Growth of the Soil - Knut Hamsun (children's ebooks free online TXT) 📗

for buying the place; Sivert, too, said it would be best. They stuck to Eleseus both of them, and one day the three drove down to Storborg to see the wonder with their own eyes.

But once there was a prospect of selling, Aronsen became a different man; he wasn’t pressed to get rid of it, not at all. If he did go away, the place could stand as it was; ’twas a first-rate holding, a “cash down” place, there’d be no difficulty in selling it any time. “You’d not give my price,” said Aronsen.

They went over the house and stores, the warehouse and sheds, inspected the miserable remains of the stock, consisting of a few mouth-organs, watch-chains, boxes of coloured papers, lamps with hanging ornaments, all utterly unsaleable to sensible folks that lived on their land. There were a few cases of nails and some cotton print, and that was all.

Eleseus was constrained to show off a bit, and looked over things with a knowing air. “I’ve no use for that sort of truck,” said he.

“Why, then, you’ve no call to buy it,” said Aronsen.

“Anyhow, I’ll offer you fifteen hundred Kroner for the place as it stands, with goods, livestock, and the rest,” said Eleseus. Oh, he was careless, enough; his offer was but a show, for something to say.

And they drove back home. No, there was no deal; Eleseus had made a ridiculous offer, that Aronsen regarded as an insult. “I don’t think much of you, young man,” said Aronsen; ay, calling him young man, considering him but a slip of a lad that had grown conceited in the town, and thought to teach him, Aronsen, the value of goods.

“I’ll not be called ‘young man’ by you, if you please,” said Eleseus, offended in his turn. They must be mortal enemies after that.

But how could it be that Aronsen had all along been so independent and so sure of not being forced to sell? There was a reason for it: Aronsen had a little hope at the back of his mind, after all.

A meeting had been held in the village to consider the position which had arisen owing to Geissler’s refusal to sell his part of the mining tract. ’Twas not only the outlying settlers who stood to lose by this, it would be fatal to the whole district.

Why could not folk go on living as well or as poorly now as before there had been any mine at all? Well, they could not, and that was all about it. They had grown accustomed to better food, finer bread, store-bought clothes and higher wages, general extravagance⁠—ay, folk had learned to reckon with money more, that was the matter. And now the money was gone again, had slipped away like a shoal of herring out to sea⁠—’twas dire distress for them all, and what was to be done?

There was no doubt about it: ex-Lensmand Geissler was taking his revenge upon the village because they had helped his superior to get him dismissed; equally clear was it that they had underestimated him at the time. He had not simply disappeared and left. By the simplest means, merely by demanding an unreasonable price for a mine, he had succeeded in checking the entire development of the district. Ay, a strong man! Axel Ström from Maaneland could bear them out in this; he was the one who had last met Geissler. Brede’s girl Barbro had had a lawsuit in the town, and come home acquitted; but Geissler, he had been there in court all the time. And if anyone suggested that Geissler was dejected, and a broken man, why, he had only to look at the costly machines that same Geissler had sent up as a present to Axel Ström.

This man it was then, who held the fate of the district in his hand; they would have to come to some agreement with him. What price would Geissler ultimately be disposed to accept for his mine? They must ascertain in any case. The Swedes had offered him twenty-five thousand⁠—Geissler had refused. But suppose the village here, the commune, were to make up the remainder, simply to get things going again? If it were not an altogether unheard-of amount, it might be worth while. Both the trader at the shore station and Aronsen up at Storborg would be willing to contribute privately and secretly; funds devoted to such a purpose now would be repaid in the long run.

The end of it was that two men were deputed to call on Geissler and take up the matter with him. And they were expected back shortly.

So it was, then, that Aronsen cherished a flicker of hope, and thought he could afford to stand on his dignity with any who offered to buy up Storborg. But it was not to last.

A week later the deputation returned home with a flat refusal. Oh, they had done the worst thing possible at the outset, in choosing Brede Olsen as one of the men they sent⁠—they had taken him as being one who best could spare the time. They had found Geissler, but he had only shaken his head and laughed. “Go back home again,” he had said. But Geissler had paid for their journey back.

Then the district was to be left to its fate?

After Aronsen had raged for a while, and grown more and more desperate, he went up one day to Sellanraa and closed the deal. Ay, Aronsen did. Eleseus got it for the price he had offered; land and house and sheds, livestock and goods, for fifteen hundred Kroner. True, on going through the inventory after, it was found that Aronsen’s wife had converted most of the cotton print to her own use; but trifles of that sort were nothing to a man like Eleseus. It didn’t do to be mean, he said.

Nevertheless, Eleseus was not exactly delighted with things as they had turned out⁠—his future was settled now, he was to bury himself in the wilds.