Chapter Twelve.
Peder Abroad.
The day after Erica’s departure to the dairy, Peder was sitting alone in his house, weaving a frail-basket. Sometimes he sighed to think how empty and silent the house appeared to what he had ever known it before. Ulla’s wheel stood in the corner, and was now never to be heard, any more than her feeble, aged voice, which had sung ballads to the last. Erica’s light, active step was gone for the present, and would it ever again be as light and active as it had been? Rolf’s hearty laugh was silent; perhaps for ever. Oddo was an inmate still, but Oddo was much altered of late, and who could wonder? Though the boy was strangely unbelieving about some things, he could not but feel how wonders and misfortunes had crowded upon one another since the night of his defiance of Nipen.
From the hour of Hund’s return, the boy had hardly been heard to speak. All these thoughts were too melancholy for old Peder, and, to break the silence, he began to sing as he wove his basket.
He had nearly got through a ballad of a hundred and five stanzas, when he heard a footstep on the floor.
“Oddo, my boy,” said he, “surely you are in early. Can it be dinner-time yet?”
“No, not this hour,” replied Oddo, in a low voice, which sank to a whisper as he said, “I have left Hund laying the troughs to water the meadow, and if he misses me, I don’t care. I could not stay;—I could not help coming;—and if he kills me for telling you, he may, for tell you I must.”
And Oddo went to close and fasten the door, and then he sat down on the ground, rested his arms on his grandfather’s knees, and told his story in such a low tone that no “little bird” under the eaves could “carry the matter.”
“O grandfather, what a mind that fellow has! he will go crazy with horror soon. I am not sure that he is not crazy now.”
“He has murdered Rolf, has he?”
“I can’t be sure, but the oddest thing is that he mixes up wolves with his rambling talk. Rolf can hardly have met with mischief from any wolf at this season.”
“No, boy; not Rolf. But did not. Hund speak of orphan children, and how wolves have been known to devour them when snow was on the ground?”
“Why, yes,” said Oddo, surprised at such a guess.
“There was a reason for Hund’s talking so of wolves, my dear. Tell me quick what he said of Rolf, and what made him say anything to you,—to an inquisitive boy like you.”
“He is like one bewitched, that cannot hold his tongue. While I was bringing the troughs, one by one, for him to lay, where the meadow was dryest, he still kept muttering and muttering to himself. As often as I came within six yards of him, I heard him mutter, mutter; then, when I helped him to lay the troughs, he began to talk to me. I was not in the mind to make him many answers, but on he went, just the same as if I had asked him a hundred questions.”
“It was such an opportunity for a curious boy, that I wonder you did not.”
“Perhaps I might, if he had stopped long enough. But if he stopped for a moment to wipe his brows, he began again before I could well speak. He asked me whether I had ever heard that drowned men could show their heads above water, and stare with their eyes, and throw their arms about, a whole day,—two days, after they were drowned.”
“Ay! indeed! Did he ask that?”
“Yes, and several other things: he asked whether I had ever heard that the islets in the fiord were so many prison-houses.”
“And what did you say?”
“I wanted him to explain; so I said they were prison-houses to the eider-ducks when they were sitting, for they never stir a yard from their nests. But he did not heed a word I spoke; he went on about drowned men being kept prisoners in the islets, moaning because they can’t get out. And he says they will knock, knock, as if they could cleave the thick hard rock.”
“What do you think of all this, my boy?”
“Why, when I said I had not heard a word of any such thing, even from my grandmother or Erica, he declared he had heard the moans himself,—moaning and crying; but then he mixed up something about the barking of wolves that made confusion in the story. Though he had been hot just before, there he stood shivering, as if it was winter, as he stood in the broiling sun. Then I asked him if he had seen dead men swim and stare, as he said he had heard them moan and cry.”
“And what did he say then?”
“He started bolt upright, as if I had been picking his pocket. He was in a passion for a minute, I know, if ever he was in his life. Then he tried to laugh as he said what a lot of new stories—stories of spirits, such stories as people love—he should have to carry home to the north, whenever he went back to his own place.”
“In the north,—his own place in the north! He wanted to mislead you there, boy. Hund was born some way to the south.”
“No, was he really? How is one to believe a word he says, except when he speaks as if he was in his asleep,—straight out from his conscience, I suppose? He began to talk about the bishop next, wanting to know when I thought he would come, and whether he was apt to hold private talk with every sort of person at the houses he stayed at.”
“How did you answer him? You know nothing about the bishop’s visits.”
“So I told him: but, to try him, I said I knew one thing,—that a quantity of fresh fish would be wanted when the bishop comes with his train; and I asked him whether he would go fishing with me, as soon as we should hear that the bishop was drawing near.”
“He would not agree to that, I fancy.”
“He asked how far out I thought of going. Of course I said to Vogel islet,—at least as far as Vogel islet. Do you know, grandfather, I thought he would have knocked me down at the word. He muttered something, I could not hear what, to get off. By that time we were laying the last trough. I asked him to go for some more, and the minute he was out of sight I scampered here. Now, what sort of a mind do you think this fellow has?”
“Not an easy one, it is plain. It is too clear also that he thinks Rolf is drowned.”
“But do you think so, grandfather?”
“Do you think so, grandson?”
“Not a bit of it. Depend upon it, Rolf is all alive, if he is swimming and staring, and throwing his arms about in the water. I think I see him now. And I will see him, if he is to be seen, alive or dead.”
“And pray, how?”
“I ought to have said if you will help me. You say, sometimes, grandfather, that you can pull a good stroke with the oar still: and I can steer as well as our master himself: and the fiord never was stiller than it is to-day. Think what it would be to bring home Rolf, or some good news of him. We would have a race up to the seater afterwards to see who could be the first to tell Erica.”
“Gently, gently, boy! What is Rolf about not to come home, if he’s alive?”
“That we shall learn from him. Did you hear that he told Erica he should go as far as Vogel islet, dropping something about being safe there from pirates and everything?”
Peder really thought there was something in this. He sent off Oddo to his work in the little meadow, and himself sought out Madame Erlingsen, who, having less belief in spirits and enchantments than Peder, was in proportion more struck with the necessity of seeing whether there was any meaning in Hund’s revelations, lest Rolf should be perishing for want of help. The story of his disappearance had spread through the whole region; and there was not a fisherman on the fiord who had not, by this time, given an opinion as to how he was drowned. But Madame was well aware that, if he were only wrecked, there was no sign that he could make that would not terrify the superstitious minds of the neighbours, and make them keep aloof, instead of helping him. In addition to all this, it was doubtful whether his signals would be seen by anybody, at a season when every one who could be spared was gone up to the dairies.
