife:—It is a consequence of the system! Up and vote, comrades! But now it was beginning to sound idiotic in their ears. They were voting, confound it, with all their might, but all the same everything was becoming dearer! Goodness knows they were law-abiding enough. They were positively perspiring with parliamentarianism, and would soon be doing nothing but getting mandates. And what then? Did any one doubt that the poor man was in the majority—an overwhelming majority? What was all this nonsense then that the majority were to gain? No, those who had the power would take good care to keep it; so they might win whatever stupid mandates they liked!

Men had too much respect for the existing conditions, and so they were always being fooled by them. It was all very well with all this lawfulness, but you didn’t only go gradually from the one to the other! How else was it that nothing of the new happened? The fact was that every single step toward the new was instantly swallowed up by the existing condition of things, and turned to fat on its ribs. Capital grew fat, confound it, no matter what you did with it; it was like a cat, which always falls upon its feet. Each time the workmen obtained by force a small rise in their wages, the employers multiplied it by two and put it onto the goods; that was why they were beginning to be so accommodating with regard to certain wage-demands. Those who were rather well off, capital enticed over to its side, leaving the others behind as a shabby proletariat. It might be that the Movement had done a good piece of work, but you wanted confounded good eyes to see it.

Thus voices were raised. At first it was only whiners about whom nobody needed to trouble—frequenters of public-houses, who sat and grumbled in their cups; but gradually it became talk that passed from mouth to mouth; the specter of unemployment haunted every home and made men think over matters once more on their own account; no one could know when his turn would come to sweep the pavement.

Pelle had no difficulty in catching the tone of all this; it was his own settlement with the advance on coming out of prison that was now about to become every one’s. But now he was another man! He was no longer sure that the Movement had been so useless. It had not done anything that marked a boundary, but it had kept the apparatus going and strengthened it. It had carried the masses over a dead period, even if only by letting them go in a circle. And now the idea was ready to take them again. Perhaps it was a good thing that there had not been too great progress, or they would probably never have wakened again. They might very well starve a little longer, until they could establish themselves in their own world; fat slaves soon lost sight of liberty.

Behind the discontented fussing Pelle could hear the new. It expressed itself in remarkable ways. A party of workmen—more than two hundred— who were employed on a large excavation work, were thrown out of work by the bankruptcy of the contractor. A new contractor took over the work, but the men made it a condition for beginning work again that he should pay them the wages that were due to them, and also for the time they were unemployed. “We have no share in the cake,” they said, “so you must take the risk too!” They made the one employer responsible for the other! And capriciously refused good work at a time when thousands were unemployed! Public opinion almost lost its head, and even their own press held aloof from them; but they obstinately kept to their determination, and joined the crowd of unemployed until their unreasonable demand was submitted to.

Pelle heard a new tone here. For the first time the lower class made capital responsible for its sins, without any petty distinction between Tom, Dick, and Harry. There was beginning to be perspective in the feeling of solidarity.

The great weariness occasioned by wandering in a spiritual desert came once more to the surface. He had experienced the same thing once before, when the Movement was raised; but oddly enough the breaking out came that time from the bottom of everything. It began with blind attacks on parliamentarianism, the suffrage, and the paroles; there was in it an unconscious rebellion against restraint and treatment in the mass. By an incomprehensible process of renewal, the mass began to resolve itself into individuals, who, in the midst of the bad times, set about an inquiry after the ego and the laws for its satisfaction. They came from the very bottom, and demanded that their shabby, ragged person should be respected.

Where did they come from? It was a complete mystery! Did it not sound foolish that the poor man, after a century’s life in rags and discomfort, which ended in his entire effacement in collectivism, should now make his appearance with the strongest claim of all, and demand his soul back?

Pelle recognized the impatience of the young men in this commotion. It was not for nothing that Peter Dreyer was the moving spirit at the meetings of the unemployed. Peter wanted him to come and speak, and he went with him two or three times, as he wanted to find out the relation of these people to his idea; but he remained in the background and could not be persuaded to mount the platform. He had nothing to do with these confused crowds, who turned all his ideas upside down. In any case he could not give them food to-day, and he had grown out of the use of strong language.