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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Treasure, by Selma Lagerlof
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
+other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
+whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of
+the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
+www.gutenberg.org.  If you are not located in the United States, you'll have
+to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook.
+
+Title: The Treasure
+
+Author: Selma Lagerlof
+
+Posting Date: October 18, 2014 [EBook #5161]
+Release Date: February, 2004
+First Posted: May 24, 2002
+Last Updated: October 15, 2003
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE TREASURE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Nicole Apostola, Charles Franks, and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team. John Mark Ockerbloom provided
+additional information about the original edition.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+The Treasure
+
+By Selma Lagerlof
+
+
+Contents
+
+   I.  At Solberga Parsonage
+  II.  On the Quays
+ III.  The Messenger
+  IV.  In the Moonlight
+   V.  Haunted
+  VI.  In the Town Cellars
+ VII.  Unrest
+VIII.  Sir Archie's Flight
+  IX.  Over the Ice
+   X.  The Roar of the Waves
+
+Because the Foreword contains key elements about the end of the book,
+it is located at the end of the e-text.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+AT SOLBERGA PARSONAGE
+
+
+
+In the days when King Frederik the Second of Denmark ruled over
+Bohuslen [FOOTNOTE: Frederik the Second reigned from 1544 to
+1588.  At that time, Bohuslen, now a province of southwest Sweden,
+formed part of Norway and was under the Danish Crown.--Trans.]
+there dwelt at Marstrand a poor hawker of fish, whose name was
+Torarin. This man was infirm and of humble condition; he had a
+palsied arm, which made him unfit to take his place in a boat for
+fishing or pulling an oar. As he could not earn his livelihood at sea
+like all the other men of the skerries, he went about selling salted
+and dried fish among the people of the mainland. Not many days
+in the year did he spend at home; he was constantly on the road
+from one village to another with his load of fish.
+
+One February day, as dusk was drawing on, Torarin came driving
+along the road which led from Kungshall up to the parish of
+Solberga. The road was a lonely one, altogether deserted, but this
+was no reason for Torarin to hold his tongue. Beside him on the
+sledge he had a trusty friend with whom to chat. This was a little
+black dog with shaggy coat, and Torarin called him Grim. He lay
+still most of the time, with his head sunk between his feet, and
+answered only by blinking to all his master said. But if his ear
+caught anything that displeased him, he stood up on the load, put
+his nose in the air, and howled worse than a wolf.
+
+"Now I must tell you, Grim, my dog," said Torarin, "that I have
+heard great news today. They told me both at Kungshall and at
+Kareby that the sea was frozen. Fair, calm weather it has been
+this long while, as you well know, who have been out in it every
+day; and they say the sea is frozen fast not only in the creeks
+and sounds, but far out over the Cattegat. There is no fairway now
+for ship or boat among the islands, nothing but firm, hard ice, so
+that a man may drive with horse and sledge as far as Marstrand and
+Paternoster Skerries."
+
+To all this the dog listened, and it seemed not to displease him.
+He lay still and blinked at Torarin.
+
+"We have no great store of fish left on our load," said Torarin,
+as though trying to talk him over. "What would you say to turning
+aside at the next crossways and going westward where the sea lies?
+We shall pass by Solberga church and down to Odsmalskil, and after
+that I think we have but seven or eight miles to Marstrand. It
+would be a fine thing if we could reach home for once without
+calling for boat or ferry."
+
+They drove on over the long moor of Kareby, and although the
+weather had been calm all day, a chill breeze came sweeping across
+the moor, to the discomfort of the traveller.
+
+"It may seem like softness to go home now when trade is at its
+best," said Torarin, flinging out his arms to warm them. "But we
+have been on the road for many weeks, you and I, and have a claim
+to sit at home a day or two and thaw the cold out of our bodies."
+
+As the dog continued to lie still, Torarin seemed to grow more
+sure of his ground, and he went on in a more cheerful tone:
+
+"Mother has been left alone in the cottage these many days. I
+warrant she longs to see us. And Marstrand is a fine town in
+winter-time, Grim, with streets and alleys full of foreign
+fishermen and chapmen. There will be dancing in the wharves every
+night of the week. And all the ale that will be flowing in the
+taverns! That is a thing beyond your understanding."
+
+As Torarin said this he bent down over the dog to see whether he
+was listening to what was said to him.
+
+But as the dog lay there wide awake and made no sign of
+displeasure, Torarin turned off at the first road that led
+westward to the sea. He flicked the horse with the slack of the
+reins and made it quicken its pace.
+
+"Since we shall pass by Solberga parsonage," said Torarin, "I will
+even put in there and ask if it be true that the ice bears as far
+as to Marstrand. The folk there must know how it is."
+
+Torarin had said these words in a low voice, without thinking
+whether the dog was listening or not. But scarcely were the words
+uttered when the dog stood up on the load and raised a terrible
+howl.
+
+The horse made a bound to one side, and Torarin himself was
+startled and looked about him to see whether wolves were in
+pursuit. But when he found it was Grim who was howling, he tried
+to calm him.
+
+"What now?" he said to him. "How many times have you and I driven
+into the parson's yard at Solberga! I know not whether Herr Arne
+[FOOTNOTE: At the time of this story "Herr" was a title roughly
+corresponding to "Sir."--Trans.] can tell us how it is with the ice,
+but I will be bound he'll give us a good supper before we set out
+on our sea voyage."
+
+But his words were not able to quiet the dog, who raised his
+muzzle and howled more dismally than ever.
+
+At this Torarin himself was not far from yielding to an uncanny
+feeling. It had now grown almost dark, but still Torarin could see
+Solberga church and the wide plain around it, which was sheltered
+by broad wooded heights to landward and by bare, rounded rocks
+toward the sea. As he drove on in solitude over the vast white
+plain, he felt he was a wretched little worm, while from the dark
+forests and the mountain wastes came troops of great monsters and
+trolls of every kind venturing into the open country on the fall
+of darkness. And in the whole great plain there was none other for
+them to fall upon than poor Torarin.
+
+But at the same time he tried again to quiet the dog.
+
+"Bless me, what is your quarrel with Herr Arne? He is the richest
+man in the country. He is of noble birth, and had he not been a
+priest there would have been a great lord of him."
+
+But this could not avail to bring the dog to silence. Then Torarin
+lost patience, so that he took Grim by the scruff of the neck and
+threw him off the sledge.
+
+The dog did not follow him as he drove on, but stood still upon
+the road and howled without ceasing until Torarin drove under a
+dark archway into the yard of the parsonage, which was surrounded
+on its four sides by long, low wooden buildings.
+
+II
+
+At Solberga parsonage the priest, Herr Arne, sat at supper
+surrounded by all his household. There was no stranger present but
+Torarin.
+
+Herr Arne was an old white-haired man, but he was still powerful
+and erect. His wife sat beside him. To her the years had been
+unkind; her head and her hands trembled, and she was nearly deaf.
+On Herr Arne's other side sat his curate. He was a pale young man
+with a look of trouble in his face, as though he was unable to
+support all the learning he had gathered in during his years of
+study at Wittenberg.
+
+These three sat at the head of the table, a little apart from the
+rest. Below them sat Torarin, and then the servants, who were old
+like their master. There were three serving-men; their heads were
+bald, their backs bent, and their eyes blinked and watered. Of
+women there were but two. They were somewhat younger and more
+able-bodied than the men, yet they too had a fragile look and were
+afflicted with the infirmities of age.
+
+At the farthest end of the table sat two children. One of them was
+Herr Arne's niece, a child of no more than fourteen years. She was
+fair-haired and of delicate build; her face had not yet reached
+its fullness, but had a promise of beauty in it. She had another
+little maid sitting beside her, a poor orphan without father or
+mother, who had been given a home at the parsonage. The two sat
+close together on the bench, and it could be seen that there was
+great friendship between them.
+
+All these folk sat at meat in the deepest silence. Torarin looked
+from one to another, but none was disposed to talk during the
+meal. All the old servants thought to themselves: "It is a goodly
+thing to be given food and to be spared the sufferings of want and
+hunger, which we have known so often in our lives. While we are
+eating we ought to have no thought but of giving thanks to God for
+His goodness."
+
+Since Torarin found no one to talk to, his glance wandered up and
+down the room. He turned his eyes from the great stove, built up
+in many stages beside the entrance door, to the lofty four-post
+bed which stood in the farthest corner of the room. He looked from
+the fixed benches that ran round the room to the hole in the roof,
+through which the smoke escaped and wintry air poured in.
+
+As Torarin the fish hawker, who lived in the smallest and poorest
+cabin on the outer isles, looked upon all these things, he
+thought: "Were I a great man like Herr Arne I would not be content
+to live in an ancient homestead with only one room. I should build
+myself a house with high gables and many chambers, like those of
+the burgomasters and aldermen of Marstrand."
+
+But more often than not Torarin's eyes rested upon a great oaken
+chest which stood at the foot of the four-post bed. And he looked
+at it so long because he knew that in it Herr Arne kept all his
+silver moneys, and he had heard they were so many that they filled
+the chest to the very lid.
+
+And Torarin, who was so poor that he hardly ever had a silver
+piece in his pocket, said to himself: "And yet I would not have
+all that money. They say Herr Arne took it from the great convents
+that were in the land in former days, and that the old monks
+foretold that this money would bring him misfortune."
+
+While yet these thoughts were in the mind of Torarin, he saw the
+old mistress of the house put her hand to her ear to listen. And
+then she turned to Herr Arne and asked him: "Why are they whetting
+knives at Branehog?"
+
+So deep was the silence in the room that when the old lady asked
+this question all gave a start and looked up in fright. When they
+saw that she was listening for something, they kept their spoons
+quiet and strained their ears.
+
+For some moments there was dead stillness in the room, but while
+it lasted the old woman became more and more uneasy. She laid her
+hand on Herr Arne's arm and asked him: "How can it be that they
+are whetting such long knives at Branehog this evening?"
+
+Torarin saw that Herr Arne stroked her hand to calm her. But he
+was in no mind to answer and ate on calmly as before.
+
+The old woman still sat listening. Tears came into her eyes from
+terror, and her hands and her head trembled more and more
+violently.
+
+Then the two little maids who sat at the end of the table began to
+weep with fear. "Can you not hear them scraping and filing?" asked
+the old mistress. "Can you not hear them hissing and grating?"
+
+Herr Arne sat still, stroking his wife's hand. As long as he kept
+silence no other dared utter a word.
+
+But they were all assured that their old mistress had heard a
+thing that was terrifying and boded ill. All felt the blood
+curdling in their veins. No one at the table raised a bit of food
+to his mouth, except old Herr Arne himself.
+
+They were thinking of the old mistress, how it was she who for so
+many years had had charge of the household. She had always stayed
+at home and watched with wise and tender care over children and
+servants, goods and cattle, so that all had prospered. Now she was
+worn out and stricken in years, but still it was likely that she
+and none other should feel a danger that threatened the house.
+
+The old lady grew more and more terrified. She clasped her hands
+in her helplessness and began to weep so sorely that the big tears
+ran down her shrunken cheeks.
+
+"Is it nothing to you, Arne Arneson, that I am so sore afraid?"
+she complained.
+
+Herr Arne bent his head to her and said: "I know not what it is
+that affrights you."
+
+"I am in fear of the long knives they are whetting at Branehog,"
+she said.
+
+"How can you hear them whetting knives at Branehog?" said Herr
+Arne, smiling. "The place lies two miles from here. Take up your
+spoon again and let us finish our supper."
+
+The old woman made an effort to overcome her terror. She took up
+her spoon and dipped it in the milk bowl, but in doing it her hand
+shook so that all could hear the spoon rattle against the edge.
+She put it down again at once. "How can I eat?" she said. "Do I
+not hear the whining of the whetstone, do I not hear it grating?"
+
+At this Herr Arne thrust the milk bowl away from him and clasped
+his hands. All the others did the same, and the curate began to
+say grace.
+
+When this was ended, Herr Arne looked down at those who sat along
+the table, and when he saw that they were pale and frightened, he
+was angry.
