Mother's Hands - Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson (novel books to read TXT) 📗

PART I

A stirring clang of swords, echoing from the glass roof of the station; the ring of steel sounding through the hissing of steam, noise of laughter and talk, mingled with the dense dull sound of truck wheels, of footsteps, of luggage loading.

Every time a fresh succession of officers thronged the glass doors, the clang of swords rang sharply; many artillery officers pressed through, and some infantry among them. All were making for the door of the same railway carriage, where a tall lady in black, with large, half-melancholy, half-imperious eyes, was standing and bowing. She bent her head slowly, a measured inclination, never more. The officers evidently came from manoeuvres or parade. The King was in the town, as was indicated by the presence of some of his harbingers, that is to say Swedish uniforms. Was he here in person? Was he expected? No, for in that case there would have been others present besides the officers. But was that lady who stood at the carriage-door the person to whom they had come to bid farewell? Was she the wife of a cavalry officer then? No, that lady could scarcely have become what she was in the midst of a small military circle with horsey surroundings. Besides, there was only respect in the greeting paid to her. The crowd was round some one who was standing on the platform and who could with difficulty be seen. At that moment a white veil was waved aloft by a lady's gloved hand. Was all this parade in honour of a lady after all?

The long prognosticated war with Russia has not yet broken out. There is probably time enough for that. Many of these officers wear decorations in advance. The colonel's manly breast bears at least eight of them. He has much to make up. Some of them--for instance, the two stately Swedes with their bland courtier eyes--are looking rather pale; perhaps they have been wounded as well as decorated in advance?

The throng presses close round the carriage-door. So it is really a lady who is the object of all this bloodless fray, this pushing and pressing, this restless motion to and fro, the endlessly shifting phantasmagoria of necks and epaulettes, of features and bearded faces, this unanimous laughter to order?

Perhaps it is a princess? Good heavens, no! In that case they would have kept at a respectful distance; but here they are pressing closer and closer, until the entrance doors of the station are again crowded with uniforms and clanging swords, this time exclusively of cavalry, and a little man, very old, beaming with friendliness, sheer friendliness, nothing but friendliness, appears followed by a staff of old and young officers. Discipline and Court obsequiousness (in a small army in time of peace courtiers alone are advanced to the higher grades) have made the expression of his countenance as irreproachably correct as that of an old dial-plate. Only there are moustaches on the dials which two concealed strings at the back seem to jerk now into a smile, now back to gravity again.

Some one called out, "Make room for the general," and in an instant a wide opening was made between two saluting semicircles, suddenly parted from each other.

Then it became possible to see the centre, which was formed of a group of ladies, foremost amongst them a tall girl in a light travelling costume and a white straw hat with a long white veil floating loosely over it. Her hands were full of flowers; she kept receiving more and more, which she handed through the crowd of ladies to her mother at the carriage-door, who laid them aside. Now it could be seen by every one that the two were mother and daughter. They were about the same height, the daughter, if anything, taller than her mother; they had the same large grey eyes, but with very different expression, although both proclaimed the wide range of their inward dominion. The mother's told of a deep comprehension of the contradictions and sufferings of life, the daughter's of an ardent nature, of restless aspiration, of warring forces which as yet had not found expression; they sparkled with triumph, through which there gleamed now and then a lightning flash of impatience. She was tall, slender, supple; her movements seemed to reflect the radiance from her eyes. It was not with their own eyes that others saw her, but through the light of her own. The look of energy in her face was a powerful auxiliary in the spell her eyes exercised over mankind. The mother's face was oval--of pure outline and broad design; the daughter's was longer, sharper, the forehead higher and framed by abundant light brown hair. Her eyebrows were straight, her nose was aquiline, her chin decided, her lips firmly cut. The beauty of a Valkyrie, but not so defiant. Her magnetic attraction came from enthusiasm, from impulsiveness; the flame in her eyes was light, not heat. On the whole, the impression she made was that she was borne up by invisible forces; all who came under the spell of that impression seemed to be lifted up as well. She talked to those on each side of her and in front of her, she exchanged greetings, she accepted flowers, and laughed; those who followed all these movements and changes felt dazzled and bewildered as though they had been watching waves in the sunshine.

Here was coquetry, perhaps, but with scarcely a particle of the quality which singles out first one and then another. Not the faintest hint of allurement in the voice. There was no sort of enervating tenderness in that uninterrupted outpouring of health, capacity and joyousness.