As soon as Hund was gone out after dinner, the old man and his grandson put off in the boat, carrying a note from Madame Erlingsen to her neighbours along the fiord, requesting the assistance of one or two rowers on an occasion which might prove one of life and death. The neighbours were obliging. The Holbergs sent a stout farm-servant with directions to call at a cousin’s, lower down, for a boatman; so that the boat was soon in fast career down the fiord,—Oddo full of expectation, and of pride in commanding such an expedition; and Peter being relieved from all necessity of rowing more than he liked.
Oddo had found occasionally the truth of a common proverb; he had easily brought his master’s horses to the water, but could not make them drink. He now found that he had easily got rowers into the boat, but that it was impossible to make them row beyond a certain point. He had used as much discretion as Peder himself about not revealing the precise place of their destination; and when Vogel islet came in sight, the two helpers at once gave him hints to steer so as to keep as near the shore, and as far from the island, as possible. Oddo gravely steered for the island, notwithstanding. When the men saw that this was his resolution, they shipped their oars, and refused to strike another stroke, unless one of them might steer. That island had a bad reputation: it was bewitched or haunted; and in that direction the men would not go. They were willing to do all they could to oblige: they would row twenty miles without resting, with pleasure; but they would not brave Nipen, nor any other demon, for any consideration.
“How far off is it, Oddo?” asked Peder.
“Two miles, grandfather. Can you and I manage it by ourselves, think you?”
“Ay, surely, if we can land these friends of ours. They will wait ashore till we call for them again.”
“I will leave you my supper if you will wait for us here, on this headland,” said Oddo to the men.
The men could make no other objection than that they were certain the boat would never return. They were very civil—would not accept Oddo’s supper on any account—would remain on the watch—wished their friends would be persuaded; and, when they found all persuasion in vain, declared they would bear testimony to Erica, and as long as they should live, to the bravery of the old man and boy who thus threw away their lives in search of a comrade who had fallen a victim to Nipen.
Amidst these friendly words the old man and his grandson put off once more alone, making straight for the islet. Of the two Peder was the greater hero, for he saw the most ground for fear.
“Promise me, Oddo,” said she, “not to take advantage of my not seeing. As sure as you observe anything strange, tell me exactly what you see.”
“I will, grandfather. There is nothing yet but what is so beautiful that I could not, for the life of me, find out anything to be afraid of. The water is as green as our best pasture, as it washes up against the grey rock. And that grey rock is all crested and tufted with green again wherever a bush can spring. It is all alive with sea-birds, as white as snow, as they wheel about it in the sun.”
“’Tis the very place,” said Peder, putting new strength into his old arm. Oddo rowed stoutly too for some way, and then he stopped to ask on what side the remains of a birch ladder used to hang down, as Peder had often told him.
“On the north side; but there is no use in looking for that, my boy. That birch ladder must have rotted away with frost and wet long and long ago.”
“It is likely,” said Oddo; “but thinking that some man must have put it there, I should like to see whether it really is impossible for one with a strong hand and light foot to mount this wall. I brought our longest boat-hook on purpose to try. Where a ladder hung before, a foot must have climbed; and if I mount, Rolf may have mounted before me.”
It chilled Peder’s heart to remember the aspect of the precipice which his boy talked of climbing; but he said nothing, feeling that it would be in vain. This forbearance touched Oddo’s feelings.
“I will run into no folly, trust me,” said he. “I do not forget that you depend on me for getting home; and that the truth, about Nipen and such things, depends, for an age to come, on our being seen at home again safe. But I have a pretty clear notion that Rolf is somewhere on the top there.”
“Suppose you call him, then.”
Oddo had much rather catch him. He pictured to himself the pride and pleasure of mastering the ascent; the delight of surprising Rolf asleep in his solitude, and the fun of standing over him to waken him, and witness his surprise. He could not give up the attempt to scale the rock: but he would do it very cautiously.
Slowly and watchfully they passed round the islet, Oddo seeking with his eye any ledge of the rock on which he might mount. Pulling off his shoes, that his bare feet might have the better hold, and stripping off almost all his clothes, for lightness in climbing, and perhaps swimming, he clambered up to more than one promising spot, and then, finding that further progress was impossible, had to come down again. At last; seeing a narrow chasm filled with leafy shrubs, he determined to try how high he could reach by means of these. He swung himself up by means of a bush which grew downwards, having its roots firmly fixed in a crevice of the rock. This gave him hold of another, which brought him in reach of a third; so that, making his way like a squirrel or a monkey, he found himself hanging at such a height, that it seemed easier to go on than to turn back. For some time after leaving his grandfather, he had spoken to him, as an assurance of his safety. When too far off to speak, he had sung aloud, to save the old man from fears; and now that he did not feel at all sure whether he should ever get up or down, he began to whistle cheerily. He was pleased to hear it answered from the boat. The thought of the old man sitting there alone, and his return wholly depending upon the safety of his companion, animated Oddo afresh to find a way up the rock. It looked to him as like a wall as any other rock about the islet. There was no footing where he was looking;—that was certain. So he advanced farther into the chasm, where the rocks so nearly met that a giant’s arm might have touched the opposite wall. Here there was promise of release from his dangerous situation. At the end of a ledge, he saw something like poles hanging on the rock,—some work of human hands, certainly. Having scrambled towards them, he found the remains of a ladder, made of birch poles, fastened together with thongs of leather. This ladder had once, no doubt, hung from top to bottom of the chasm; and its lower part, now gone, was that ladder of which Peder had often spoken as a proof that men had been on the island.
With a careful hand, Oddo pulled at the ladder; and it did not give way. He tugged harder, and still it only shook. He must try it; there was nothing else to be done. It was well for him now that he was used to dangerous climbing,—that he had had adventures on the slippery, cracked glaciers of Sulitelma, and that being on a height with precipices below, was no new situation to him. He climbed, trusting as little as possible to the ladder, setting his foot in preference on any projection of the rock, or any root of the smallest shrub. More than one pole cracked: more than one fastening gave way, when he had barely time to shift his weight upon a better support. He heard his grandfather’s voice calling, and he could not answer. It disturbed him, now that his joints were strained, his limbs trembling, and his mouth parched so that his breath rattled as it came.