+
+He began to speak to them of the days when he had lately come to
+Bohuslen to preach the Lutheran doctrine. Then he and his servants
+were forced to fly from the Papists like wild beasts before the
+hunter. "Have we not seen our enemies lie in wait for us as we
+were on our way to the house of God? Have we not been driven out
+of the parsonage, and have we not been compelled to take to the
+woods like outlaws? Does it beseem us to play the coward and give
+ourselves up for lost on account of an evil omen?"
+
+As Herr Arne said this he looked like a valiant champion, and the
+others took heart anew on hearing him.
+
+"Ay, it is true," they thought. "God has protected Herr Arne
+through the greatest perils. He holds His hand over him. He will
+not let His servant perish."
+
+III
+
+As soon as Torarin drove out upon the road his dog Grim came up to
+him and jumped up on to the load. When Torarin saw that the dog
+had been waiting outside the parsonage his uneasiness came back.
+"What, Grim, why do you stay outside the gate all the evening? Why
+did you not go into the house and have your supper?" he said to
+the dog. "Can there be aught of ill awaiting Herr Arne? Maybe I
+have seen him for the last time. But even a strong man like him
+must one day die, and he is near ninety years old."
+
+He guided his horse into a road which led past the farm of
+Branehog to Odsmalskil.
+
+When he was come to Branehog he saw sledges standing in the yard
+and lights shining through the cracks of the closed shutters.
+
+Then Torarin said to Grim: "These folks are still up. I will go in
+and ask if they have been sharpening knives here tonight."
+
+He drove into the farmyard, but when he opened the door of the
+house he saw that a feast was being held. Upon the benches by the
+wall sat old men drinking ale, and in the middle of the room the
+young people played and sang.
+
+Torarin saw at once that no man here thought of making his weapon
+ready for a deed of blood. He slammed the door again and would
+have gone his way, but the host came after him. He asked Torarin
+to stay, since he had come, and led him into the room.
+
+Torarin sat for a good while enjoying himself and chatting with
+the peasants. They were in high good humour, and Torarin was glad
+to be rid of all his gloomy thoughts.
+
+But Torarin was not the only latecomer to the feast that evening.
+Long after him a man and a woman entered the door. They were
+poorly clad and lingered bashfully in the corner between door and
+fireplace.
+
+The host at once came forward to his two guests. He took the hand
+of each and led them up the room. Then he said to the others: "Is
+it not truly said that the shorter the way the more the delay?
+These are our nearest neighbors. Branehog had no other tenants
+besides them and me."
+
+"Say rather there are none but you," said the man. "You cannot
+call me a tenant. I am only a poor charcoal-burner whom you have
+allowed to settle on your land."
+
+The man seated himself beside Torarin and they began to converse.
+The newcomer told Torarin how it was he came so late to the feast.
+It was because their cabin had been visited by three strangers
+whom they durst not leave, three journeymen tanners who had been
+with them all day. When they came in the morning they were worn
+out and ailing; they said they had lost their way in the forest
+and had wandered about for a whole week. But after they had eaten
+and slept they soon recovered their strength, and when evening
+came they had asked which was the greatest and richest house
+thereabout, for thither they would go and seek for work. The wife
+had answered that the parsonage, where Herr Arne dwelt, was the
+best place. Then at once they had taken long knives out of their
+packs and begun to sharpen them. They were at this a good while,
+with such ferocious looks that the charcoal-burner and his wife
+durst not leave their home. "I can still see them as they sat
+grinding their knives," said the man. "They looked terrible with
+their great beards that had not been cut or tended for many a day,
+and they were clad in rough coats of skin, which were tattered and
+befouled. I thought I had three werewolves in the house with me,
+and I was glad when at last they took themselves off."
+
+When Torarin heard this he told the charcoal-burner what he
+himself had witnessed at the parsonage.
+
+"So it was true enough that this night they whetted knives at
+Branehog," said Torarin, laughing. He had drunk deeply, because of
+the sorrow and heaviness that were upon him when he came, seeking
+to comfort himself as best he could. "Now I am of good cheer
+again," said he, "since I am well assured it was no evil omen the
+parson's lady heard, but only these tanners making ready their
+gear."
+
+IV
+
+Long after midnight a couple of men came out of the house at
+Branehog to harness their horses and drive home.
+
+When they had come into the yard they saw a great fire flaring up
+against the sky in the north. They hastened back into the house
+and cried out: "Come out! Come out! Solberga parsonage is on
+fire!"
+
+There were many folks at the feast, and those who had a horse
+leapt upon his back and made haste to the parsonage; but those who
+had to run with their own swift feet were there almost as soon.
+
+When the people came to the parsonage nobody was to be seen, nor
+was there any sign of movement; all seemed to be asleep, though
+the flames rose high into the air.
+
+Yet it was none of the houses that burned, but a great pile of
+wood and straw and faggots that had been stacked against the wall
+of the old dwelling. It had not been burning long. The flames had
+done no more than blacken the sound timber of the wall and melt
+the snow on the thatched roof. But now they had begun to take hold
+of the thatch.
+
+Everyone saw at once that this was arson. They began to wonder
+whether Herr Arne and his wife were really asleep, or whether some
+evil had befallen them.
+
+But before the rescuers entered the house they took long poles and
+pulled away the burning faggots from the wall and clambered up to
+the roof to tear off the thatch, which had begun to smoke and was
+ready to catch fire.
+
+Then some of the men went to the door of the house to enter and
+call Herr Arne; but when the first man came to the threshold he
+turned aside and made way for him who came next.
+
+The second man took a step forward, but as he was about to grasp
+the door-handle he turned away and made room for those who stood
+behind him.
+
+It seemed a ghastly door to open, for a broad stream of blood
+trickled over the threshold and the handle was besmeared with
+blood.
+
+Then the door opened in their faces and Herr Arne's curate came
+out. He staggered toward the men with a deep wound in his head,
+and he was drenched with blood. For an instant he stood upright
+and raised his hand to command silence. Whereupon he spoke with
+the death rattle in his voice: "This night Herr Arne and all his
+household have been murdered by three men who climbed down through
+the smoke-hole in the roof and were clad in rough skins. They
+threw themselves upon us like wild beasts and slew us."
+
+He could utter no more. He fell down at the men's feet and was
+dead.
+
+They then entered the room and found all as the curate had said.
+
+The great oaken chest in which Herr Arne kept his money was gone,
+and Herr Arne's horse had been taken from the stable and his
+sledge from the shed.
+
+Sledge tracks led from the yard across the glebe meadows down to
+the sea, and twenty men hastened away to seize the murderers. But
+the women set themselves to laying out the dead and carried them
+from the bloody room out upon the pure snow.
+
+Not all of Herr Arne's household could be found; there was one
+missing. It was the poor little maid whom Herr Arne had taken into
+his house. There was much wondering whether, perchance, she had
+been able to escape, or whether the robbers had taken her with
+them.
+
+But when they made careful search through the room they found her
+hidden away between the great stove and the wall. She had kept
+herself concealed there throughout the struggle and had taken no
+hurt at all, but she was so sick with terror that she could
+neither speak nor answer a question.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+ON THE QUAYS
+
+
+
+The poor maid who had escaped the butchery had been taken by
+Torarin to Marstrand. He had conceived so great pity for her that
+he had offered her lodging in his cramped cabin and a share of the
+food which he and his mother ate.
+
+"This is the only thing I can do for Herr Arne," thought Torarin,
+"in return for all the times he has bought my fish and allowed me
+to sit at his table."
+
+"Poor and lowly as I am," thought Torarin, "it is better for the
+maid that she go with me to the town than that she stay here among
+the country folk. In Marstrand are many rich burgesses, and
+perhaps the young maid may take service with one of them and so be
+well cared for."
+
+When first the girl came to the town she sat and wept from morning
+to night. She bewailed Herr Arne and his household, and lamented
+that she had lost all who were dear to her. Most of all she wept
+for her foster sister, and said she wished she had not hidden
+herself against the wall, so that she might have shared death with
+her.
+
+Torarin's mother said nothing to this so long as her son was at
+home. But when he had gone on his travels again she said one
+morning to the girl:
+
+"I am not rich enough, Elsalill, to give you food and clothing
+that you may sit with your hands in your lap and nurse your
+sorrow. Come with me down to the quays and learn to clean fish."
+
+So Elsalill went with her down to the quays and stood all day
+working among the other fish cleaners.
+
+But most of the women on the quays were young and merry. They
+began to talk to Elsalill and asked her why she was so silent and
+sorrowful.
+
+Then Elsalill began to tell them of the terrible thing that had
+befallen her no more than three nights ago. She spoke of the three
+robbers who had broken into the house by the smoke-hole in the
+roof and murdered all who were near and dear to her.
+
+As Elsalill told her tale a black shadow fell across the table at
+which she worked. And when she looked up three fine gentlemen
+stood before her, wearing broad hats with long feathers and velvet
+clothes with great puffs, embroidered in silk and gold.
+
+One of them seemed to be of higher rank than the others; he was
+very pale, his chin was shaven, and his eyes sat deep in his head.
+He looked as though he had lately been ill. But in all else he
+seemed a gay and bold-faced cavalier, who walked on the sunny
+quays to show his fine clothes and his handsome face.
+
+Elsalill broke off both work and story. She stood looking at him
+with open mouth and staring eyes. And he smiled at her.
+
+"We are not come hither to frighten you, mistress," said he, "but
+to beg that we too may listen to your tale."
+
+Poor Elsalill! Never in her life had she seen such a man. She felt
+she could not speak in his presence; she merely held her peace and
+cast her eyes upon her work.
+
+The stranger began again: "Be not afraid of us, mistress! We are
+Scotsmen who have been in the service of King John of Sweden ten
+full years, but now have taken our discharge and are bound for
+home. We have come to Marstrand to find a ship for Scotland, but
+when we came hither we found every channel and firth frozen over,
+and here we must bide and wait. We have no business to employ us,
+and therefore we range about the quays to meet whom we may. We
+should be happy, mistress, if you would let us hear your tale."
+
+Elsalill knew that he had talked thus long to let her recover from
+her emotion. At last she thought to herself: "You can surely show
+that you are not too homely to speak to a noble gentleman,
+Elsalill! For you are a maiden of good birth and no fisher lass."
+
+"I was but telling of the great butchery at Solberga parsonage,"
+said Elsalill. "There are so many who have heard that story."
+
+"Yes," said the stranger, "but I did not know till now that any of
+Herr Arne's household had escaped alive."
+
+Then Elsalill told once more of the wild robbers' deed. She spoke
+of how the old serving-men had gathered about Herr Arne to protect
+him and how Herr Arne himself had snatched his sword from the wall
+and pressed upon the robbers, but they had overcome them all. And
+the old mistress had taken up her husband's sword and set upon the
+robbers, but they had only laughed at her and felled her to the
+floor with a billet of wood. And all the other women had crouched
+against the wall of the stove, but when the men were dead the
+robbers came and pulled them down and slew them. "The last they
+slew," said Elsalill, "was my dear foster sister. She begged for
+life so piteously, and two of them would have let her live; but
+the third said that all must die, and he thrust his knife into her
+heart."
+
+While Elsalill was speaking of murder and blood the three men
+stood still before her. They did not exchange a glance with each
+other, but their ears grew long with listening, and their eyes
+sparkled, and sometimes their lips parted so that the teeth
+glistened.
+
+Elsalill's eyes were full of tears; not once did she look up
+whilst she was speaking. She did not see that the man before her
+had the eyes and teeth of a wolf. Only when she had finished
+speaking did she dry her eyes and look up at him.
+
+But when he met Elsalill's glance his face changed in an instant.
+"Since you have seen the murderers so well, mistress," said he,
+"you would doubtless know them again if you met them?"
+
+"I have no more than seen them by the light of the brands they
+snatched from the hearth to light their murdering," said Elsalill;
+"but with God's help I'll surely know them again. And I pray to
+God daily that I may meet them." "What mean you by that,
+mistress?" asked the stranger. "Is it not true that the murderous
+vagabonds are dead?"
+
+"Indeed, I have heard so," said Elsalill. "The peasants who set
+out after them followed their tracks from the parsonage down to a
+hole in the ice. Thus far they saw tracks of sledge-runners upon
+the smooth ice, tracks of a horse's hoofs, tracks of men with
+heavy nailed boots. But beyond the hole no tracks led on across
+the ice, and therefore the peasants supposed them all dead."
