Through the keyhole she caught a glimpse of her mother's big body standing beside the alcove. She was bent over it, and from the movement of her back, it could be seen that she had got hold of the old woman. Granny was defending herself.

"Come out with it at once," Sorine shouted hoa.r.s.ely. "Or I'll pull you out of bed."

"I'll call for some one," groaned Granny, hammering on the wall.

"Call for help if you like," ridiculed Sorine, "there's no-one to hear you. Maybe you've got it in the eiderdown, since you hold it so tightly."

"Oh, hold your mouth, you thief," moaned Granny. Suddenly there was a scream, Sorine must have got hold of the packet on the old woman's breast.

Ditte jumped in and lifted the latch. "Granny," she shrieked, but she was not heard in the fearful noise. They fought, Granny's screams were like those of a dying animal. "I'll make you shut up, you witch!" shouted Sorine, and the old woman's scream died away to an uncanny rattle; Ditte wanted to a.s.sist her grandmother, but could not move, and suddenly fell unconscious to the ground. When she came to herself again, she was lying face downwards on the floor; her forehead hurt. She stumbled to her feet. The door stood open, and her mother had gone. Large white flakes of snow came floating in, showing white in the darkness.

Ditte's first thought was that it would be cold for Granny. She closed the door and went towards the bed. Old Maren lay crouched together among the untidy bedclothes. "Granny," called Ditte and crying groped for the sunken face. "It's only me, dear little Granny."

She took the old woman's face entreatingly between her thin toil-worn hands, crying over it for a while; then undressed herself and crept into bed beside her. She had once heard Granny say about some one she had been called to: "There is nothing to be done for him, he's quite cold!" And she was obsessed with that thought, Granny must not be allowed to get cold, or she would have no Granny left. She crept close to the body, and worn out by tears and exhaustion soon fell asleep.

Towards morning she woke feeling cold; Granny was dead and cold.

Suddenly she understood the awfulness of it all, and hurrying into her clothes, she fled.

She ran across the fields in the direction of home, but when she reached the road leading to the sea, she went along it to Per Nielsen's farm. There they picked her up, benumbed with misery.

"Granny's dead!" she broke out over and over again, looking from one to the other with terror in her eyes. That was all they could get out of her. When they proposed taking her home to the Crow's Nest, she began to scream, so they put her to bed, to rest.

When she woke later in the day, Per Nielsen came in to her. "Well, I suppose you'd better be thinking of getting home," said he. "I'll go with you."

Ditte gazed at him with fear in her eyes.

"Are you afraid of your stepfather?" asked he. She did not answer.

The wife came in.

"I don't know what we're to do," said he, "she's afraid to go home.

The stepfather can't be very good to her."

Ditte turned sharply towards him. "I want to go home to Lars Peter,"

she said, sobbing.

CHAPTER XIX

ILL LUCK FOLLOWS THE RAVEN'S CALL

On receiving information of old Maren's death, four of her children a.s.sembled at the hut on the Naze, to look after their own interests, and watch that no-one ran off with anything. The other four on the other side of the globe, could of course not be there.

There was no money--not as much as a farthing was to be found, in spite of their searching, and the splitting up of the eiderdown--and the house was mortgaged up to the hilt. They then agreed to give Sorine and her husband what little there was, on condition that they provided the funeral. On this occasion, Sorine did not spare money, she wanted the funeral to be talked about. Old Maren was put into the ground with more grandeur than she had lived.

Ditte was at the funeral--naturally, as she was the only one who had ever cared for the dead woman. But in the churchyard she so lost control over herself, that Lars Peter had to take her aside, to prevent her disturbing the parson. She had such strong feelings, every one thought.

But in this respect Ditte changed entirely. After Granny's death, she seemed to quieten. She went about doing her work, was not particularly lively, but not depressed either. Lars Peter observed that she and her mother quarreled no longer. This was a pleasant step in the right direction!

Ditte resigned herself to her lot. It cost her an effort to remain under the same roof as her mother; she would rather have left home.

But this would have reflected on her stepfather, and her sense of justice rebelled against this. Then too the thought of her little brothers and sisters kept her back; what would become of them if she left?

She remained--and took up a definite position towards her mother.

Sorine was kind and considerate to her, so much so that it was almost painful, but Ditte pretended not to notice it. All advances from her mother glanced off her. She was stubborn and determined, carrying through what she set her mind on--the mother was nothing to her.