He reached the top, however. He sprang from the edge of the precipice, unable to look down, threw himself on his face, and panted and trembled, as if he had never before climbed anything less safe than a staircase. Never before, indeed, had he done anything like this. The feat was performed,—the islet was not to him inaccessible. This thought gave him strength. He sprang to his feet again, and whistled loud and shrill. He could imagine the comfort this must be to Peder; and he whistled more and more merrily till he found himself rested enough to proceed on his search for Rolf.
Never had he seen a place so full of water-birds and their nests. Their nests strewed all the ground; and they themselves were strutting and waddling, fluttering and vociferating in every direction. They were perfectly tame, knowing nothing of men, and having had no experience of disturbance. The ducks that were leading their broods allowed Oddo to stroke their feathers; and the drakes looked on, without taking any offence.
“If Rolf is here,” thought Oddo, “he has been living on most amiable terms with his neighbours.”
After an anxious thought or two of Nipen,—after a glance or two round the sky and shores for a sign of wind,—Oddo began in earnest his quest of Rolf. He called his name,—gently,—then louder.
There was some kind of answer. Some sound of human voice he heard, he was certain; but so muffled, so dull, that whence it came he could not tell. It might even be his grandfather, calling from below. So he crossed to quite the verge of the little island, wishing with all his heart that the birds would be quiet, and cease their civility of all answering when he spoke. When quite out of hearing of Peder, Oddo called again, with scarcely a hope of any result, so plain was it to his eyes that no one resided on the island. On its small summit there was really no intermission of birds’ nests;—no space where any one had lain down;—no sign of habitation,—no vestige of food, dress, or utensils. With a saddened heart, therefore, Oddo called again; and again he was sure there was an answer; though whence and what he could not make out. He then sang a part of a chant that he had learned by Rolf singing it as he sat carving his share of the new pulpit. He stopped in the middle, and presently believed that he heard the air continued, though the voice seemed so indistinct, and the music so much as if it came from underground, that Oddo began to recall, with some doubt and fear, the stories of the enchantment of the place. It was not long before he heard a cry from the water below. Looking over the precipice he saw what made him draw back in terror: he saw the very thing Hund had described,—the swimming and staring head of Rolf, and the arms thrown up in the air. Not having Hund’s conscience, however, and having much more curiosity, he looked again; and then a third time.
“Are you Rolf, really?” asked he, at last.
“Yes; but who are you,—Oddo or the demon,—up there where nobody can climb? Who are you?”
“I will show you. We will find each other out,” thought Oddo, with a determination to take the leap, and ascertain the truth. He leaped, and struck the water at a sufficient distance from Rolf. When he came up again, they approached each other, staring, and each with some doubt as to whether the other was human or a demon.
“Are you really alive, Rolf?” said the one.
“To be sure I am, Oddo,” said the other: “but what demon carried you to the top of that rock, that no man ever climbed?”
Oddo looked mysterious, suddenly resolving to keep his secret for the present.
“Not that way,” said Rolf. “I have not the strength I had, and I can’t swim round the place now. I was just resting myself when I heard you call, and came out to see. Follow me home.”
He turned, and began to swim homewards. Oddo had the strongest inclination to go with him, to see what would be revealed; but there were two objections. His grandfather must be growing anxious; and he was not perfectly sure yet whether his guide might not be Nipen in Rolf’s likeness, about to lead him to some hidden prison.
“Give me your hand, Rolf,” said the boy, bravely.
It was a real, substantial, warm hand.
“I don’t wonder you doubt,” said Rolf. “I can’t look much like myself,—unshaven, and shrunk, and haggard as my face must be.”
Oddo was now quite satisfied; and he told of the boat and his grandfather. The boat was scarcely farther off than the cave; and poor Rolf was almost in extremity for drink. The water and brandy he brought with him had been finished, nearly two days, and he was suffering extremely from thirst. He thought he could reach the boat, and Oddo led the way, bidding him not mind his being without clothes till they could find him some.
Glad was the old man to hear his boy’s call from the water: and his face lighted up with wonder and pleasure when he heard that Rolf was not far behind. He lent a hand to help him into the boat, and asked no questions till he had given him food and drink. He reproached himself for having brought neither camphor nor asafoetida, to administer with the corn-brandy. Here was the brandy, however; and some water, and fish, and bread, and cloud-berries. Great was the amazement of Peder and Oddo at Rolf’s pushing aside the brandy, and seizing the water. When he had drained the last drop, he even preferred the cloud-berries to the brandy. A transient doubt thence occurred whether this was Rolf after all. Rolf saw it in their faces, and laughed: and when they had heard his story of what he had suffered from thirst, they were quite satisfied, and wondered no longer.
He was all impatience to be gone. It tried him more now to think how long it would be before Erica could hear of his preservation than to bear all that had gone before. Being without clothes, however, it was necessary to visit the cave, and bring away what was there. In truth, Oddo was not sorry for this. His curiosity about the cave was so great, that he felt it impossible to go home without seeing it; and the advantage of holding the secret knowledge of such a place was one which he would not give up. He seized an oar, gave another to Rolf; and they were presently off the mouth of the cave. Peder sighed at their having to leave him again: but he believed what Rolf said of there being no danger, and of their remaining close at hand. One or the other came popping up beside the boat, every minute, with clothes, or net, or lines, or brandy-flask, and finally with the oars of the poor broken skiff; being obliged to leave the skiff itself behind. Rolf did not forget to bring away whole handsful of beautiful shells, which he had amused himself with collecting for Erica.
At last, they entered the boat again; and while they were dressing, Oddo charmed his grandfather with a description of the cave,—of the dark, sounding walls, the lofty roof, and the green tide breaking on the white sands. It almost made the listener cool to hear of these things: but, as Oddo had remarked, the heat had abated. It was near midnight, and the sun was going to set. Their row to the shore would be in the cool twilight: and then they should take in companions, who, fresh from rest, would save them the trouble of rowing home.
When all were too tired to talk, and the oars were dipping somewhat lazily, and the breeze had died away, and the sea-birds were quiet, old Peder, who appeared to his companions to be asleep, raised his head, and said, “I heard a sob. Are you crying, Oddo?”
“Yes, grandfather.”
“What is your grief, my boy?”
“No grief—anything but grief now. I have felt more grief than you know of though, or anybody. I did not know it fully myself till now.”
“Right, my boy: and right to say it out, too.”
“I don’t care now who knows how miserable I have been. I did not believe, all the time, that Nipen had anything to do with these misfortunes—”
“Right, Oddo,” exclaimed Rolf, now.