+
+"And do you not believe them dead, Elsalill?" asked the stranger.
+
+"Oh, yes, I think they must be drowned," said Elsalill; "and yet I
+pray to God daily that they may have escaped. I speak to God in
+this wise: 'Let it be so that they have only driven the horse and
+the sledge into the hole, but have themselves escaped.'"
+
+"Why do you wish this, Elsalill?" asked the stranger.
+
+The tender maid Elsalill, she flung back her head and her eyes
+shone like fire. "I would they were alive that I might find them
+out and seize them. I would they were alive that I might tear
+their hearts out. I would they were alive that I might see their
+bodies quartered and spiked upon the wheel."
+
+"How do you think to bring all this about?" said the stranger.
+"For you are only a weak little maid."
+
+"If they were living," said Elsalill, "I should surely bring their
+punishment upon them. Rather would I go to my death than let them
+go free. Strong and mighty they may be, I know it, but they would
+not be able to escape me."
+
+At this the stranger smiled upon her, but Elsalill stamped her
+foot.
+
+"If they were living, should I not remember that they have taken
+my home from me, so that I am now a poor lass, compelled to stand
+here on the cold quay and clean fish? Should I not remember that
+they have slain all those near to me, and should I not remember
+most of all the man who plucked my foster sister from the wall and
+slew her who was so dear to me?"
+
+But when the tender little maid gave proof of such great wrath,
+the three Scottish campaigners burst out laughing. So full of
+merriment were they that they went off, lest Elsalill might take
+offence. They walked across the harbour and up a narrow alley
+which led to the market-place. But long after they were out of
+sight Elsalill heard their roars of loud and scornful laughter.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+THE MESSENGER
+
+
+
+A week after his death Herr Arne was buried in Solberga church,
+and on the same day an inquest was held upon the murder in the
+assize house at Branehog.
+
+Now Herr Arne's fame was such throughout Bohuslen, and so many
+people came together on the day of his funeral, both from the
+mainland and the islands, that it was as though an army had
+assembled about its leader. And so great a concourse moved between
+Solberga church and Branehog that toward evening not an inch of
+snow could be seen that had not been trampled by men's feet.
+
+But late in the evening, when all had gone their ways, came
+Torarin the fish hawker driving along the road from Branehog to
+Solberga.
+
+Torarin had talked with many men in the course of the day; again
+and again had he told the story of Herr Arne's death. He had been
+well entertained too at the assize and had been made to empty many
+a mug of ale with travellers from afar.
+
+Torarin felt dull and heavy and lay down upon his load. It
+saddened him to think that Herr Arne was gone, and as he
+approached the parsonage a yet more grievous thought began to
+torment him. "Grim, my dog," he said, "had I believed that warning
+of the knives I might have warded off the whole disaster. I often
+think of that, Grim, my dog. It disquiets my spirit, I feel as
+though I had had a part in taking Herr Arne's life. Now remember
+what I say--next time I hear such a thing I will hold it true and
+be guided by it!"
+
+Now while Torarin lay dozing upon his load with eyes half closed,
+his horse went on as he pleased, and on coming to Solberga
+parsonage he turned into the yard from old habit and went up to
+the stable door, Torarin being all unwitting. Only with the
+stopping of the sledge did he rise up and look about him; and then
+he fell a-shuddering, when he saw that he was in the yard of a
+house where so many people had been murdered no more than a week
+before.
+
+He seized the reins at once to turn his horse and drive into the
+road again, but at that moment he felt a hand upon his shoulder
+and looked round. Beside him stood old Olof the groom, who had
+served at the parsonage as long as Torarin could remember.
+
+"Have you such haste to leave our house tonight, Torarin?" said
+the man. "Let be and come indoors! Herr Arne sits there waiting
+for you."
+
+A thousand thoughts came into Torarin's head. He knew not whether
+he was dreaming or awake. Olof the groom, whom he saw standing
+alive and well beside him, he had seen a week before lying dead
+amongst the others with a great wound in his throat.
+
+Torarin took a firmer hold of the reins. He thought the best thing
+for him was to make off as soon as he could. But Olof the groom's
+hand still lay upon his shoulder, and the old fellow gave him no
+peace.
+
+Torarin racked his brains to find an excuse. "I had no thought of
+coming to disturb Herr Arne so late in the evening," said he. "My
+horse turned in here whilst I was unaware. I will go now and find
+a lodging for the night. If Herr Arne wishes to see me, I can well
+come again tomorrow."
+
+With this Torarin bent forward and struck his horse with the slack
+of the reins to make him move off.
+
+But at the same instant the parson's man was at the horse's head;
+he caught him by the bridle and forced him to stand still. "Cease
+your obstinacy, Torarin!" said the man. "Herr Arne is not yet gone
+to bed, he sits waiting for you. And you should know full well
+that you can have as good a night's lodging here as anywhere in
+the parish."
+
+Torarin was about to answer that he could not be served with
+lodging in a roofless house. But before speaking he raised his
+eyes to the dwelling house, and then he saw that the old timber
+hall stood unharmed and stately as before the fire. And yet that
+very morning Torarin had seen the naked rafters thrusting out into
+the air.
+
+He looked and looked and rubbed his eyes, but there was no doubt
+of it, the parsonage stood there unharmed, with thatch and snow
+upon its roof. He saw smoke and sparks streaming up through the
+louver, and rays of light gleaming through the illclosed shutters
+upon the snow.
+
+A man who travels far and wide on the cold highway knows no better
+sight than the gleam that steals out of a warm room. But the sight
+made Torarin even more terrified than before. He whipped up his
+horse till he reared and kicked, but not a step would he go from
+the stable door.
+
+"Come in with me, Torarin!" said the groom. "I thought you had
+enough remorse already over this business."
+
+Then Torarin remembered the promise he had made himself on the
+road and, though a moment before he had stood up and lashed his
+horse furiously, he was now meek as a lamb.
+
+"Well, Olof groom, here am I!" he said, and sprang down from the
+sledge. "It is true that I wish to have no more remorse over this
+business. Take me in to Herr Arne!"
+
+But it was with the heaviest steps he had ever known that Torarin
+went across the yard to the house.
+
+When the door was opened Torarin closed his eyes to avoid looking
+into the room, but he tried to take heart by thinking of Herr
+Arne. "He has given you many a good meal. He has bought your fish,
+even when his own larder was full. He has always shown you
+kindness in his lifetime, and assuredly he will not harm you after
+death. Mayhap he has a service to ask of you. You must not forget,
+Torarin, that we are to show gratitude to the dead as to the
+living."
+
+Torarin opened his eyes and looked down the room. He saw the great
+hall just as he had seen it before. He recognized the high brick
+stove and the woven tapestries that hung upon the walls. But he
+glanced many times from wall to wall before daring to raise his
+eyes to the table and the bench where Herr Arne had been wont to
+sit.
+
+At last he looked there, and then he saw Herr Arne himself sitting
+in the flesh at the head of the table with his wife on one side
+and his curate on the other, as he had seen him a week before. He
+seemed to have just finished his meal, the dish was thrust away,
+and his spoon lay on the table before him. All the old men and
+women servants were sitting at the table, but only one of the
+young maids.
+
+Torarin stood still a long time by the door and watched them that
+sat at table. They all looked anxious and mournful, and even Herr
+Arne was gloomy as the rest and supported his head in his hand.
+
+At last Torarin saw him raise his head.
+
+"Have you brought a stranger into the house with you, Olof groom?"
+
+"Yes," answered the man, "it is Torarin the fish hawker, who has
+been this day at the assize at Branehog."
+
+Herr Arne's looks seemed to grow more cheerful at this, and
+Torarin heard him say: "Come forward then, Torarin, and give us
+news of the assize! I have sat here and waited for half the
+night."
+
+All this had such a real and natural air that Torarin began to
+feel more and more courageous. He walked quite boldly across the
+room to Herr Arne, asking himself whether the murder was not an
+evil dream and whether Herr Arne was not in truth alive.
+
+But as Torarin crossed the room, his eyes from old habit sought
+the four-post bed, beside which the great money chest used to
+stand. But the ironbound chest was no longer in its place, and
+when Torarin saw that a shudder again passed through him.
+
+"Now Torarin is to tell us how things went at the assize today,"
+said Herr Arne.
+
+Torarin tried to do as he was bid and tell of the assize and the
+inquest, but he could command neither his lips nor his tongue, and
+his speech was faulty and stammering, so that Herr Arne stopped
+him at once. "Tell me only the main thing, Torarin. Were our
+murderers found and punished?"
+
+"No, Herr Arne," Torarin had the boldness to answer. "Your
+murderers lie at the bottom of Hakefjord. How would you have any
+take revenge on them?"
+
+When Torarin returned this answer Herr Arne's old temper seemed to
+be kindled within him and he smote the table hard. "What is that
+you say, Torarin? Has the Governor of Bohus been here with judges
+and clerks and held assize and has no man had the wit to tell him
+where he may find my murderers?"
+
+"No, Herr Arne," answered Torarin. "None among the living can tell
+him that."
+
+Herr Arne sat awhile with a frown on his brow, staring dismally
+before him. Then he turned once more to Torarin.
+
+"I know that you bear me affection, Torarin. Can you tell me how I
+may be revenged upon my murderers?"
+
+"I can well understand, Herr Arne," said Torarin, "that you wish
+to be revenged upon those who so cruelly have deprived you of your
+life. But there is none amongst us who walk God's earth that can
+help you in this."
+
+Herr Arne fell into a deep brooding when he heard this answer.
+
+There was a long silence. After a while Torarin ventured to put
+forward a request. "I have now fulfilled your desire, Herr Arne,
+and told you how it went at the assize. Have you aught else to ask
+me, or will you now let me go?"
+
+"You are not to go, Torarin," said Herr Arne, "until you have
+answered me once more whether none of the living can give us
+vengeance."
+
+"Not if all the men in Bohuslen and Norway came together to be
+revenged upon your murderers would they be able to find them,"
+said Torarin.
+
+Then said Herr Arne: "If the living cannot help us, we must help
+ourselves."
+
+With this Herr Arne began in a loud voice to say a paternoster,
+not in Norse but in Latin, as had been the use of the country
+before his time. And as he uttered each word of the prayer he
+pointed with his finger at one of those who sat with him at the
+table. He went through them all in this way many times, until he
+came to Amen. And as he spoke this word his finger pointed at the
+young maid who was his niece.
+
+The young maid rose at once from the bench, and Herr Arne said to
+her: "You know what you have to do."
+
+Then the young maiden lamented and said: "Do not send me upon this
+errand! It is too heavy a charge to lay upon so tender a maid as
+I."
+
+"You shall assuredly go," said Herr Arne. "It is right that you
+go, since you have most to revenge. None of us has been robbed of
+so many years of life as you, who are the youngest among us."
+
+"I desire not to be revenged on any man," said the maiden.
+
+"You are to go at once," said Herr Arne. "And you will not be
+alone. You know that there are two among the living who sat with
+us here at table a week ago."
+
+But when Torarin heard these words he thought they meant that Herr
+Arne charged him to contend with malefactors and murderers, and he
+cried out: "By the mercy of God I conjure you, Herr Arne--"
+
+At that moment it seemed to Torarin that both Herr Arne and the
+parsonage vanished in a mist, and he himself sank down as though
+he had fallen from a giddy height, and with that he lost
+consciousness.
+
+When he came to himself again dawn was breaking and he saw that he
+was lying on the ground in the yard of Solberga parsonage. His
+horse stood beside him with the sledge, and Grim barked and howled
+over him.
+
+"It was all but a dream," said Torarin; "now I see that. The house
+is deserted and in ruin. I have seen neither Herr Arne nor any
+other. But I was so startled by the dream that I fell off the
+load."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+IN THE MOONLIGHT
+
+
+
+When Herr Arne had been dead a fortnight there came some nights of
+clear, bright moonlight, and one evening Torarin was out with his
+sledge. He checked his horse time after time, as though he had
+difficulty in finding the way. Yet he was not driving through any
+trackless forest, but upon what looked like a wide and open plain,
+above which rose a number of rocky knolls.