This was the reason of her success--be it said to the credit of those who surrounded her. No one came first, no one was especially distinguished. They all received their meed, each after his kind.

This unanimous admiration and homage had sprung into existence the previous autumn, when the cavalry colonel, who had married her mother's sister, brought her back from Paris. This persistent candidate for the favour of men and women, who neglected no one except his own wife, had since the previous autumn had no more pressing or more important duty than to introduce his beautiful niece into society. He performed this office on horseback at her side, at balls at her side, at theatres and concerts at her side; he allowed no one else to take his place. He gave riding-parties in her honour, and the whole body of cavalry succumbed; he gave a ball in her honour at which half the assembly fell victims; he took her to the officers' great banquet, and all the guests were smitten. As an old courtier he knew every move of the game; she never appeared under unfavourable circumstances or to no purpose--on this occasion, every person present had been specially invited.

As to that, they all responded as willingly as possible; but otherwise they would simply not have known of it, or the duty of the service might not have allowed them to come, or many of them would have considered it obtrusive. Now they were there by order; to an officer the feeling that he is obeying an order adds sensibly to his enjoyment. Just look at the little general's back, as he kisses her hand, brings her greetings from his Majesty and gives her the bouquet which he himself has gathered for her in the morning! Look at his back, I say; it seems made to be patted and currycombed like a horse's. As he straightens himself again, he looks as happy in the beams from her eyes as a stiff-legged dog who sniffs meat under a napkin.

I have said that those present had the feeling, and to an officer it is an agreeable one, of paying homage to order. That his Majesty himself had approved of her was a higher consecration yet. In the winter, out on the ice, he had deigned to fasten on her skates. It is true that she was not alone in this great distinction, or in becoming a member of the Royal Skating Club. The same honour was accorded to a great number of young girls besides. But every cavalry and artillery officer present--and there were many of them standing by when he knelt to fasten on her skates--considered it a special distinction offered to their lady.

Supported by the infantry, they sped after her over the glittering ice, without pause or stop--the Swedes as well. It needed but little stretch of fancy to picture her leading a sortie, to see in imagination horses, artillery, powder waggons, gliding over the mirror-like surface to the sound of horns, tramping of hoofs, and neighing of horses.

But, if she had presented no other aspect than this, all her beauty, exceptional as it was, would not have accomplished what we have just seen.

No, there was more than that. She was not a woman to be seized, caught, held fast--it was like trying to take burning fire in one's hand. "She was neither for men nor women," some said of her, and the thought spurred them on. She eluded those who were in her presence, to the absent she seemed a meteor; if memory is itself luminous, its glow is heightened by reflection from others.

This impression was strengthened by certain sayings of hers, some of which went the rounds.

When the King fastened on her skates he said gallantly: "You have the most charming little foot." "Yes, from to-day onwards," she replied.

A jovial colonel of artillery had dissipated a fortune on his comrades, on women, and on himself. "I lay my heart at your feet," he said. "Why, what would you have left to give away?" she laughed, and gave him her hand for the polonaise.

She stopped in the polonaise before a young lieutenant, who turned scarlet. "You are one of those one could die for," he whispered.

She took his arm in a friendly manner. "Well, to live for me would probably be a bore for both of us."

She once went to the poet-in-ordinary of the regiment, a smart captain, to offer him a philippine. "Do you wish it?" she asked. "There is one thing we all wish in respect to you," he answered, "but we can never manage to say it--what can the reason be?" "To say what?" she asked. "'I love you.'" "Oh! of course, they know that I should laugh at it," she laughed; and offered him the half almond, and from that time they remained as good friends as ever.

But there were other kinds of sayings of hers which aroused yet more respect. A discussion was going on one day at the fireside about a certain gate which was called the "gate of truth"; all who went through it were obliged to say what they thought, upon which she exclaimed: "Ah, then I should get to know what I think myself!" One of those present said that those were exactly the words which the Danish Bishop Monrad had used when he heard of the gate. "And he was called a sphinx," added the speaker.

She sat quietly for a little while, became paler and paler, and then got up. Some time after she was found in an adjoining room weeping.

A learned man said at the dinner-table: "Those who are destined for something great know it from childhood." "Yes, but they know not for what!" she rejoined quickly. But then she became embarrassed. She tried to make a better thing of