“But I was not quite certain: and how could I say a word against it when I was the one to provoke Nipen? Now Rolf is safe, and Erica will be happy again, and I shall not feel as if everybody’s eyes were upon me, and know that it is only out of kindness that they do not reproach me as having done all the mischief. I shall hold up my head again now, as some may think I have done all along: but I did not in my own eyes,—no, not in my own eyes, for all these weary days that are gone.”
“Well, they are gone now,” said Rolf. “Let them go by and be forgotten.”
“Nay,—not forgotten,” said Peder. “How is my boy to learn if he forgets—”
“Don’t fear that for me, grandfather,” said Oddo, as the tears still streamed down his face. “No fear of that. I shall not forget these last days,—no, not as long as I live.”
Chapter Thirteen.
Plot and Counterplot.
The comrades who were waiting and watching on the point were duly amazed to see three heads in the boat on her return; and duly delighted to find that the third was Rolf,—alive, and no ghost. They asked question upon question, and Rolf answered some fully and truly, while he showed reserve upon others; and at last, when closely pressed, he declared himself too much exhausted to talk, and begged permission to lie down in the bottom of the boat and sleep. Upon this, a long silence ensued. It lasted till the farm-house was in sight at which one of the rowers was to be landed. Oddo then exclaimed, “I wonder what we have all been thinking about. We have not settled a single thing about what is to be said and done; and here we are almost in sight of home, and Hund’s cunning eyes.”
“I have settled all about it,” replied Rolf, raising himself up from the bottom of the boat, where they all thought he had been sleeping soundly. “My mind,” said he, “is quite clear. The first thing I have decided upon is that I may rely on the honour of our friends here. You have proved your kindness, friends, in coming on this expedition, but for which I should have died in my hole, like a superannuated bear in its den. This is a story that the whole country will hear of; and our grandchildren will tell it on winter nights, when there is talk of the war that brought the pirates on our coasts. Your names will go abroad with the story, comrades, and, on one condition, with high honour: and that condition is, that you say not a word beyond the family you live in, for the next few days, of the adventure of this night, or of your having seen me. More depends on this than you know of now; more than I will tell, this day, to any person but my master. My good old friend there will help me to a meeting with my master, without asking a question as to what I have to say to him. Will you not, Peder?”
“Surely. I have no doubt you are right,” replied Peder.
The neighbours were rather sorry, but they could not object. They smiled at Oddo, and nodded encouragement, when he implored Rolf to fix a time when everything might be known, and to answer just this and just that little inquiry.
“Oddo,” said his grandfather, “be a man among us men. Show that your honour is more to you than your curiosity.”
“Thank you, grandfather, I will. I will ask only one more question; and that Rolf will thank me for. Had we not better fix some place, far away from Hund’s eyes and thoughts, for my master and Rolf to have their talk; and then I will guide my master—”
“Guide your master,” cried Rolf, laughing, “when your master knew every rock and every track in the country years enough before you were born!”
“You did not let me finish,” said Oddo. “You may want a messenger,—he or you; and I know every track in the country: and there is no one swifter of foot, or that can keep counsel better.”
“That is true, Rolf,” said Peder. “If the boy is too curious to know everything, it is not for the sake of telling it again. If you should happen to want a messenger, it may be worth attending to what he says.”
“I have no objection to add that to my plan, if Erlingsen pleases,” said Rolf. “I must see Erlingsen; but there is another person that I must make haste to see,—that I would fly to if I could. What I wish is, that my master would meet me on the road to where she is; supposing Hund to remain at home.”
He was told that there was no fear of Hund’s roving while the bishop was daily expected. Rolf having been out of the way, the whole story of the journey of the bishop of Tronyem had to be told him. It made him thoughtful; and he dropped a word or two of satisfaction, as if it had thrown new light upon what he was thinking of.
“All this,” said he, “only makes me wish the more to see Erlingsen immediately. I should say the best way will be for you to set me ashore somewhere short of home, and ask Erlingsen to meet me at the Black Tarn. There cannot be a quieter place: and I shall be so far on my way to the seater.”
“If you will just make a looking-glass of the Black Tarn,” said Oddo, “you will see that you have no business to carry such a face as yours to the seater. Erica will die of terror at you for the mountain-demon, before you can persuade her it is only you.”
“I was thinking,” observed one of the rowers, who relished the idea of going down to posterity in a wonderful story,—“I was just thinking that your wisest way will be to take a rest in my bed at Holberg’s, without anybody knowing, and shave yourself with my razor, and dress in my Sunday clothes, and so show yourself to your betrothed in such a trim as that she will be glad to see you.”
“Do so, Rolf,” urged Peder. Everybody said “Do so,” and agreed that Erica would suffer far less by remaining five or six hours longer in her present state of mind, than by seeing her lover look like a ghastly savage, or perhaps hearing that he was lying by the roadside, dying of his exertions to reach her. Rolf tried to laugh at all this: but he could not contradict it. He would not hear a word of any messenger being sent. He declared that it would only torment her, as she would not believe in his return till she saw him: and he dropped something about everybody being so wanted at home that nobody ought to stray.
All took place as it was settled in the boat. Before the people on Holberg’s farm had come in to breakfast, Rolf was snug in bed, with a large pitcher of whey by the bedside, to quench his still insatiable thirst. No one but the Holbergs knew of his being there; and he got away unseen in the afternoon, rested, shaven, and dressed, so as to look more like himself, though still haggard. Packing his old clothes into a bundle, which he carried with a stick over his shoulder, and laden with nothing else but a few rye-cakes, and a flask of the everlasting corn-brandy, he set forth, thanking his hosts very heartily for their care, and somewhat mysteriously assuring them that they would hear something soon, and that meantime they had better not have to be sought far from home.