+
+The whole tract was covered with glittering white snow. It had
+fallen in calm weather and lay evenly, not in drifts and eddies.
+As far as the eye could see there was nothing but the same even
+plain and the same rocky knolls.
+
+"Grim, my dog," said Torarin, "if we saw this tonight for the
+first time we should think we were driving over a great heath. But
+still we should wonder that the ground was so even and the road
+free from stones and ruts. What sort of tract can this be, we
+should say, where there are neither ditches nor fences, and how
+comes it that no grass or bushes stick up through the snow? And
+why do we see no rivers and streams, which elsewhere are wont to
+draw their black furrows through the white fields even in the
+hardest frost?"
+
+Torarin was delighted with these fancies, and Grim too found
+pleasure in them. He did not move from his place on the load, but
+lay still and blinked.
+
+But just as Torarin had finished speaking he drove past a lofty
+pole to which a broom was fastened.
+
+"If we were strangers here, Grim, my dog," said Torarin, "we might
+well ask ourselves what sort of heath this was, where they set up
+such marks as we use at sea. 'This can never be the sea itself?'
+we should say at last. But we should think it utterly impossible.
+This that lies so firm and fast, can this be only water? And all
+the rocky knolls that we see so firmly united, can they be only
+holms and skerries parted by the rolling waves? No, we should
+never believe it was possible, Grim, my dog."
+
+Torarin laughed and Grim still lay quiet and did not stir. Torarin
+drove on, until he rounded a high knoll. Then he gave a cry as
+though he had seen something strange. He put on an air of great
+surprise, dropped the reins and clapped his hands.
+
+"Grim, my dog, so you would not believe this was the sea! Now you
+can tell what it is. Stand up, and then you will see that there is
+a big ship lying before us! You would not recognize the beacons,
+but this you cannot mistake. Now I think you will not deny that
+this is the sea itself we are driving over."
+
+Torarin stayed still awhile longer as he gazed at a great vessel
+which lay frozen in. She looked altogether out of place as she lay
+with the smooth and even snowfields all about her.
+
+But when Torarin saw a thin column of smoke rising from the
+vessel's poop he drove up and hailed the skipper to hear if he
+would buy his fish. He had but a few codfish left at the bottom of
+his load, since in the course of the day he had been round to all
+the vessels which were frozen in among the islands, and sold off
+his stock.
+
+On board were the skipper and his crew, and time was heavy on
+their hands. They bought fish of the hawker, not because they
+needed it, but to have someone to talk to. When they came down on
+to the ice, Torarin put on an innocent air.
+
+He began to speak of the weather. "In the memory of man there has
+not been such fine weather as this year," said Torarin. "For
+wellnigh three weeks we have had calm weather and hard frost. This
+is not what we are used to in the islands."
+
+But the skipper, who lay there with his great gallias full-laden
+with herring barrels, and who had been caught by the ice in a bay
+near Marstrand just as he was ready to put to sea, gave Torarin a
+sharp look and said: "So then you call this fine weather?"
+
+"What should I call it else?" said Torarin, looking as innocent as
+a child. "The sky is clear and calm and blue, and the night is
+fair as the day. Never before have I known the time when I could
+drive about the ice week after week. It is not often the sea
+freezes out here, and if once and again the ice has formed, there
+has always come a storm to break it up a few days after."
+
+The skipper still looked black and glum; he made no answer to all
+Torarin's chat. Then Torarin began asking him why he never found
+his way to Marstrand. "It is no more than an hour's walk over the
+ice," said Torarin. But again he received no answer. Torarin could
+see that the man feared to leave his ship an instant, lest he
+might not be at hand when the ice broke up. "Seldom have I seen
+eyes so sick with longing," thought Torarin.
+
+But the skipper, who had been held ice-bound among the skerries
+day after day, unable to hoist his sails and put to sea, had been
+busy the while with many thoughts, and he said to Torarin: "You
+are a man who travels much abroad and hears much news of all that
+happens: can you tell me why God has barred the way to the sea so
+long this year, keeping us all in captivity?"
+
+As he said this Torarin ceased to smile, but put on an ignorant
+air and said: "I cannot see what you mean by that."
+
+"Well," said the skipper, "I once lay in the harbour of Bergen a
+whole month, and a contrary wind blew all that time, so that no
+ship could come out. But on board one of the ships that lay there
+wind-bound was a man who had robbed churches, and he would have
+gone free but for the storm. Now they had time to search him out,
+and as soon as he had been taken ashore there came good weather
+and a fair wind. Now do you understand what I mean when I ask you
+to tell me why God keeps the gates of the sea barred?"
+
+Torarin was silent awhile. He had a look as though he would make
+an earnest answer. But he turned it aside and said: "You have
+caught the melancholy with sitting here a prisoner among the
+skerries. Why do you not come in to Marstrand? I can tell you
+there is a merry life with hundreds of strangers in the town. They
+have naught else to do but drink and dance."
+
+"How can it be they are so merry there?" asked the skipper.
+
+"Oh," said Torarin, "there are all the seamen whose ships are
+frozen in like yours. There is a crowd of fishermen who had just
+finished their herring catch when the ice stayed them from sailing
+home. And there are a hundred Scottish mercenaries discharged from
+service, who lie here waiting for a ship to carry them home to
+Scotland. Do you think all these men would hang their heads and
+lose the chance of making merry?"
+
+"Ay, it may well be that they can divert themselves, but, as for
+me, I have a mind to stay out here."
+
+Torarin gave him a rapid glance. The skipper was a tall man and
+thin; his eyes were bright and clear as water, with a melancholy
+look in them. "To make that man merry is more than I or any other
+can do," thought Torarin.
+
+Again the skipper began of his own accord to ask a question.
+"These Scotsmen," he said, "are they honest folk?"
+
+"Is it you, maybe, that are to take them over to Scotland?" asked
+Torarin.
+
+"Well," said the skipper, "I have a cargo for Edinburgh, and one
+of them was here but now and asked me would I take them. But I
+have small liking to sail with such wild companions aboard and I
+asked for time to think on it. Have you heard aught of them? Think
+you I may venture to take them?"
+
+"I have heard no more of them but that they are brave men. I doubt
+not but you may safely take them."
+
+But no sooner had Torarin said this than his dog rose from the
+sledge, threw his nose in the air, and began to howl.
+
+Torarin broke off his praises of the Scotsmen at once. "What ails
+you now, Grim, my dog?" he said. "Do you think I stay here too
+long, wasting the time in talk?"
+
+He made ready to drive off. "Well, God be with you all!" he cried.
+
+Torarin drove in to Marstrand by the narrow channel between
+Klovero and Koo. When he had come within sight of the town, he
+noticed that he was not alone on the ice.
+
+In the bright moonlight he saw a tall man of proud bearing walking
+in the snow. He could see that he wore a plumed hat and rich
+clothes with ample puffs. "Hallo!" said Torarin to himself; "there
+goes Sir Archie, the leader of the Scots, who has been out this
+evening to bespeak a passage to Scotland."
+
+Torarin was so near to the man that he drove into the long shadow
+that followed him. His horse's hoofs were just touching the shadow
+of the hat plumes.
+
+"Grim," said Torarin, "shall we ask if he will drive with us to
+Marstrand?"
+
+The dog began to bristle up at once, but Torarin laid his hand
+upon his back. "Be quiet, Grim, my dog! I can see that you have no
+love for the Scotsmen."
+
+Sir Archie had not noticed that any one was so close to him. He
+walked on without looking round. Torarin turned very quietly to
+one side in order to pass him.
+
+But at that moment Torarin saw behind the Scottish gallant
+something that looked like another shadow. He saw something long
+and thin and gray, which floated over the white surface without
+leaving footprints in the snow or making it crunch.
+
+The Scotsman advanced with long and rapid strides, looking neither
+to the right hand nor to the left. But the gray shadow glided on
+behind him, so near that it seemed as though it would whisper
+something in his ear.
+
+Torarin drove slowly on till he came abreast of them. Then he
+could see the Scotsman's face in the bright moonlight. He walked
+with a frown on his brow and seemed vexed, as though full of
+thoughts that displeased him.
+
+Just as Torarin drove past, he turned about and looked behind him
+as though aware of someone following.
+
+Torarin saw plainly that behind Sir Archie stole a young maid in a
+long gray garment, but Sir Archie did not see her. When he turned
+his head she stood motionless, and Sir Archie's own shadow fell
+upon her, dark and broad, and hid her.
+
+Sir Archie turned again at once and pursued his way, and again the
+maiden hurried forward and made as though she would whisper in his
+ear.
+
+But when Torarin saw this his terror was more than he could bear.
+He cried aloud and whipped up his horse, so that it brought him at
+full gallop and dripping with sweat to the door of his cabin.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+HAUNTED
+
+
+
+The town with all its houses and buildings stood upon that side of
+Marstrand island which looked to landward and was protected by a
+wreath of holms and islets. There people swarmed in its streets
+and alleys; there lay the harbour, full of ships and boats, the
+quays, with folk busy gutting and salting fish; there lay the
+church and churchyard, the market and town hall, and there stood
+many a lofty tree and waved its green branches in summer time.
+
+But upon that half of Marstrand island which looked westward to
+the sea, unguarded by isles or skerries, there was nothing but
+bare and barren rocks and ragged headlands thrust out into the
+waves. Heather there was in brown tufts and prickly thorn bushes,
+holes of the otter and the fox, but never a path, never a house or
+any sign of man.
+
+Torarin's cabin stood high up on the ridge of the island, so that
+it had the town on one side and the wilderness on the other. And
+when Elsalill opened her door she came out upon broad, naked slabs
+of rock, from which she had a wide view to the westward, even to
+the dark horizon of the open sea.
+
+All the seamen and fishermen who lay icebound at Marstrand used to
+pass Torarin's cabin to climb the rocks and look for any sign of
+the ice parting in the coves and sounds.
+
+Elsalill stood many a time at the cottage door and followed with
+her eyes the men who mounted the ridge. She was sick at heart from
+the great sorrow that had befallen her, and she said to herself:
+"I think everyone is happy who has something to look for. But I
+have nothing in the wide world on which to fix my hopes."
+
+One evening Elsalill saw a tall man, who wore a broad-brimmed hat
+with a great feather, standing upon the rocks and gazing westward
+over the sea like all the others.
+
+And Elsalill knew at once that the man was Sir Archie, the leader
+of the Scots, who had talked with her on the quay.
+
+As he passed the cabin on his way home to the town, Elsalill was
+still standing in the doorway, and she was weeping.
+
+"Why do you weep?" he asked, stopping before her.
+
+"I weep because I have nothing to long for," said Elsalill. "When
+I saw you standing upon the rocks and looking out over the sea, I
+thought: 'He has surely a home beyond the water, and there he is
+going.'"
+
+Then Sir Archie's heart was softened, and it made him say: "It is
+many a year since any spoke to me of my home. God knows how it
+fares with my father's house. I left it when I was seventeen to
+serve in the wars abroad."
+
+On saying this Sir Archie entered the cottage with Elsalill and
+began to talk to her of his home.
+
+And Elsalill sat and listened to Sir Archie, who spoke both long
+and well. Each word that came from his lips made her feel happy.
+But when the time drew on for Sir Archie to go, he asked if he
+might kiss her.
+
+Then Elsalill said No, and would have slipped out of the door, but
+Sir Archie stood in her way and would have made her kiss him.
+
+At that moment the door of the cottage opened, and its mistress
+came in in great haste.
+
+Then Sir Archie drew back from Elsalill. He simply gave her his
+hand in farewell and hurried away.
+
+But Torarin's mother said to Elsalill: "It was well that you sent
+for me, for it is not fitting for a maid to sit alone in the house
+with such a man as Sir Archie. You know full well that a soldier
+of fortune has neither honour nor conscience."
+
+"Did I send for you?" asked Elsalill, astonished.
+
+"Yes," answered the old woman. "As I stood at work on the quay
+there came a little maid I had never seen before, and brought me
+word that you begged me to go home."
+
+"How did this maid look?" asked Elsalill.
