The old days had left their mark on them both. They came into line with the little one, even her childish cries under the low ceiling carried the old couple a quarter of a century back, to the days when the weight of years was not yet felt, and they could do their work with ease. And once there, the way to still earlier days was not so far--to that beautiful time when tiredness was unknown, and Soren after a hard day's work would walk miles over the common, to where Maren was in service, stay with her until dawn, and then walk miles back home again, to be the first man at work.

Inevitably they were young again! Had they not a little one in the house? A little pouting mouth was screaming and grunting for milk.

Soren came out of his old man's habit, and turned his gaze once more towards the sea and sky. He took back his share in the boat and went to sea again.

Things went tolerably well to begin with. It was summer time when Ditte had pushed him back to his old occupation again; it was as if she had really given the old people a second youth. But it was hard to keep up with the others, in taking an oar and pulling up nets by the hour. Moreover in the autumn when the herrings were deeper in the sea, the nets went right down, and were often caught by the heavy undertow, Soren had not strength to draw them up like the other men, and had to put up with the offer of lighter work. This was humiliating; and even more humiliating was it to break down from night watches in the cold, when he knew how strong he had been in days gone by.

Soren turned to the memories of old days for support, that he might a.s.sert himself over the others. Far and wide he told tales of his youth, to all who would listen.

In those days implements were poor, and clothes were thin, and the winter was harder than now. There was ice everywhere, and in order to obtain food they had to trail over the ice with their gear on a wooden sledge right out to the great channel, and chop holes to fish through. Woollen underclothing was unknown, and oilskins were things none could afford; a pair of thick leather trousers were worn--with stockings and wooden shoes. Often one fell in--and worked on in wet clothes, which were frozen so stiff that it was impossible to draw them off.

To Soren it was a consolation to dwell upon all this, when he had to give up such strenuous work as the rowing over to the Swedish coast, before he could get a good catch. There he would sit in the stern feeling small and useless, talking away and fidgeting with the sails in spite of the lack of wind. His partners, toiling with the heavy oars, hardly listened to him. It was all true enough, they knew that from their fathers, but it gained nothing in being repeated by Soren's toothless mouth. His boasting did not make the boat any lighter to pull; old Soren was like a stone in the net.

Maren was probably the only one, who at her own expense could afford to give a helping hand. She saw how easily he became tired, try as he would to hide it from her--and she made up her mind to trust in Providence for food. It was hard for him to turn out in the middle of the night, his old limbs were as heavy as lead, and Maren had to help him up in bed.

"'Tis rough tonight!" said she, "stay at home and rest." And the next night she would persuade him again, with another excuse. She took care not to suggest that he should give up the sea entirely; Soren was stubborn and proud. Could she only keep him at home from time to time, the question would soon be decided by his partners.

So Soren remained at home first one day and then another; Maren said that he was ill. He fell easily into the trap, and when this had gone on for some little time, his partners got tired of it, and forced him to sell his part of the boat and implements. Now that he was driven to remain at home, he grumbled and scolded, but settled down to it after a while. He busied himself with odd jobs, patched oilskins and mended wooden shoes for the fishermen and became quite brisk again. Maren could feel the improvement, when he good-naturedly began to chaff her again as before.

He was happiest out on the downs, with Ditte holding his hand, looking after the sheep. Soren could hardly do without the little one; when she was not holding his hand, he felt like a cripple without his staff. Was it not he whom she had chosen for her first smile, when but three weeks old! And when only four or five months old dropped her comforter and turned her head on hearing his tottering steps.

"'Tis all very well for you," said Maren half annoyed. "'Tis you she plays with, while I've the looking after and feeding of her; and that's another thing." But in her heart she did not grudge him first place with the little one; after all he was the man--and needed a little happiness.

There was no one who understood Ditte as did her grandfather. They two could entertain each other by the hour. They spoke about sheep and ships and trees, which Ditte did not like, because they stood and made the wind blow. Soren explained to her that it was G.o.d who made the wind blow--so that the fishermen need not toil with their oars so much. Trees on the contrary did no work at all and as a punishment G.o.d had chained them to the spot.

"What does G.o.d look like?" asked Ditte. The question staggered Soren. There he had lived a long life and always professed the religion taught him in childhood; at times when things looked dark, he had even called upon G.o.d; nevertheless, it had never occurred to him to consider what the good G.o.d really looked like. And here he was confounded by the words of a little child, exactly as in the Bible.

"G.o.d?" began Soren hesitating on the word, to gain time. "Well, He's both His hands full, He has. And even so it seems to us others, that at times He's taken more upon Himself than He can do--and that's what He looks like!"

And so Ditte was satisfied.

To begin with Soren talked most, and the child listened. But soon it was she who led the conversation, and the old man who listened entranced. Everything his girlie said was simply wonderful, and all of it worth repet.i.tion, if only he could remember it. Soren remembered a good deal, but was annoyed with himself when some of it escaped his memory.

"Never knew such a child," said he to Maren, when they came in from their walk. "She's different from our girls somehow."

"Well, you see she's the child of a farmer's son," answered Maren, who had never got over the greatest disappointment of her life, and eagerly caught at anything that might soften it.

But Soren laughed scornfully and said: "You're a fool, Maren, and that's all about it."

