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

road; carts drove there now. Isak may be content, may start with a little thrill of pride; he was the founder of a district, the pioneer.

“Look here, we can’t go wasting time on this bit of a house place if we’re to get that fodder loft done this year,” says he.

With a new brightness, new spirit; as it were, new courage and life.

X

A woman tramping up along the road. A steady summer rain falls, wetting her, but she does not heed it; other things are in her mind⁠—anxiety. Barbro it is, and no other⁠—Brede’s girl, Barbro. Anxious, ay; not knowing how the venture will end; she has gone from service at the Lensmand’s, and left the village. That is the matter.

She keeps away from all the farms on the road up, unwilling to meet with folk; easy to see where she was going, with a bundle of clothing on her back. Ay, going to Maaneland, to take service there again.

Ten months she has been at the Lensmand’s now, and ’tis no little time, reckoned out in days and nights, but an eternity reckoned in longing and oppression. It had been bearable at first, Fru Heyerdahl looking after her kindly, giving her aprons and neat things to wear; ’twas a joy to be sent on errands to the store with such fine clothes to wear. Barbro had been in the village as a child; she knew all the village folk from the days when she had played there, gone to school there, kissed the lads there, and joined in many games with stones and shells. Bearable enough for a month or so. But then Fru Heyerdahl had begun to be even more careful about her, and when the Christmas festivities began, she was strict. And what good could ever come of that? It was bound to spoil things. Barbro could never have endured it but that she had certain hours of the night to herself; from two to six in the morning she was more or less safe, and had stolen pleasures not a few. What about Cook, then, for not reporting her? A nice sort of woman she must be! Oh, an ordinary woman enough, as the world finds them; Cook went out without leave herself. They took it in turns. And it was quite a long time before they were found out. Barbro was by no means so depraved that it showed in her face, impossible to accuse her of immorality. Immorality? She made all the resistance one could expect. When young men asked her to go to a Christmas dance, she said “No” once, said “No” twice, but the third time she would say: “I’ll try and come from two to six.” Just as a decent woman should, not trying to make herself out worse than she is, and making a display of daring. She was a servant-girl, serving all her time, and knew no other recreation than fooling with men. It was all she asked for. Fru Heyerdahl came and lectured her, lent her books⁠—and a fool for her pains. Barbro had lived in Bergen and read the papers and been to the theatre! She was no innocent lamb from the countryside⁠ ⁠…

But Fru Heyerdahl must have grown suspicious at last. One day she comes up at three in the morning to the maids’ room and calls: “Barbro!”

“Yes,” answers Cook.

“It’s Barbro I want. Isn’t she there? Open the door.”

Cook opens the door and explains as agreed upon, that Barbro had had to run home for a minute about something. Home for a minute at this time of night? Fru Heyerdahl has a good deal to say about that. And in the morning there is a scene. Brede is sent for, and Fru Heyerdahl asks: “Was Barbro at home with you last night⁠—at three o’clock?”

Brede is unprepared, but answers: “Three o’clock? Yes, yes, quite right. We sat up late, there was something we had to talk about,” says Brede.

The Lensmand’s lady then solemnly declares that Barbro shall go out no more at nights.

“No, no,” says Brede.

“Not as long as she’s in this house.”

“No, no; there, you can see, Barbro, I told you so,” says her father.

“You can go and see your parents now and then during the day,” says her mistress.

But Fru Heyerdahl was wide awake enough, and her suspicion was not gone; she waited a week, and tried at four in the morning. “Barbro!” she called. Oh, but this time ’twas Cook’s turn out, and Barbro was at home; the maids’ room was a nest of innocence. Her mistress had to hit on something in a hurry.

“Did you take in the washing last night?”

“Yes.”

“That’s a good thing, it’s blowing so hard.⁠ ⁠… Good night.”

But it was not so pleasant for Fru Heyerdahl to get her husband to wake her in the middle of the night and go padding across herself to the servants’ room to see if they were at home. They could do as they pleased, she would trouble herself no more.

And if it had not been for sheer ill-luck, Barbro might have stayed the year out in her place that way. But a few days ago the trouble had come.

It was in the kitchen, early one morning. Barbro had been having some words with Cook, and no light words either; they raised their voices, forgetting all about their mistress. Cook was a mean thing and a cheat, she had sneaked off last night out of her turn because it was Sunday. And what excuse had she to give? Going to say goodbye to her favourite sister that was off to America? Not a bit of it; Cook had made no excuse at all, but simply said that Sunday night was one had been owing to her for a long time.

“Oh, you’ve not an atom of truth nor decency in your body!” said Barbro.

And there was the mistress in the doorway.

She had come out, perhaps, with no more thought than that the girls were