+
+"I heeded her not so closely that I can tell you how she looked,"
+said the old woman. "But one thing I marked; she went so lightly
+upon the snow that not a sound was heard."
+
+When Elsalill heard this she turned very pale and said: "Then it
+must have been an angel from heaven who brought you the message
+and led you home."
+
+II
+
+Another time Sir Archie sat in Torarin's cabin and talked with
+Elsalill.
+
+There was no one beside them; they talked gaily together and were
+very cheerful.
+
+Sir Archie was telling Elsalill that she must go home with him to
+Scotland. There he would build her a castle and make her a fine
+lady. He told her she should have a hundred serving-maids to wait
+upon her, and she should dance at the court of the King.
+
+Elsalill sat silently listening to every word Sir Archie said to
+her, and she believed them all. And Sir Archie thought that never
+had he met a damsel so easy to beguile as Elsalill.
+
+Suddenly Sir Archie ceased speaking and looked down at his left
+hand.
+
+"What is it, Sir Archie? Why do you say no more?" asked Elsalill.
+
+Sir Archie opened and closed his hand convulsively. He turned it
+this way and that.
+
+"What is it, Sir Archie?" asked Elsalill. "Does your hand pain you
+on a sudden?"
+
+Then Sir Archie turned to Elsalill with a startled face and said:
+"Do you see this hair, Elsalill, that is wound about my hand? Do
+you see this lock of fair hair?"
+
+When he began to speak the girl saw nothing, but ere he had
+finished she saw a coil of fine, fair hair wind itself twice about
+Sir Archie's hand.
+
+And Elsalill sprang up in terror and cried out: "Sir Archie, whose
+hair is it that is bound about your hand?"
+
+Sir Archie looked at her in confusion, not knowing what to say.
+"It is real hair, Elsalill, I can feel it. It lies soft and cool
+about my hand. But whence did it come?"
+
+The maid sat staring at his hand, and it seemed that her eyes
+would fall out of her head.
+
+"So was it that my foster sister's hair was wound about the hand
+of him who murdered her," she said.
+
+But now Sir Archie burst into a laugh. He quickly drew back his
+hand.
+
+"Why," said he, "you and I, Elsalill, we are frightening ourselves
+like little children. It was nothing more than a bright sunbeam
+falling through the window."
+
+But the girl fell to weeping and said: "Now methinks I am
+crouching again by the stove and I can see the murderers at their
+work. Ah, but I hoped to the last they would not find my dear
+foster sister, but then one of them came and plucked her from the
+wall, and when she sought to escape he twined her hair about his
+hand and held her fast. And she fell on her knees before him and
+said: 'Have pity on my youth! Spare my life, let me live long
+enough to know why I have come into the world! I have done you no
+ill, why would you kill me? Why would you deny me my life?' But he
+paid no heed to her words and killed her."
+
+While Elsalill said this Sir Archie stood with a frown on his brow
+and turned his eyes away.
+
+"Ah, if I might one day meet that man!" said Elsalill. She stood
+before Sir Archie with clenched fists.
+
+"You cannot meet the man," said Sir Archie. "He is dead."
+
+But the maid threw herself upon the bench and sobbed. "Sir Archie,
+Sir Archie, why have you brought the dead into my thoughts? Now I
+must weep all evening and all night. Leave me, Sir Archie, for now
+I have no thought for any but the dead. Now I can only think upon
+my foster sister and how dear she was to me."
+
+And Sir Archie had no power to console her, but was banished by
+her tears and wailing and went back to his companions.
+
+III
+
+Sir Archie could not understand why his mind was always so full of
+heavy thoughts. He could never escape them, whether he drank with
+his companions, or whether he sat in talk with Elsalill. If he
+danced all night at the wharves they were still with him, and if
+he walked far and wide over the frozen sea, they followed him
+there.
+
+"Why am I ever forced to remember what I would fain forget?" Sir
+Archie asked himself. "It is as though someone were always
+stealing behind me and whispering in my ear.
+
+"It is as though someone were weaving a net about me," said Sir
+Archie, "to catch all my own thoughts and leave me none but this.
+I cannot see the pursuer who casts the net, but I can hear his
+step as he comes stealing after me."
+
+"It is as though a painter went before me and painted the same
+picture wherever my eyes may rest," said Sir Archie. "Whether I
+look to heaven or to earth I see naught else but this one thing."
+
+"It is as though a mason sat within my heart and chiselled out the
+same heavy care," said Sir Archie. "I cannot see this mason, but
+day and night I can hear the blows of his mallet as he hammers at
+my heart. 'Heart of stone, heart of stone,' he says, 'now you
+shall yield. Now I shall hammer into you a lasting care.'"
+
+Sir Archie had two friends, Sir Philip and Sir Reginald, who
+followed him wherever he went. They were grieved that he was
+always cast down and that nothing could avail to cheer him.
+
+"What is it that ails you?" they would say. "What makes your eyes
+burn so, and why are your cheeks so pale?"
+
+Sir Archie would not tell them what it was that tormented him. He
+thought: "What would my comrades say of me if they knew I yielded
+to these unmanly thoughts? They would no longer obey me if they
+found out that I was racked with remorse for a deed there was no
+avoiding."
+
+As they continued to press him, he said at last, to throw them off
+the scent: "Fortune is playing me strange tricks in these days.
+There is a girl I have a mind to win, but I cannot come at her.
+Something always stands in my way."
+
+"Maybe the maiden does not love you?" said Sir Reginald.
+
+"I surely think her heart is disposed toward me," said Sir Archie;
+"but there is something watching over her, so that I cannot win
+her."
+
+Then Sir Reginald and Sir Philip began to laugh and said: "Never
+fear, we'll get you the girl."
+
+That evening Elsalill was walking alone up the lane, coming from
+her work. She was tired and thought to herself: "This is a hard
+life and I find no joy in it. It sickens me to stand all day in
+the reek of fish. It sickens me to hear the other women laugh and
+jest in their rude voices. It sickens me to see the hungry gulls
+fly above the tables trying to snatch the fish out of my hands.
+Oh, that someone would come and take me away from here! I would
+follow him to the world's end."
+
+When Elsalill had reached the darkest part of the lane, Sir
+Reginald and Sir Philip came out of the shadow and greeted her.
+
+"Mistress Elsalill," they said, "we have a message for you from
+Sir Archie. He is lying sick at the inn. He longs to speak with
+you and begs you to accompany us home."
+
+Elsalill began to fear that Sir Archie might be grievously sick,
+and she turned at once and went with the two Scottish gallants who
+were to bring her to him.
+
+Sir Philip and Sir Reginald walked one on each side of her. They
+smiled at one another and thought that nothing could be easier
+than to delude Elsalill.
+
+Elsalill was in great haste; she almost ran down the lane. Sir
+Philip and Sir Reginald had to take long strides to keep up with
+her.
+
+But as Elsalill was making such haste to reach the inn, something
+began to roll before her feet. It seemed to have been thrown down
+in front of her, and she nearly stumbled over it.
+
+"What can it be that rolls on and on before my feet?" thought
+Elsalill. "It must be a stone that I have kicked from the ground
+and sent rolling down the hill."
+
+She was in such a hurry to reach Sir Archie that she did not like
+being hindered by the thing that rolled close before her feet. She
+kicked it aside, but it came back at once and rolled before her
+down the lane.
+
+Elsalill heard it ring like silver when she kicked it away, and
+she saw that it was bright and shining.
+
+"It is no common stone," she thought. "I believe it is a coin of
+silver." But she was in such haste to reach Sir Archie that she
+thought she had no time to pick it up.
+
+But again and again it rolled before her feet, and she thought:
+"You will go on the faster if you stoop down and pick it up. You
+can throw it far away if it is nothing."
+
+She stooped down and picked it up. It was a big silver coin and it
+shone white in her hand.
+
+"What is it that you have found in the street, mistress?" asked
+Sir Reginald. "It shines so white in the moonlight."
+
+At that moment they were passing one of the great storehouses,
+where foreign fisher-folk lodged while they lay at Marstrand.
+Before the entrance hung a lantern, which threw a feeble light
+upon the street.
+
+"Let us see what you have found, mistress," said Sir Philip,
+standing under the light.
+
+Elsalill held up the coin to the lantern, and hardly had she cast
+eye upon it when she cried out: "This is Herr Arne's money! I know
+it well. This is Herr Arne's money!"
+
+"What's that you say, mistress?" asked Sir Reginald. "What makes
+you say it is Herr Arne's money?"
+
+"I know the coin," said Elsalill. "I have often seen it in Herr
+Arne's hand. Yes, it is surely Herr Arne's money."
+
+"Shout not so loudly, mistress!" said Sir Philip. "People run here
+already to know the cause of this outcry."
+
+But Elsalill paid no heed to Sir Philip. She saw that the door of
+the warehouse stood open. A fire blazed in the midst of the floor
+and round about it sat a number of men conversing quietly and at
+leisure.
+
+Elsalill hastened in to them, holding the coin aloft. "Listen to
+me, every man!" she cried. "Now I know that Herr Arne's murderers
+are alive. Look here! I have found one of Herr Arne's coins."
+
+All the men turned toward her. She saw that Torarin the fish
+hawker sat among them.
+
+"What is that you tell us so noisily, my girl?" Torarin asked.
+"How can you know Herr Arne's moneys from any other?"
+
+"Well may I know this very piece of silver from any other," said
+Elsalill. "It is old and heavy, and it is chipped at the edge.
+Herr Arne told us that it came from the time of the old kings of
+Norway, and never would he part with it when he counted out money
+to pay for his goods."
+
+"Now you must tell us where you have found it, mistress," said
+another of the fishermen.
+
+"I found it rolling before me in the street," said Elsalill. "One
+of the murderers has surely dropped it there."
+
+"It may be as you say," said Torarin, "but what can we do in this
+matter? We cannot find the murderers by this alone, that you know
+they have walked in one of our streets."
+
+The fishermen were agreed that Torarin had spoken wisely. They
+settled themselves again about the fire.
+
+"Come home with me, Elsalill," said Torarin. "This is not an hour
+for a young maid to run about the streets of the town."
+
+As Torarin said this, Elsalill looked about for her companions.
+But Sir Reginald and Sir Philip had stolen away without her
+noticing their departure.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+IN THE TOWN CELLARS
+
+
+
+One morning the hostess of the Town Cellars at Marstrand threw
+open her doors to sweep the steps and the lobby, and then she
+caught sight of a young maid sitting on one of the steps and
+waiting. She was dressed in a long gray garment which was fastened
+with a belt at the waist. Her hair was fair, and it was neither
+bound nor braided, but hung down on either side of her face.
+
+As the door opened she went down the steps into the lobby, but it
+seemed to the hostess that she moved as though walking in her
+sleep. And all the time she kept her eyelids lowered and her arms
+pressed close to her side. The nearer she came, the more
+astonished was the hostess at the fragile slenderness of her form.
+Her face was fair, but it was delicate and transparent, as though
+it had been made of brittle glass.
+
+When she came down to the hostess she asked whether there was any
+work she could do, and offered her services.
+
+Then the hostess thought of all the wild companions whose habit it
+was to sit drinking ale and wine in her tavern, and she could not
+help smiling. "No, there is no place here for a little maid like
+you," she said.
+
+The maiden did not raise her eyes nor make the slightest movement,
+but she asked again to be taken into service. She desired neither
+board nor wages, she said, only to have a task to perform.
+
+"No," said the hostess, "if my own daughter were as you are, I
+should refuse her this. I wish you a better lot than to be servant
+here."
+
+The young maid went quietly up the steps, and the hostess stood
+watching her. She looked so small and helpless that the woman took
+pity on her.
+
+She called her back and said to her: "Maybe you run greater risks
+if you wander alone about the streets and alleys than if you come
+to me. You may stay with me today and wash the cups and dishes,
+and then I shall see what you are fit for."
+
+The hostess took her to a little closet she had contrived beyond
+the hall of the tavern. It was no bigger than a cupboard and had
+neither window nor loophole, but was only lighted by a hatch in
+the wall of the public room.
+
+"Stand here today," said the hostess to the maid, "and wash me all
+the cups and dishes I pass you through this hatch, then I shall
+see whether I can keep you in my service."