Sorine's eyes constantly followed her when un.o.bserved--she was afraid of her. Had the child been in the hut when it happened, or had she only arrived later? Sorine was not sure whether she herself had overturned the chair that evening in the darkness? How much did Ditte know? That she knew something her mother could tell from her face. She would have given much to find out, and often touched upon the question--with her uncertain glance at the girl.

"'Tis terrible to think that Granny should die alone," she would say, hoping the child would give herself away. But Ditte was obstinately silent.

One day Sorine gave Lars Peter a great surprise, by putting a large sum of money on the table in front of him. "Will that build the house, d'you think?" asked she.

Lars Peter looked at her; he was astounded.

"I've saved it by selling eggs and b.u.t.ter and wool," said she; "and by starving you," she added with an uncertain smile. "I know that I've been stingy and a miser; but in the end it pays you as well."

It was so seldom she smiled. "How pretty it made her!" thought Lars Peter, looking lovingly at her. She had lately been happier and more even tempered--no doubt the prospect of getting a better home.

He counted the money--over three hundred crowns! "That's a step forward," said he. The next evening when returning home he had bricks on the cart; and every evening he continued bringing home materials for building.

People who pa.s.sed the Crow's Nest saw the erection of beams and bricks shoot up, and rumors began to float round the neighborhood.

It began with a whisper that the old woman had left more than had been spoken of. Then it was said that perhaps, after all, old Maren had not died a natural death. And some remembered having seen Sorine on her way from the Crow's Nest towards the hamlet, on the same afternoon as her mother's death; little by little more was added to this, until it was declared that Sorine had strangled her own mother. Ditte was probably--with the exception of the mother--the only one who knew the real facts, and nothing could be got out of her when it affected her family--least of all on an occasion like this. But it was strange that she should happen to arrive just at the critical moment; and still more remarkable that she should run to Per Nielsen's and not home with the news of her grandmother's death.

Neither Sorine herself nor Lars Peter heard a word of these rumors.

Ditte heard it at school through the other children, but did not repeat it. When her mother was more than usually considerate, her hate would seethe up in her--"Devil!" it whispered inside her, and suddenly she would feel an overwhelming desire to shout to her father: "Mother stifled Granny with the eiderdown!" It was worst of all when hearing her speak lovingly about the old woman. But the thought of his grief stopped her. He went about now like a great child, seeing nothing, and was more than ever in love with Sorine; he was overjoyed by the change for the better. Ditte and the others loved him as never before.

When Sorine was too hard on the children, they would hide from her outside the house, and only appear when their father returned at night. But since Granny's death there had been no need for this. The mother was entirely changed; when her temper was about to flare up, an unseen hand seemed to hold it back.

But it happened at times that Ditte could not bear to stay in the same room with her mother, and then she would go back to her old way and hide herself.

One evening she lay crouching in the willows. Sorine came time after time to the door, calling her in a friendly voice, and at each call a feeling of disgust went through the girl. "Ugh!" said she; it made her almost sick. After having searched for her round the house, Sorine went slowly up to the road and back again, peering about all the time: pa.s.sing so close to Ditte that her dress brushed her face: then she went in.

Ditte was cold, and tired of hiding, but in she would not go--not till her father came home. He might not return until late, or not at all. Ditte had experienced this before, but then there had been a reason for it. It was no whipping she expected now!

No, but how lovely it had been to walk in holding her father's hand.

He asked no question now, but only looked at the mother accusingly, and could not do enough for one. Perhaps he would make an excuse for a trip over to ... no ... this ... Ditte began to cry. It was terrible that however much she mourned for Granny--suddenly she would find she had forgotten Granny was dead. "Granny's dead, dear little Granny's dead," she would repeat to herself, so that it should not happen again, but the next minute it was just the same.

It was so disloyal!

Now that it was too late, she was sorry she had not gone in when her mother called. She drew her feet up under her dress and began pulling up the gra.s.s to keep herself awake. Hearing a sound from the distance she jumped up--wheels approaching! but alas, it was not the well-known rumbling of her father's cart.

The cart turned from the road down in the direction of the Crow's Nest. Two men got out and went into the house; both wore caps with gold braid on. Ditte crept down to the house, behind the willows; her heart was beating loudly. The next moment they reappeared with her mother between them; she was struggling and shrieking wildly.

"Lars Peter!" she cried heartrendingly in the darkness; they had to use force to get her into the cart. Inside the house the children could be heard crying in fear.

This sound made Ditte forget everything else, and she rushed forward. One of the men caught her by the arm, but let her go at a sign from the other man. "D'you belong to the house?" asked he.

Ditte nodded.

"Then go in to the little ones and tell them not to be afraid....

Drive on!"