As he expected, he met no one whom he knew. Nine-tenths of the neighbours were far away on the seaters, and of the small remainder, almost all were attending the bishop on the opposite shore of the lake. Rolf shook his head at every deserted farm-house that he passed, thinking how the pirates might ransack the dwellings, if they should happen to discover that few inhabitants remained in them but those whose limbs were too old to climb the mountain. He shook his head again when he thought what consternation he might spread through these dwellings by dropping at the doors the news of how near the pirate-schooner lay. It seemed to be out of the people’s minds now because it was out of sight, and the bishop had become visible instead. As for the security which some talked of from there being so little worth taking in the Nordland farm-houses,—this might be true if only one house was to be attacked, and that one defended: but half-a-dozen ruffians, coming ashore, to search eight or ten undefended houses in a day, might gather enough booty to pay them for their trouble. Of money they would find little or none; but in some families there were gold chains, crosses, and ear-rings, which had come down from a remote generation, or silver goblets and tankards. There were goats worth carrying away for their milk, and spirited horses and their harness, to sell at a distance. There were stores of the finest bed and table linen in the world; sacks of flour, cellars full of ale, kegs of brandy, and a mass of tobacco in every house. Fervently did Rolf wish, as he passed by these comfortable dwellings, that the enemy would cast no eye or thought upon their comforts till he should have given such information in the proper quarters as should deprive them of the power of doing mischief in this neighbourhood.
Leaving the last of the farm-houses behind, he ascended the ravine, and came out upon the expanse of rich herbage which Erica had trodden but a few days before. He thought, as she had done, of his own description of their journeying together to the seater, and of the delight with which she would leap from the cart to walk with him on the first sight of the waving grass upon the upland. His heart beat joyously at the thought, instead of mourning like hers. He was transported with happiness when he thought how near he was to her now, and on the eve of a season of delight,—a few balmy summer weeks upon the pastures, to be followed by his marriage. This affair of the pirates once finished, was ever man so happy as he was going to be? The thought made him spring as lightly through the tall grass that lay between him and the Black Tarn as the reindeer from point to point of the mountain steep.
The breeze blew in his face, refreshing him with its coolness, and with the fragrance of the birch, with which it was loaded. But it brought something else,—a transient sound which surprised Rolf,—voices of men, who seemed, if he could judge from so rapid a hint, to be talking angrily. He began to consider whom, besides Oddo, Erlingsen could have thought it safe or necessary to bring with him, or whether it was somebody met with by chance. At all events, it would be wisest not to show himself, and to approach with all possible caution. Cautiously, therefore, he drew near, keeping a vigilant watch all around, and ready to pop down into the grass on any alarm. Being unable to see any one near the tarn, he was convinced the talkers must be seated under the crags on its margin, and he therefore made a circuit, to get behind the rocks, and then climbed a huge fragment, which seemed to have been toppled down from some steep, and to have rolled to the brink of the water. Two stunted pines grew out from the summit of this crag, and between these pines Rolf placed himself, and looked down from thence.
Two men sat on the ground in the shadow of the rock: one was Hund, and the other must undoubtedly be one of the pirate crew. His dress, arms, and broken language all showed him to be so; and it was, in fact, the same man that Erica had met near the same place; though that she had had such an adventure was the last thing her lover dreamed of as he surveyed the man’s figure from above. This man appeared surly. Hund was extremely agitated.
“It is very hard,” said he, “when all I want is to do no harm to anybody,—neither to my old friends nor my new acquaintances,—that I cannot be let alone. I have done too much mischief in my life already. The demons have made sport of me;—it is their sport that I have as many lives to answer for as any man of twice my age in Nordland; and now that I would be harmless for the rest of my days—”
“Don’t trouble yourself to talk about your days,” interrupted the pirate; “they will be too few to be worth speaking of, if you do not put yourself under our orders again. You are a deserter; and as a deserter you go back with me, unless you choose to go as a comrade.”
“And what might I expect that your orders would be, if I went with you?”
“You know very well that we want you for a guide. That is all you are worth. In a fight, you would only be in the way, unless—indeed, you could contrive to get out of the way.”
“Then you would not expect me to fight against my master and his people?”
“Nobody was ever so foolish as to expect you to fight, more or less, I should think. No; your business would be to pilot us to Erlingsen’s, and answer truly all our questions about their ways and doings.”
“Surprise them in their sleep!” muttered Hund. “Wake them up with the light of their own burning roofs! And they would know me by that light! They would point me out to the bishop;—they would find time in their hurry to mark me for the monster they might well think me.”
“Yes; you would be in the front, of course,” observed the pirate. “But there is one comfort for you,—if you are so earnest to see the bishop as you told me you were, my plan is the best. When once we lock him down on board our schooner, you can have him all to yourself. You can confess your sins to him the whole day long; for nobody else will want a word with either of you. You can show him your enchanted island down in the fiord, and see if he can lay the ghost for you.”
Hund sprang to his feet in an agony of passion. The well-armed pirate was up as soon as he. Rolf drew back two paces to be out of sight, if by chance they should look up, and armed himself with a heavy stone. He heard the pirate say—
“You can try to run away, if you like. I shall shoot you through the head before you have gone five yards. And you may refuse to return with me; and then I shall know how to report of you to my captain. I shall tell him that you are lying at the bottom of this lake—if it has a bottom—with a stone tied round your neck, like a drowned wild cat. I hope you may chance to find your enemy there, to make the place the pleasanter.”
Rolf could not resist the impulse to send his heavy stone into the middle of the tarn, to see the effect upon the men below. He gave a good cast on the very instant, and prodigious was the splash as the stone hit the water precisely in the middle of the little lake. The men did not see the cause of the commotion that followed; but, starting and turning at the splash, they saw the rings spreading in the dark waters which had lain as still as the heavens but a moment before. How could two guilty, superstitious men doubt that the waters were thrown into agitation by the pirate’s last words? Yet they glanced fearfully round the whole landscape, far and near. They saw no living thing but a hawk, which, startled from its perch on a scathed pine, was wheeling round in the air in an unsteady flight. The pirate pointed to the bird with one hand, while he laid the other on the pistol in his belt.
“Yes,” said Hund, trembling; “the bird saw it. Did you see it?”
“See what?”
“The water-sprite, Uldra. Before you throw me in to the water-sprite, we will see which is the strongest.” And in desperation, Hund, unarmed as he was, threw himself upon the pirate, sprang at his throat, and both wrestled with all their force. Rolf could not but look; and he saw that the pirate had drawn forth his pistol, and that all would be over with Hund in a moment if he did not interfere. He stood forward between the two pine stems on the ridge of the rock, and uttered very loud the mournful cry which had so terrified his enemies at Vogel islet. The combatants flew asunder as if parted by a flash of lightning. Both looked up to the point whence the sound had come, and there they saw what they supposed to be Rolf’s spectre pointing at them, and the eyes staring as when looking up from the waters of the fiord. How could these guilty and superstitious men doubt that it was Rolf’s spectre which, rising through the centre of the tarn, had caused the late commotion in its waters? Away they fled, at first in different directions; but it amused Rolf to observe that, rather than be alone, Hund turned to follow the track of the tyrant who had just been threatening and insulting him, and driving him to struggle for his life.