+
+The maiden went into the closet, and she moved so silently that
+the hostess thought it was like a dead woman slipping into her
+grave.
+
+She stood the whole day and spoke to none, nor ever leaned her
+head through the hatch to look at the folk who came and went in
+the tavern. And she did not touch the food that was set before
+her. Nobody heard her make a clatter as she washed, but whenever
+the hostess held out her hand to the hatch, she passed out clean
+cups and dishes without a speck on them.
+
+But when the hostess took them to set them out on the table, they
+were so cold that she thought they would sear the skin off her
+fingers. And she shuddered and said: "It is as though I took them
+from the cold hands of Death himself."
+
+II
+
+One day there had been no fish to clean on the quays, so that
+Elsalill had stayed at home. She sat at the spinning-wheel and was
+alone in the cottage. A good fire was burning on the hearth, and
+it was light enough in the room.
+
+In the midst of her work she felt a light breath, as though a cold
+breeze had swept over her forehead. She looked up and saw her dead
+foster sister standing beside her.
+
+Elsalill laid her hand on the wheel to stop it, and sat still,
+looking at her foster sister. At first she was afraid, but she
+thought to herself: "It is unworthy of me to be afraid of my
+foster sister. Whether she be dead or alive, I am still glad to
+see her."
+
+"Dear sister," she said to the dead girl, "is there aught you
+would have me do?"
+
+The other said to her in a voice that had neither strength nor
+tone: "My sister Elsalill, I am in service at the tavern, and the
+hostess has made me stand and wash cups and dishes all day. Now
+the evening is come and I am so tired that I can hold out no
+longer. I have come hither to ask if you will not give me your
+help."
+
+When Elsalill heard this it was as though a veil was drawn over
+her mind. She could no longer think nor wonder nor feel any fear.
+She only knew joy at seeing her foster sister again, and she
+answered: "Yes, dear sister, I will come straight and help you."
+
+Then the dead girl went to the door, and Elsalill followed her.
+But as they stood on the threshold her foster sister paused and
+said to Elsalill: "You must put on your cloak. There is a strong
+wind outside." And as she said this her voice sounded clearer and
+less muffled than before.
+
+Elsalill then took her cloak from the wall and wrapped it around
+her. She thought to herself: "My foster sister loves me still. She
+wishes me no evil. I am only happy that I may go with her wherever
+she may take me."
+
+And then she followed the dead girl through many streets, all the
+way from Torarin's cabin, which stood on a rocky slope, down to
+the level streets about the harbour and the market place.
+
+The dead girl always walked two paces in front of Elsalill. A
+heavy gale was blowing that evening, howling through the streets,
+and Elsalill noticed that when a violent gust would have flung her
+against the wall, the dead girl placed herself between her and the
+wind and screened her as well as she could with her slender body.
+
+When at last they came to the town hall the dead girl went down
+the cellar steps and beckoned Elsalill to follow her. But as they
+were going down the wind blew out the light in the lantern that
+hung in the lobby and they were in darkness. Then Elsalill did not
+know where to turn her steps and the dead girl had to put her hand
+on hers to lead her. But the dead girl's hand was so cold that
+Elsalill started and began to quake with fear. Then the dead girl
+drew her hand away and wound it in a corner of Elsalill's cloak
+before she led her on again. But Elsalill felt the icy chill
+through fur and lining.
+
+Now the dead girl led Elsalill through a long corridor and opened
+a door for her. They came into a little dark closet where a feeble
+light fell through a hatch in the wall. Elsalill saw that they
+were in a room where the scullery wench stood and scoured cups and
+dishes for the hostess to set out on the tables for her customers.
+Elsalill could just see that a pail of water stood upon a stool,
+and in the hatch were many cups and goblets that wanted rinsing.
+
+"Will you help me with this work tonight, Elsalill?" said the dead
+girl.
+
+"Yes, dear sister," said Elsalill, "you know I will help you with
+whatsoever you wish."
+
+Elsalill then took off her cloak, rolled up her sleeves and began
+the work.
+
+"Will you be very quiet and silent in here, Elsalill, so that the
+hostess may not know that I have found help?"
+
+"Yes, dear sister," said Elsalill; "you may be sure I will."
+
+"Then farewell, Elsalill," said the dead girl. "I have only one
+more thing to ask of you. And it is that you be not too angry with
+me for this thing."
+
+"Wherefore do you bid me farewell?" said Elsalill. "I will gladly
+come every evening and help you."
+
+"No, there is no need for you to come after this evening," said
+the dead girl. "I have good hope that tonight you will give me
+such help that my mission will now be ended."
+
+As they spoke thus Elsalill was already leaning over her work. All
+was still for a while, but then she felt a light breath on her
+forehead, as when the dead girl had come to her in Torarin's
+cabin. She looked up and saw that she was alone. Then she knew
+what it was that had felt like a faint breeze upon her face, and
+said to herself: "My dead foster sister has kissed my forehead
+before she parted from me."
+
+Elsalill now turned to her work and finished it. She rinsed out
+all the bowls and tankards and dried them. Then she looked in the
+hatch whether any more had been set in there, and finding none she
+stood at the hatch and looked out into the tavern.
+
+It was an hour of the day when there was usually little custom in
+the cellars. The hostess was absent from her bar and none of her
+tapsters was to be seen in the room. The place was empty, save for
+three men, who sat at the end of a long table. They were guests,
+but they seemed well at their ease, for one of them, who had
+emptied his tankard, went to the bar, filled it from one of the
+great tuns of ale and wine that stood there, and sat down again to
+drink.
+
+Elsalill felt as though she had come here from a strange world.
+Her thoughts were with her dead foster sister, and she could not
+clearly take in what she saw. It was a long while before she was
+aware that the three men at the table were well known and dear to
+her. For they who sat there were none other than Sir Archie and
+his two friends Sir Reginald and Sir Philip.
+
+For some days past Sir Archie had not visited Elsalill, and she
+was glad to see him. She was on the point of calling to him that
+she was there at hand; but then the thought came to her, how
+strange it was that he had ceased to visit her, and she kept
+silence. "Maybe his fancy has turned to another," thought
+Elsalill. "Maybe it is of her he is thinking."
+
+For Sir Archie sat a little apart from the others. He was silent
+and gazed steadily before him, without touching his drink. He took
+no part in the talk, and when his friends addressed a word to him,
+he was seldom at the pains to make them an answer.
+
+Elsalill could hear that the others were trying to put life into
+him. They asked him why he had left drinking, and even sought to
+persuade him that he should go and talk with Elsalill and so
+recover his good humour.
+
+"You are to pay no heed to me," said Sir Archie. "There is another
+that fills my thoughts. Still do I see her before me, and still do
+I hear the sound of her voice in my ears."
+
+And then Elsalill saw that Sir Archie was gazing at one of the
+massive pillars that upheld the cellar roof. She saw, too, what
+till then she had not marked, that her foster sister stood beside
+that pillar and looked upon Sir Archie. She stood there quite
+motionless in her gray habit, and it was not easy to discover her,
+as she stood so close against the pillar.
+
+Elsalill stood quite still looking into the room. She noted that
+her foster sister kept her eyes raised when she looked upon Sir
+Archie. During the whole time she was with Elsalill she had walked
+with her eyes upon the ground.
+
+Now her eyes were the only thing about her that was ghastly.
+Elsalill saw that they were dim and filmed. They had no glance,
+and the light was not mirrored in them any more.
+
+After a while Sir Archie began again to lament. "I see her every
+hour. She follows me wherever I go," he said.
+
+He sat with his face toward the pillar where the dead girl stood,
+and stared at her. But Elsalill was sure that he did not see her.
+It was not of her he spoke, but of one who was ever in his
+thoughts.
+
+Elsalill never left the hatch and followed with her eyes all that
+took place, thinking that most of all she wished to find out who
+it was that filled Sir Archie's thoughts.
+
+Suddenly she was aware that the dead girl had taken her place on
+the bench beside Sir Archie and was whispering in his ear.
+
+But still Sir Archie knew nothing of her being so close to him or
+of her whispering in his ear. He was only aware of her presence in
+the mortal dread that came over him.
+
+Elsalill saw that when the dead girl had sat for a few moments
+whispering to Sir Archie, he hid his face in his hands and wept.
+"Alas, would I had never found the maid!" he said. "I regret
+nothing else but that I did not let the maiden go when she begged
+me."
+
+The other two Scotsmen ceased drinking and looked in alarm at Sir
+Archie, who thus laid aside all his manliness and yielded to
+remorse. For a moment they were perplexed, but then one of them
+went up to the bar, took the tallest tankard that stood there and
+filled it with red wine. He brought it to Sir Archie, clapped him
+on the shoulder and said: "Drink, brother! Herr Arne's hoard is
+not yet done. So long as we have coin to buy such wine as this, no
+cares need sit upon us."
+
+But in the same instant as these words were spoken: "Drink,
+brother! Herr Arne's hoard is not yet done," Elsalill saw the dead
+girl rise from the bench and vanish.
+
+And in that moment Elsalill saw before her eyes three men with
+great beards and rough coats of skin, struggling with Herr Arne's
+servants. And now it was plain to her that they were the three who
+sat in the cellar--Sir Archie, Sir Philip, and Sir Reginald.
+
+III
+
+Elsalill came out of the closet where she had stood and rinsed the
+hostess's cups, and softly closed the door behind her. In the
+narrow corridor outside she stopped and stood motionless leaning
+against the wall for nearly an hour.
+
+As she stood there she thought to herself: "I cannot betray him.
+Let him be guilty of what evil he may, I love him with all my
+heart. I cannot send him to be broken upon the wheel. I cannot see
+them burn away his hands and feet."
+
+The storm that had raged all day became more and more violent as
+evening wore on, and Elsalill could hear its roar as she stood in
+the darkness.
+
+"Now the first storms of spring have come," she thought. "Now they
+have come in all their might to set the waters free and break up
+the ice. In a few days we shall have open sea, and then Sir Archie
+will sail from hence, never to return. No more misdeeds can he
+commit in this land. What profits it then if he be taken and
+suffer for his crime? Neither the dead nor the living have any
+comfort of it."
+
+Elsalill drew her cloak about her. She thought she would go home
+and sit quietly at her work without betraying her secret to any
+one.
+
+But before she had raised a foot to go, she changed her purpose
+and stayed.
+
+She stood still listening to the roaring of the gale. Again she
+thought of the coming of spring. The snow would disappear and the
+earth put on its garment of green.
+
+"Merciful heaven, what a spring will this be for me!" thought
+Elsalill. "No joy and no happiness can bloom for me after the
+chills of this winter.
+
+"No more than a year ago I was so happy when winter was past and
+spring came," she thought. "I remember one evening which was so
+fair that I could not sit within doors. So I took my foster sister
+by the hand, and we went out into the fields to fetch green
+boughs and deck the stove."
+
+She recalled to mind how she and her foster sister had walked along
+a green pathway.  And there by the side of the way they had seen a
+young birch that had been cut down.  The wood showed that it had
+been cut many days before.  But now they saw that the poor lopped
+tree had begun to put forth leaves and its buds were bursting.
+
+Then her foster sister had stopped and bent over the tree. "Ah,
+poor tree," she said, "what evil can you have done, that you are
+not suffered to die, though you are cut down?  What makes you put
+forth leaves, as though you still lived?"
+
+And Elsalill had laughed at her and answered: "Maybe it grows so
+sweet and green that he who cut it down may see the harm he has
+wrought and feel remorse."
+
+But her foster sister did not laugh with her, and there were tears
+in her eyes. "It is terrible for a dead man if he cannot rest in
+his grave.  They who are dead have small comfort to look for;
+neither love nor happiness can reach them. All the good they yet
+desire is that they may be left to sleep in peace. Well may I weep
+when you say this birch cannot die for thinking of its murderer.
+The hardest fate for one deprived of life is that he may not sleep
+in peace but must pursue his murderer. The dead have naught to
+long for but to be left to sleep in peace."
+
+When Elsalill recalled these words she began to weep and wring her
+hands.