CHAPTER VI

THE DEATH OF SoREN MAN

One day Soren came crawling on all fours over the doorstep. Once inside, he stumbled to his feet and moved with great difficulty towards the fireplace, where he clung with both hands to the mantelpiece, swaying to and fro and groaning pitifully the while. He collapsed just as Maren came in from the kitchen, she ran to him, got off his clothes and put him to bed.

"Seems like I'm done for now," said Soren, when he had rested a little.

"What's wrong with you, Soren?" asked Maren anxiously.

"'Tis naught but something's given inside," said Soren sullenly.

He refused to say more, but Maren got out of him afterwards that it had happened when drawing the tethering-peg out of the ground.

Usually it was loose enough. But today it was firm as a rock, as if some one was holding it down in the earth. Soren put the tethering-rope round his neck and pulled with all his might, it did give way; but at the same time something seemed to break inside him.

Everything went dark, and a big black hole appeared in the earth.

Maren gazed at him with terror. "Was 't square?" asked she.

Soren thought it was square.

"And what of Girlie?" asked Maren suddenly.

She had disappeared when Soren fainted.

Maren ran out on the hills with anxious eyes. She found Ditte playing in the midst of a patch of wild pansies, fortunately Maren could find no hole in the ground. But the old rotten rope had parted. Soren, unsteady on his feet, had probably fallen backwards and hurt himself. Maren knotted the rope together again and went towards the little one. "Come along, dearie," said she, "we'll go home and make a nice cup of coffee for Grandad." But suddenly she stood transfixed. Was it not a cross the child had plaited of gra.s.s, and set among the pansies? Quietly Maren took the child by the hand and went in. Now she knew.

Soren stayed in bed. There was no outward hurt to be seen, but he showed no inclination to get up. He hardly slept at all, but lay all day long gazing at the ceiling, and fumbling with the bedclothes.

Now and then he groaned, and Maren would hurry to his side. "What ails you, Soren, can't you tell me?" said she earnestly.

"Ails me? Nothing ails me, Maren, but death," answered Soren. Maren would have liked to try her own remedies on him, but might just as well spare her arts for a better occasion; Soren had seen a black hole in the ground; there was no cure for that.

So matters stood. Maren knew as well as he, that this was the end; but she was a st.u.r.dy nature, and never liked to give in. She would have wrestled with G.o.d himself for Soren, had there been anything definite to fight about. But he was fading away, and for this there was no cure; though if only the poison could be got out of his blood, he might even yet be strong again.

"Maybe 'tis bleeding you want."

But Soren refused to be bled. "Folks die quickly enough without,"

said he, incredulous as he had always been. Maren was silent and went back to her work with a sigh. Soren never did believe in anything, he was just as unbelieving as he had been in his young days--if only G.o.d would not be too hard on him.

At first Soren longed to have the child with him always, and every other minute Maren had to bring her to the bedside. The little one did not like to sit quietly on a chair beside Grandad's bed, and as soon as she saw a chance of escape, off she would run. This was hardest of all to Soren, he felt alone and forsaken, all was blackness and despair.

Before long, however, he lost all interest in the child, as he did in everything else. His mind began to wander from the present back to bygone days; Maren knew well what it meant. He went further and still further back to his youth and childhood. Strange it was how much he could remember things which otherwise had been forgotten.

And it was not rambling nonsense that he talked, but all true enough; people older than he who came from the hamlet to visit him confirmed it, and wondered at hearing him speak of events that must have happened when he was but two or three years old. Soren forgot the latter years of his life, indeed he might never have lived them so completely had they faded from his mind.

This saddened Maren. They had lived a long life, and gone through so much together, and how much more pleasant it would have been, if they could have talked of the past together once more before they parted. But Soren would not listen, when it came to their mutual memories. No, the garden on the old farm--where Soren lived when five years old--that he could remember! Where this tree stood, and that--and what kind of fruit it bore.

And when he had gone as far back as he could remember, his mind would wander forward again, and in his delirium he would rave of his days as a shepherd boy or sailor boy and heaven knows what.

In his uneasy dreams he mixed up all his experiences, the travels of his youth, his work and difficulties. At one minute he would be on the sea furling sail in the storm, the next he would struggle with the ground. Maren who stood over him listened with terror to all that he toiled with; he seemed to be taking his life in one long stride. Many were the tribulations he had been through, and of which she now heard for the first time. When his mind cleared once more, he would be worn out with beads of perspiration standing on his forehead.

His old partners came to see him, and then they went through it again--Soren _had_ to talk of old times. He could only say a few words, weak as he was; but then the others would continue. Maren begged them not to speak too much, as it made him restless, and he would struggle with it in his dreams.

It was worst when he imagined himself on the old farm; pitiful to see how he fought against the sea's greedy advance, clutching the bedclothes with his wasted fingers. It was a wearisome leave-taking with existence, as wearisome as existence itself had been to him.

One day when Maren had been to the village shop, Ditte ran out screaming, as she came back. "Grandad's dead!" she burst out sobbing. Soren lay bruised and senseless across the doorstep to the kitchen. He had been up on the big chest, meddling with the hands of the clock. Maren dragged him to bed and bathed his wounds, and when it was done he lay quietly following her movements with his eyes.

Now and then he would ask in a low voice what the time was, and from this Maren knew that he was nearing his end.