“Ay,” thought Rolf, “it is his conscience that makes me so much more terrible to him than that ruffian. I never hurt a hair of his head; and yet, through his conscience, my face is worse than the blasting lightning to his eyes.—When will all the people hereabouts find out, as my mistress said when I was a boy,—when will people find out that the demons and sprites they live in fear of all come out of their own heads and hearts? Here, in Hund’s case, is guilt shaping out visions whichever way he turns. Not one of his ghost-stories is there for months past, but I am at the bottom of; and that only through his consciousness of hating and wanting to injure me. Then, in the opposite case—of one as innocent as the whitest flower in all this pasture—in my Erica’s case, the ghosts she sees are all from passions that leave her heart pure, but bewilder her eyes. It is the fear that she was early made subject to, and the grief that she feels for her mother, that create demons and sprites for her. The day may come, if I can make her happy enough, when I may convince her that, for all she now thinks, she never yet saw a token of any evil spirit—of any spirit but the Good One that rules all things. What a sigh she will give—what a free breathing hers will be, the day when I can show her, as plainly as I see myself, that it is nothing but her own fears and griefs that have crossed her path, and she never doubting that they were demons and sprites! Heigh-ho! Where is Erlingsen? It is nothing short of cruel to keep me waiting to-day, of all days, and in this spot of all places, almost within sight of the seater where my poor Erica sits pining, and seeing nothing of the pastures, but only with her mind’s eye, the sea-caves where she thinks these limbs are stretched, cold and helpless, as in a grave. A pretty story I shall have to tell her, if she will only believe it, of another sort of sea-cave.”
To pass the time, he took out the shells he had collected for Erica, and admired them afresh, and planned where she would place them, so as best to adorn their sitting-room, when they were married. Erlingsen arrived before he had been thus engaged five minutes; and indeed before he had been more than a quarter of an hour altogether at the place of meeting.
“My dear master!” exclaimed Rolf, on seeing him coming, “have pity on Erica and me; and hear what I have to tell you, that I may be gone.”
“You shall be gone at once, my good fellow! I will walk with you, and you shall tell your story as we go.”
Rolf shook his head, and objected that he could not, in conscience, take Erlingsen a step further from home than was necessary, as he was only too much wanted there.
“Is that Oddo yonder?” he asked. “He said you would bring him.”
“Yes: he has grown trustworthy of late. We have had fewer heads and hands among us than the times require since Peder grew old and blind, and you were missing, and Hund had to be watched instead of trusted. So we have been obliged to make a man of Oddo, though he has the years of a boy, and the curiosity of a woman. I brought him now, thinking that a messenger might be wanted, to raise the country against the pirates; and I believe Oddo, in his present mood, will be as sure as we know he can be swift.”
“It is well we have a messenger. Where is the bishop?”
“Just going to his boat, at this moment, I doubt not,” replied Erlingsen, measuring with his eye the length of the shadows. “The bishop is to sup with us this evening.”
“And how long to stay?”
“Over to-morrow night, at the least. If many of the neighbours should bring their business to him, it may be longer. My little Frolich will be vexed that he should come while she is absent. Indeed, I should not much wonder if she sets out homeward when she hears the news you will carry, so that we shall see her at breakfast.”
“It is more likely,” observed Rolf, “that we shall see the bishop up the mountain at breakfast. Ah! you stare; but you will find I am not out of my wits when you hear what has come to my knowledge since we parted, and especially within this hour.”
Erlingsen was indeed presently convinced that it was the intention of the pirates to carry off the Bishop of Tronyem, in order that his ransom might make up to them for the poverty of the coasts. He heard besides such an ample detail of the plundering practices which Rolf had witnessed from his retreat as convinced him that the strangers, though in great force, must be prevented by a vigorous effort from doing further mischief. The first thing to be done was to place the bishop in safety on the mountain; and the next was so to raise the country as that these pirates should be certainly taken when they should come within reach.
Oddo was called, and entrusted with the information which had to be conveyed to the magistrate at Saltdalen. He carried his master’s tobacco-pouch as a token,—this pouch, of Lapland make, being well known to the magistrate as Erlingsen’s. Oddo was to tell him of the danger of the bishop, and to request him to send to the spot whatever force could be mustered at Saltdalen; and moreover to issue the budstick, (Note 1) to raise the country. The pirates having once entered the upper reach of the fiord, might thus be prevented from ever going back again, and from annoying any more the neighbourhood which they had so long infested.
Erlingsen promised to be wary on his return homewards, so as not to fall in with the two whom Rolf had put to flight. He said, however, that if by chance he should cross their path, he did not doubt he could also make them run, by acting the ghost or demon, though he had not had Rolfs advantage of disappearing in the fiord before their eyes. They were already terrified enough to fly from anything that called itself a ghost.
The three then went on their several ways,—Oddo speeding over the ridges like a sprite on a night errand, and Rolf striding up the grassy slopes like (what he was) a lover anxious to be beside his betrothed, after a perilous absence.
Note 1. When it is desired to send a summons or other message over a district in Norway where the dwellings are scattered, the budstick is sent round by running messengers. It is a stick, made hollow, to hold the magistrate’s order, and a screw at one end to secure the paper in its place. Each messenger runs a certain distance, and then delivers it to another, who must carry it forward. If any one is absent, the budstick must be laid upon the “house-father’s great chair, by the fire-side;” and if the house is locked, it must be fastened outside the door, so as to be seen as soon as the host returns. Upon great occasions it was formerly found that a whole region could be raised in a very short time. The method is still in use for appointments on public business.
Chapter Fourteen.
Midnight.
This was the day when the first cheese of the season was found to be perfect and complete. Frolich, Stiorna, and Erica examined it carefully, and pronounced it a well-pressed, excellent Gammel cheese, such as they should not be ashamed to set before the bishop, and therefore one which ought to satisfy the demon. It now only remained to carry it to its destination,—to the ridge where the first cheese of the season was always laid for the demon, and where, it appeared, he regularly came for his offering, as no vestige of the gift was ever to be found the next morning,—only the round place in the grass where it had lain, and the marks of some feet which had trodden the herbage.
“Help me up with it upon my head, Stiorna,” said Erica. “If Frolich looks at it any longer, she will grudge such a cheese going where it ought. Is not that the thought that is in your mind at this moment, Frolich, dear?”