+
+"My foster sister will not find rest in her grave," she said,
+"unless I betray my beloved. If I do not aid her in this, she must
+roam above ground without respite or repose. My poor foster
+sister, she has nothing more to hope for but to find peace in her
+grave, and that I cannot give her unless I send the man I love to
+be broken on the wheel."
+
+IV
+
+Sir Archie came out of the tavern and went through the long
+corridor. The lantern hanging from the roof had now been lighted
+again, and by its light he saw that a young maid stood leaning
+against the wall.
+
+She was so pale and stood so still that Sir Archie was afraid and
+thought: "There at last before my eyes stands the dead girl who
+haunts me every day."
+
+As Sir Archie went past Elsalill he laid his hand on hers to feel
+if it was really a dead girl standing there. And her hand was so
+cold that he could not say whether it belonged to the living or
+the dead.
+
+But as Sir Archie touched Elsalill's hand she drew it back, and
+then Sir Archie knew her again.
+
+He thought she had come there for his sake, and great was his joy
+to see her. At once a thought came to him: "Now I know what I will
+do, that the dead girl may be appeased and cease to haunt me."
+
+He took Elsalill's hands within his own and raised them to his
+lips. "God bless you for coming to me this evening, Elsalill!" he
+said.
+
+But Elsalill's heart was sore afflicted. She could not speak for
+tears, even so much as to tell Sir Archie she had not come there
+to meet him.
+
+Sir Archie stood silent a long while, but he held Elsalill's hands
+in his the whole time. And the longer he stood thus, the clearer
+and more handsome did his face become.
+
+"Elsalill," said Sir Archie, and he spoke very earnestly, "for
+many days I have not been able to see you, because I have been
+tormented by heavy thoughts. They have left me no peace, and I
+believed I should soon go out of my mind. But tonight it goes
+better with me and I no longer see before me the image that
+tormented me. And when I found you here, my heart told me what I
+had to do to be rid of my torment for all time."
+
+He bent down to look into Elsalill's eyes, but as she stood with
+drooping eyelids he went on: "You are angry with me, Elsalill,
+because I have not been to see you for many days. But I could not
+come, for when I saw you I was reminded even more of what tortured
+me. When I saw you I was forced to think even more of a young maid
+to whom I have done wrong. Many others have I wronged in my
+lifetime, Elsalill, but my conscience plagues me for naught else
+but what I did to this young maid."
+
+As Elsalill still said nothing, he took her hands again and raised
+them to his lips and kissed them.
+
+"Now, listen, Elsalill, to what my heart said to me when I saw you
+standing here and waiting for me. 'You have done injury to one
+maiden,' it said, 'and for what you have made her suffer, you must
+atone to another. You shall take her to wife, and you shall be so
+good to her that she shall never know sorrow. Such faithfulness
+shall you show her that your love will be greater on the day of
+your death than on your wedding day.'"
+
+Elsalill stood still as before with downcast eyes. Then Sir Archie
+laid his hand on her head and raised it. "You must tell me,
+Elsalill, whether you hear what I say," he said.
+
+Then he saw that Elsalill was weeping so violently that great
+tears ran down her cheeks.
+
+"Why do you weep, Elsalill?" asked Sir Archie.
+
+"I weep, Sir Archie," said Elsalill, "because I have too great
+love for you in my heart."
+
+Then Sir Archie came yet closer to Elsalill and put his arm around
+her. "Do you hear how the wind howls without?" said he. "That
+means that soon the ice will break up, and that ships again will
+be free to sail over to my native land. Tell me now, Elsalill,
+will you come with me, so that I may make good to you the evil I
+have done to another?"
+
+Sir Archie continued to whisper to Elsalill of the glorious life
+that awaited her, and Elsalill began to think to herself: "Alas,
+if only I did not know what evil he had done! Then I would go with
+him and live happily."
+
+Sir Archie came closer and closer to her, and when Elsalill looked
+up she saw that his face was bending over her and that he was
+about to kiss her on the forehead. Then she remembered the dead
+girl who had so lately been with her and kissed her. She tore
+herself free from Sir Archie and said: "No, Sir Archie, I will
+never go with you."
+
+"Yes," said Sir Archie, "you must come with me, Elsalill, or else
+I shall be drawn down to my destruction."
+
+He began to whisper to the girl ever more tenderly, and again she
+thought to herself: "Were it not more pleasing to God and men that
+he be allowed to atone for his evil life and become a righteous
+man? Whom can it profit if he be punished with death?"
+
+As these thoughts were in Elsalill's mind two men came by on their
+way to the tavern. When Sir Archie marked that they cast curious
+eyes on him and the maid, he said to her: "Come, Elsalill, I will
+take you home. I would not that any should see you had come to the
+tavern for me."
+
+Then Elsalill looked up, as though suddenly calling to mind that
+she had another duty to perform than that of listening to Sir
+Archie. But her heart smote her when she thought of betraying his
+crime. "If you deliver him to the hangman, I must break," her
+heart said to her. And Sir Archie drew the girl's cloak more
+tightly about her and led her out into the street. He walked with
+her all the way to Torarin's cabin, and she noticed that whenever
+the storm blew fiercely in their faces, he placed himself before
+her and screened her.
+
+Elsalill thought, all the time they were walking: "My dead foster
+sister knew nothing of this, that he would atone for his crime and
+become a good man."
+
+Sir Archie still whispered the tenderest words in Elsalill's ear.
+And the longer she listened to him, the more firmly she believed
+in him.
+
+"It must have been that I might hear Sir Archie whisper such words
+as these in my ear that my foster sister called me forth," she
+thought. "She loves me so dearly. She desires not my unhappiness
+but my happiness."
+
+And as they stopped before the cabin, Sir Archie asked Elsalill
+once more whether she would go with him across the sea. And
+Elsalill answered that with God's help she would go.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+UNREST
+
+
+
+Next day the storm had ceased. The weather was now milder, but it
+had caused little shrinking of the ice and the sea was closed as
+fast as ever.
+
+When Elsalill awoke in the morning she thought: "It is surely
+better that a wicked man repent and live according to God's
+commandments than that he be punished with death."
+
+That day Sir Archie sent a messenger to Elsalill, and he brought
+her a heavy armlet of gold.
+
+And Elsalill was glad that Sir Archie had thought of giving her
+pleasure, and she thanked the messenger and accepted the gift.
+
+But when he was gone she fell to thinking that this armlet had
+been bought for her with Herr Arne's money. When she thought of
+this she could not endure to look on it. She plucked it from her
+arm and threw it far away.
+
+"What will my life be, if I must always call to mind that I am
+living on Herr Arne's money?" she thought. "If I put a mouthful of
+food to my lips, must I not think of the stolen money? And if I
+have a new gown, will it not ring in my ears that it is bought
+with ill-gotten gold? Now at last I see that it is impossible for
+me to go with Sir Archie and join my life to his. I shall tell him
+this when he comes."
+
+When evening was drawing on, Sir Archie came to her. He was in
+cheerful mood, he had not been plagued with evil thoughts, and he
+believed it was owing to his promise to make good to one maiden
+the wrong he had done another.
+
+When Elsalill saw him and heard him speak she could not bring
+herself to tell him that she was sad at heart and would part from
+him.
+
+All the sorrows which gnawed at her were forgotten as she sat
+listening to Sir Archie.
+
+The next day was a Sunday, and Elsalill went to church. She was
+there both in the morning and in the evening.
+
+As she sat during the morning service listening to the sermon, she
+heard someone weeping and sobbing close by.
+
+She thought it was one of those who sat beside her in the pew, but
+whether she looked to right or left she saw none but calm and
+devout worshippers.
+
+Nevertheless, she plainly heard a sound of weeping, and it seemed
+so near to her that she might have touched the one who wept by
+putting out her hand.
+
+Elsalill sat listening to the sighing and sobbing, and thought to
+herself that she had never heard so sorrowful a sound.
+
+"Who is it that is afflicted with such deep grief that she must
+shed these bitter tears?" thought Elsalill.
+
+She looked behind her, and she leaned forward over the next pew to
+see. But all were sitting in silence, and no face was wet with
+tears.
+
+Then Elsalill thought there was no need to ask or wonder, for
+indeed she had known from the first who it was that wept beside
+her. "Dear sister," she whispered, "why do you not show yourself
+to me, as you did but lately? For you must know that I would
+gladly do all I may to dry your tears."
+
+She listened for an answer, but none came. All she heard was the
+sobbing of the dead girl beside her.
+
+Elsalill tried to hearken to what the preacher was saying in the
+pulpit, but she could follow little of it. And she grew impatient
+and whispered: "I know one who has more cause to weep than any,
+and that is myself. Had not my foster sister revealed her murderer
+to me I might have sat here with a heart full of joy."
+
+As she listened to the weeping she became more and more resentful,
+so that she thought: "How can my dead foster sister require of me
+that I shall betray the man I love? Never would she herself have
+done such a thing, if she had lived."
+
+She was shut up in the pew, but she could scarcely sit still. She
+rocked backward and forward and wrung her hands. "Now this will
+follow me all day," she thought. "Who knows," she went on, growing
+more and more anxious, "who knows whether it will not follow me
+through life?"
+
+But the sobbing beside her grew ever deeper and sadder, and at
+last her heart was touched in spite of herself, and she too began
+to weep. "She who weeps so must have a terribly heavy grief," she
+thought. "She must have to bear suffering heavier than any of the
+living can conceive."
+
+When the service was over and Elsalill had come out of church, she
+heard the sobbing no longer. But all the way home she wept to
+herself because her foster sister could find no peace in her
+grave.
+
+When the time of evensong came Elsalill went again to the church,
+being constrained to know whether her foster sister still sat
+there weeping.
+
+And as soon as Elsalill entered the church she heard her, and her
+soul trembled within her when she caught the sound of the sobbing.
+She felt her strength forsaking her and she had but one desire--to
+help the dead girl who was wandering among the living and knew no
+rest.
+
+When Elsalill came out of church it was still light enough for her
+to see that one of those who walked before her left bloody
+footprints in the snow.
+
+"Who can it be so poor that he goes barefoot and leaves bloody
+footprints in the snow?" she thought.
+
+All those who walked before her seemed to be well-to-do folk. They
+were neatly dressed and well shod.
+
+But the red footprints were not old. Elsalill could see they were
+made by one of the group that walked before her. "It is someone
+who is footsore from a long journey," she thought. "God grant he
+may not have far to go ere he find shelter and rest."
+
+She had a strong desire to know who it was that had made this
+weary pilgrimage, and she followed the footprints, though they led
+her away from her home.
+
+But suddenly she saw that all the church-goers had gone another
+way and that she was alone in the street. Nevertheless, the
+blood-red footprints were there as plain as before. "It is my poor
+foster sister who is going before me," she thought; and she owned
+to herself that she had guessed it all the time.
+
+"Alas, my poor foster sister, I thought you went so lightly upon
+earth that your feet did not touch the ground. But none among the
+living can know how painful your pilgrimage must be."
+
+The tears started to her eyes, and she sighed: "Could she but find
+peace in her grave! Woe is me that she must wander here so long,
+till she has worn her feet to bleeding!"
+
+"Stay, my dear foster sister!" she cried. "Stay, that I may speak
+to you!"
+
+But as she cried thus, she saw that the footprints fell yet faster
+in the snow, as though the dead girl were hastening her steps.
+
+"Now she flies from me. She looks no more for help from me," said
+Elsalill.
+
+The bloody footprints made her quite frantic, and she cried out:
+"My dear foster sister, I will do all you ask if only you may find
+rest in your grave!"
+
+So soon as Elsalill had uttered these words a tall, big woman who
+had followed her came up and laid a hand on her arm.
+
+"Who may you be, crying and wringing your hands here in the
+street?" the woman asked. "You call to my mind a little maid who
+came to me on Friday looking for a place and then ran away from
+me. Or perhaps you are the same?"
+
+"No, I am not the same," said Elsalill, "but if, as I think, you
+are the hostess of the Town Cellars, then I know what maid it is
+you speak of."
+
+"Then you can tell me why she took herself off and has not come
+back," said the hostess.
+
+"She left you," said Elsalill, "because she did not choose to hear
+the talk of all the evildoers who gather in your tavern."
+
+"Many a wild companion comes to my tavern," said the hostess, "but
+among them are no evildoers."