“No. I do not grudge it,” replied Frolich. “My mother says it is right freely to give whatever the feelings of those who help us require.”
“And you do thus freely give,—my mistress and all who belong to her, without a sign of grudging,” declared Erica. “But, would you not be better pleased if the gift required was a bunch of mossflowers, or a basket of cloud-berries?”
“Perhaps so;—yet, no; I think not. Our good cheeses are not wasted. They do not lie and rot in the sun and the mists. Somebody has the benefit of them, whether it be the demon or not.”
“Who else should it be?” asked Stiorna. “There is not a man, woman, or child, on any seater in Sulitelma, who would touch a cheese laid out for the mountain-demon.”
“Perhaps not. I never watched, to see what happens when the Gammel cheese is left alone. I only say I do not grudge our cheese, as somebody has it. I will carry it myself, in token of good-will, if you will let me, Erica. Here,—shift it upon my head.”
Erica would not hear of this, and began to walk away with her load, begging Stiorna to watch the cattle,—not once to take her eye off them, till she should return to assume her watch for the night hours.
“I know why you will not let me carry the cheese,” said Frolich, smiling. “You are thinking of Oddo with the cake and ale. Nobody but you must deposit offerings henceforward. You are afraid I should eat up that cheese, almost as heavy as myself. You think there would not be a paring left for the demon, by the time I got to the ridge.”
“Not so,” replied Erica. “I think that he to whom this cheese is destined had rather be served by one who does not laugh at him. And it is a safer plan for you, Frolich.”
And off went Erica with her cheese.
The ridge on which she laid it would have tempted her at any other time to sit down. It was green and soft with mosses, and offered as comfortable a couch to one tired with the labours of the day as any to be found at the farm. But, to-night it was to be haunted: so Erica merely stayed to do her duty. She selected the softest tuft of moss on which to lay the cheese, put her offering reverently down, and then diligently gathered the brightest blossoms from the herbage around, and strewed them over the cheese. She then walked rapidly homewards, without once looking behind her. If she had had the curiosity and courage to watch for a little while, she would have seen her offering carried off by an odd little figure, with nothing very terrible in its appearance; namely, a woman about four feet high, with a flat face, and eyes wide apart, wearing a reindeer garment like a waggoner’s frock, a red comforter about her neck, a red cloth cap on her head, a blue worsted sash, and leather boots up to the knee:—in short, such a Lapland girl as Erica would have given a rye-cake to as charity, but would not have thought of asking to sit down, even in her master’s kitchen;—for the Norwegian servants are very high and saucy towards the Lapps who wander to their doors. It is not surprising that the Lapps who pitch their tents on the mountain should like having a fine Gammel cheese for the trouble of picking it up: and the company whose tents Erica had passed on her way up to the seater, kept a good look-out upon all the dairy people round, and carried off every cheese meant for the demon. While Erica was gathering and strewing the blossoms, this girl was hidden near: and, trusting to Erica’s not looking behind her, the rogue swept off the blossoms, and threw them at her, before she had gone ten yards, trundled the cheese down the other side of the ridge, made a circuit, and was at the tents with her prize before supper-time! What would Erica have thought if she had beheld this fruit of so many milkings and skimmings, so much boiling and pressing, devoured by greedy Lapps in their dirty tent?
On her way homewards, Erica remembered that this was Midsummer Eve,—a season when her mother was in her thoughts more than at any other time, for Midsummer Eve is sacred in Norway to the Wood-Demon, whose victim she believed her mother to have been. Every woodman sticks his axe into a tree that night, that the demon may, if he pleases, begin the work of the year by felling trees, or making a fagot. Erica hastened to the seater, to discover whether Erlingsen had left his axe behind, and whether Jan had one with him.
Jan had an axe, and remembering his duty, though tired and sleepy, was just going to the nearest pine grove with it when Erica reached home; she seized Erlingsen’s axe and went also, and stuck it in a tree, just within the verge of the grove, which was in that part a thicket, from the growth of underwood. This thicket was so near the back of the dairy that the two were home in five minutes; yet they found Frolich almost as impatient as if they had been gone an hour. She asked whether their heathen worship was done at last, so that all might go to bed, or whether they were to be kept awake till midnight by more mummery?
Erica replied by showing that Jan was already gone to his loft over the shed, and begging leave to comb and curl Frolich’s hair, and see her to rest at once. Stiorna was asleep; and Erica herself meant to watch the cattle this night. They lay couched in the grass, all near each other, and within view, in the mild slanting sunshine, and here she intended to sit, on the bench outside the home-shed, and keep her eye on them till morning.
“You are thinking of the Bishop of Tronyem’s cattle,” said Frolich.
“I am, dear. This is Midsummer Eve, you know,—when, as we think, all the spirits love to be abroad.”
“You will die before your time, Erica,” said the weary girl. “These spirits give you no rest of body or mind. What a day’s work we have done! And now you are going to watch till twelve, one, two o’clock! I could not keep awake,” she said, yawning, “if there was one demon at the head of the bed, and another at the foot, and the underground people running like mice all over the floor.”
“Then go and sleep, dear; I will fetch your comb, if you will just keep an eye on the cattle for the moment I am gone.”
As Erica combed Frolich’s long fair hair, and admired its shine in the sunlight, and twisted it up behind, and curled it on each side, the weary girl leaned her head against her, and dropped asleep. When all was done, she just opened her eyes to find her way to bed, and say, “You may as well go to bed comfortably, for you will certainly drop asleep here, if you don’t there.”
“Not with my pretty Spiel in sight. I would not lose my white heifer for seven nights’ sleep. You will thank me when you find your cow, and all the rest, safe in the morning. Good night, dear.”
And Erica closed the door after her young mistress, and sat down on the bench outside, with her face towards the sun, her lure by her side, and her knitting in her hands. She was glad that the herd lay so that by keeping her eye on them she could watch that wonder of Midsummer night within the Arctic Circle, the dipping of the sun below the horizon, to appear again immediately. She had never been far enough to the north to see the sun complete its circle without disappearing at all, but she did not wish it; she thought the softening of the light which she was about to witness, and the speedy renewing of day, more wonderful and beautiful. She sat soothed by her employment and by the tranquillity of the scene, and free from fear. She had done her duty by the spirits of the mountain and the wood; and in case of the appearance of any object that she did not like, she could slip into the house in an instant. Her thoughts were therefore wholly Rolf’s. She could endure now to contemplate a long life spent in doing honour to his memory by the industrious discharge of duty. She would watch over Peder, and receive his last breath,—an office which should have been Rolf’s. She would see another houseman arrive, and take possession of that house, and become betrothed and marry: and no one, not even her watchful mistress, should see a trace of repining in her countenance, or hear a tone of bitterness from her lips. It should be her part to see that others were happier than she had been. However weary her heart might be, she would dance at every wedding,—of fellow-servant or of young mistress. She would cloud nobody’s happiness, but would do all she could to make Rolf’s memory pleasant to those who had known him, and wished him well. She thought she could do all this in prospect of the day when her grave should be dug beside those of Peder and Ulla, and when her spirit should meet Rolf, and learn at length how he had died, and be assured that he had watched over her as faithfully as she had remembered him.
As these thoughts passed through her mind, making her future life appear shorter and less dreary than she could have imagined possible a few hours before, her fingers were busily at work, and her eyes rested on the lovely scene before her. From the elevation at which she was, it appeared as if the ocean swelled up into the very sky, so high was the horizon line: and between lay a vast region of rock and river, hill and dale, forest, fiord, and town, part in golden sunlight, part in deep shadow, but all, though bright as the skies could make it, silent as became the hour. As Erica found that she could glance at the sun itself without losing sight of the cattle, which still lay within her indirect vision, she carefully watched the descent of the orb, anxious to observe precisely when it should disappear, and how soon its golden spark would kindle up again from the waves. When its lower rim was just touching the waters, its circle seemed to be of an enormous size, and its whole mass to be flaming. Its appearance was very unlike that of the comparatively small, compact, brilliant luminary which rides the sky at noon. Erica was just thinking so, when a rustle in the thicket, within the pine grove, made her involuntarily turn her head in that direction. Instantly remembering that it was a common device of the underground people for one of them to make the watcher look away, in order that others might drive off the cattle, she resumed her duty, and gazed steadfastly at the herd. They were safe—neither reduced to the size of mice, nor wandering off, though she had let her eye glance away from them.
The sky, however, did not look like itself. There were two suns in it. Now, Erica really did quite forget the herd for some time, even her dear white heifer,—while she stared bewildered at the spectacle before her eyes. There was one sun,—the sun she had always known,—half sunk in the sea, while above it hung another, round and complete; somewhat less bright perhaps, but as distinct and plain before her eyes as any object in heaven or earth had ever been. Her work dropped from her hands, as she covered her eyes for a moment. She started to her feet, and then looked again. It was still there, though the lower sun was almost gone. As she stood gazing, she once more heard the rustle in the wood. Though it crossed her mind that the Wood-Demon was doubtless there making choice of his axe and his tree, she could not move, and had not even a wish to take refuge in the house, so wonderful was this spectacle,—the clearest instance of enchantment she had ever seen. Was it meant for good,—a token that the coming year was to be a doubly bright one? If not, how was she to understand it?
“Erica!” cried a voice at this moment from the wood,—a voice which thrilled her whole frame. “My Erica!”
She not only looked towards the wood now, but sprang forwards: but her eyes were so dazzled by having gazed at the sun that she could see nothing. Then she remembered how many forms the cunning demon could assume, and she turned back, thinking how cruel it was to delude her with her lover’s voice, when, instead of his form, she should doubtless see some horrid monster: most likely a hippopotamus, or, at best, an overgrown bear, showing its long, sharp, white teeth, to terrify her. She turned in haste, and laid her hand on the latch of the door, glancing once more at the horizon.
There was now no sun at all. The burnish was gone from every part of the landscape, and a mild twilight reigned.
One good omen had vanished; but there was still enchantment around; for again she heard the thrilling “Erica.”
There was no huge beast glaring through the pine stems, and trampling down the thicket; but, instead, there was the figure of a man advancing from the shadow into the pasture.
“Why do you take that form?” said the trembling girl, sinking down on the bench. “I had rather have seen you as a bear. Did you not find the axe? I laid it for you. Pray,—pray, come no nearer.”
“I must, my love, to show you that it is your own Rolf. Erica, do not let your superstition come for ever between us.”
She held out her arms;—she could not rise, though she strove to do so. Rolf sat beside her,—she felt his kisses on her forehead,—she felt his heart beat,—she felt that not even a spirit could assume the very tones of that voice.
“Do forgive me,” she murmured; “but it is Midsummer Eve; and I felt so sure—”
“As sure of my being the demon as I am sure there is no cruel spirit here, though it is Midsummer Eve. Look, love! See how the day smiles upon us!”
And he pointed to where a golden star seemed to kindle on the edge of the sea. It was the sun again, rising after its few minutes of absence.
“I saw two just now,” cried Erica,—“two suns. Where are we, really? And how is all this? And where do you come from?”
And she gazed, still wistfully,—doubtfully in her lover’s face.
“I will show you,” said he, smiling. And while he still held her with one arm, lest, in some sudden fancy, she should fly him as a ghost, he used the other hand to empty his pockets of the beautiful shells he had brought, tossing them into her lap.
“Did you ever see such, Erica? I have been where they lie in heaps. Did you ever see such beauties?”
“I never did, Rolf; you have been at the bottom of the sea.”
And once more she shrank from what she took for the grasp of a drowned man.
“Not to the bottom, love,” replied he, still clasping her hand. “Our fiord is deep; perhaps as deep as they say. I dived as deep as a man may, to come up with the breath in his body; but I could never find the bottom. Did I not tell you that I should go down as far as Vogel island; and that I should there be safe?”
“Yes! You did—you did!”
“Well! I went to Vogel island; and here I am safe!”
“It is you! We are together again!” she exclaimed now in full belief. “Thank God! Thank God!”
As she wept upon his shoulder, he told her where he had been, what perils he had met, how he had been saved, and how he had arrived the first moment he could; and then he went on to declare that their enemies would soon be disposed of, that they would be married, that they would take possession of Peder’s house, and make him comfortable, and would never be separated again as long as they lived.
They did not heed the time, as they talked and talked; and Rolf was just telling how he had more than once seen a double sun, without finding any remarkable consequences follow, when Stiorna came forth with her milk-pails, just before four o’clock. She started and dropped one of her pails, when she saw who was sitting on the bench; and Erica started no less at the thought of how completely she had forgotten the cattle and the underground people all this time. The herd was all safe, however,—every cow as large as life, and looking exactly like itself; so that the good fortune of this Midsummer Eve had been perfect.