+
+"Yet the maid heard three that sat there talking among
+themselves," said Elsalill, "and one of them said: 'Drink,
+brother! Herr Arne's hoard is not yet done.'"
+
+When Elsalill had said these words she thought: "Now I have helped
+my foster sister and told what I heard. Now may God help me that
+this woman pay no heed to my words; so I shall be quit."
+
+But when she saw in the hostess's face that she believed her, she
+was afraid and would have run away.
+
+But before she had time to move, the hostess's heavy hand had
+taken firm hold of her so that she could not escape.
+
+"If you can witness that such words have been uttered in my
+tavern, mistress," said the hostess, "then you were best not to
+run away. For you must go with me to those who have the power to
+seize the murderers and bring them to justice."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+SIR ARCHIE'S FLIGHT
+
+
+
+Elsalill came into the tavern wrapt in her long cloak and went
+straight to a table where Sir Archie sat drinking with his
+friends. A crowd of customers sat about the tables in the cellar,
+but Elsalill took no heed of all the wondering glances that
+followed her, as she went and sat down beside the man she loved.
+Her only thought was to be with Sir Archie in the few moments of
+freedom which were left to him.
+
+When Sir Archie saw Elsalill come and sit by him, he rose and
+moved with her to a table that stood far down the room, hidden by
+a pillar. She could see that he was displeased at her coming to
+meet him in a place where it was not the custom for young maids to
+show themselves.
+
+"I have no long message to bring you, Sir Archie," said Elsalill;
+"but I would have you know that I cannot go with you to your own
+country."
+
+When Sir Archie heard Elsalill speak thus he was in despair, since
+he feared that, if he lost Elsalill, the evil thoughts would again
+take possession of him.
+
+"Why will you not go with me, Elsalill?" he asked.
+
+Elsalill was as pale as death. Her thoughts were so confused that
+she scarce knew what answer she made him.
+
+"It is a perilous thing to follow a soldier of fortune," she said.
+"For none can tell whether such a man will keep his plighted
+troth."
+
+Before Sir Archie had time to answer, a sailor came into the
+tavern.
+
+He went up to Sir Archie and told him he was sent by the skipper
+of the great gallias which lay in the ice behind Klovero. The
+skipper prayed Sir Archie and all his men to make ready their
+goods and come aboard that evening. The storm had sprung up again
+and the sea was clearing far away to the westward. It might well
+be that before daybreak they would have open water and could sail
+for Scotland.
+
+"You hear what this man says?" said Sir Archie to Elsalill. "Will
+you come with me?"
+
+"No," said Elsalill, "I will not go with you."
+
+But in her heart she was very glad, for she thought: "Now belike
+it will turn out so that he may escape ere the watch can come and
+seize him."
+
+Sir Archie rose and went over to Sir Philip and Sir Reginald and
+spoke to them of the message. "Get you back to the inn before me,"
+he said, "and make all ready. I have a word or two yet to say to
+Elsalill."
+
+When Elsalill saw that Sir Archie was coming back to her, she
+waved her hands as though to prevent him. "Why do you come back,
+Sir Archie?" she said. "Why do you not hasten down to the sea as
+fast as your feet may carry you?"
+
+For such was her love for Sir Archie. She had indeed betrayed him
+for her dear foster sister's sake, but her most fervent wish was
+that he might escape.
+
+"No, first will I beg you once more to come with me," said Sir
+Archie.
+
+"But you know, Sir Archie, that I cannot come with you," said
+Elsalill.
+
+"Why can you not?" said Sir Archie. "You are a poor orphan, so
+forlorn and friendless that none will care what becomes of you.
+But if you come with me, I will make you a noble lady. I am a
+powerful man in my own country. You shall be clad in silk and
+gold, and you shall tread a measure at the King's court."
+
+Elsalill was shaking with alarm at his delaying while flight was
+still open to him. She could scarce calm herself to answer: "Go
+hence, Sir Archie! You must tarry no longer to importune me."
+"There is something I would say to you, Elsalill," said Sir
+Archie, and his voice became more tender as he spoke. "When first
+I saw you, my only thought was of tempting and beguiling you. In
+the beginning I promised you riches in jest, but since two nights
+ago I have meant honestly by you. And now it is my purpose and
+desire to make you my wife. You may trust in me, as I am a
+gentleman and a soldier."
+
+At that moment Elsalill heard the march of armed men in the square
+outside. "If I go with him now," she thought, "he may yet escape.
+If I refuse, I drive him to destruction. It is for my sake he
+tarries here so long that the watch will lay hands on him. But how
+can I go with the man who has murdered all my dear ones?"
+
+"Sir Archie," said Elsalill, and she hoped her words might startle
+him, "Do you not hear the tramp of armed men in the square?"
+
+"Oh, yes, I hear it," said Sir Archie; "there has been some
+alehouse brawl, I doubt not. Let it not fright you, Elsalill; it
+is but some fishermen that have come to clapper-claws over their
+cups."
+
+"Sir Archie," said Elsalill, "do you not hear them stand before
+the town hall?"
+
+Elsalill was trembling from head to foot, but Sir Archie took no
+note of it; he was quite calm.
+
+"Where else would you have them stand?" said Sir Archie. "They
+must bring the brawlers here to lay them by the heels in the watch
+house. Listen not to them, Elsalill, but to me, who ask you to
+follow me over the sea!"
+
+But Elsalill tried once more to put fear into Sir Archie. "Sir
+Archie," she said, "do you not hear the watch coming down the steps
+to the cellar?"
+
+"Oh, yes, I hear them," said Sir Archie; "they will come here to
+empty a pot of ale, since their prisoners are safe under lock and
+key. Think not of them, Elsalill, but think how tomorrow you and I
+will be sailing the wide sea to my dear native land!"
+
+But Elsalill was pale as a corpse, and she shook so that she could
+scarce speak. "Sir Archie," she said, "do you not see them
+speaking with the hostess yonder at the bar? They are asking her
+whether any of those they seek is within."
+
+"I'll wager they are charging her to brew them a warm, strong
+drink this stormy night," said Sir Archie. "You need not quake and
+tremble so mightily, Elsalill. You can follow me without fear. I
+tell you that if my father would have me wed the noblest damsel in
+our land, I should now say her nay. Come with me over the sea in
+full security, Elsalill! Nothing awaits you there but joy and
+happiness."
+
+More and more of the pikemen had collected about the door, and
+Elsalill was now beside herself with terror. "I cannot look on
+while they come and seize him," she thought. She leaned toward Sir
+Archie and whispered to him: "Do you not hear, Sir Archie? They
+are asking the hostess whether any of Herr Arne's murderers is
+here within."
+
+Then Sir Archie threw a glance across the room and looked at the
+pikemen who were speaking with the hostess. But he did not rise
+and fly as Elsalill had expected: he bent down and looked deeply
+into her eyes. "Is it you, Elsalill, who have discovered and
+betrayed me?" he asked.
+
+"I have done it for my dear foster sister's sake, that she might
+have peace in her grave," said Elsalill. "God knows what it has
+cost me to do it. But now fly, Sir Archie! There is yet time. They
+have not yet barred all doors and lobbies."
+
+"You wolf's cub!" said Sir Archie. "When first I saw you on the
+quay I thought I ought to kill you."
+
+But Elsalill laid her hand on his arm. "Fly, Sir Archie! I cannot
+sit still and see them come and take you. If you will not fly
+without me, then in God's name I will go with you. But do not stay
+longer here for my sake, Sir Archie! I will do all you ask of me,
+if only you will save your life."
+
+But now Sir Archie was very angry, and he spoke scornfully to
+Elsalill. "Now, mistress, you shall never go in gold-embroidered
+shoes through lofty castle halls. Now you may stay in Marstrand
+all your days and gut herrings. Never shall you wed a man who has
+castle and lands, Elsalill. Your man shall be a poor fisherman and
+your dwelling a cabin on a cold rock."
+
+"Do you not hear them setting guards before all the doors to bar
+the way with their pikes?" asked Elsalill. "Why do you not hasten
+hence? Why do you not fly out upon the ice and hide yourself in a
+ship?"
+
+"I do not fly because I have a mind to sit and talk with
+Elsalill," said Sir Archie. "Are you thinking that now there is an
+end of all your joy, Elsalill? Are you thinking that now there is
+an end of my hope of atoning for my crime?"
+
+"Sir Archie," whispered Elsalill, rising from her seat in her
+terror; "now the men are all posted. Now they will catch and seize
+you. Make haste and fly! I shall come out to your ship, Sir
+Archie, if only you will fly."
+
+"You need not be so frightened, Elsalill," said Sir Archie. "We
+have some time left to talk together. These fellows have no
+stomach to set upon me here, where I can defend myself. They mean
+to take me in the narrow stair. They think to spit me on their
+long pikes. And that is what you have always wished me, Elsalill."
+
+But the more her terror gained on Elsalill, the calmer became Sir
+Archie. She never ceased praying him to fly, but he laughed at
+her.
+
+"You need not be so sure, mistress, that these fellows can take
+me. I have come through greater dangers than this. I'll warrant I
+was harder put to it some months since in Sweden. Some slanderers
+had told King John that his Scots guard was disloyal to him. And
+the King believed them. He threw the three commanders into dungeon
+and sent their men out of his realm, and had them guarded till
+they had passed the border."
+
+"Fly, Sir Archie, fly!" begged Elsalill.
+
+"You need not be troubled for me, Elsalill," said Sir Archie with
+a hard laugh. "This evening I am myself again, my old humour is
+come back. I see no more the young maid that haunted me, and I
+shall hold my own, never fear. I will tell you of those three who
+lay in King John's dungeon. They stole out of the tower one night,
+when their guards were drowsy with liquor, and ran their ways. And
+then they fled to the border. But so long as they were in the
+Swedish king's land they durst not betray themselves. They had no
+choice, Elsalill, but to make themselves rough coats of skin and
+give out that they were journeymen tanners travelling the country
+in search of work."
+
+Now Elsalill began to mark how changed Sir Archie was toward her.
+And she knew he hated her, since he had found out that she had
+betrayed him.
+
+"Speak not so, Sir Archie!" said Elsalill.
+
+"Why should you play me false, just when I trusted you most?" said
+Sir Archie. "Now I am again the man I was. Now none shall find me
+merciful. And now you'll see, Fortune will favour me, as she has
+done hitherto. Were we not in bad case, I and my comrades, when at
+last we had walked through all Sweden and come down to the coast
+here? We had no money to buy us honourable clothes. We had no
+money to pay for our shipping to Scotland. We knew no remedy but
+to break into Solberga parsonage."
+
+"Speak no more of that!" said Elsalill.
+
+"Yes, now you must hear all, Elsalill," said Sir Archie. "There is
+one thing you know not, and it is that when first we came into the
+house we went to Herr Arne, roused him, and told him he must give
+us money. If he gave it freely, we would not harm him. But Herr
+Arne resisted us with force, and so we had to strike him down. And
+when we had dispatched him, we had to make an end of all his
+household."
+
+Elsalill interrupted Sir Archie no more, but her heart felt cold
+and empty. She shuddered as she looked upon Sir Archie, for as he
+spoke a cruel and bloodthirsty look came over him. "What was I
+about to do?" she thought. "Have I been mad and loved the man who
+murdered all my dear ones? God forgive my sin!"
+
+"When we thought all were dead," said Sir Archie, "we dragged the
+heavy money chest out of the house. Then we set fire about it,
+that men might think Herr had been burnt alive."
+
+"I have loved a wolf of the woods," said Elsalill to herself. "And
+him I have tried to save from justice!"
+
+"But we drove down to the ice and fled to sea," Sir Archie went
+on. "We had no fear so long as we saw the flames mounting to the
+sky, but when we saw them die down we took alarm. We knew then
+that neighbours had come and put out the fire, and that we should
+be pursued. So we drove back toward land, for we had seen the
+outlet of a stream where the ice was thin. We lifted the chest
+from the sledge and drove forward till the ice broke under the
+horse's hoofs. Then we let it drown and sprang off to one side. If
+you were aught but a little maid, Elsalill, you would see that
+this was bravely done. We acquitted ourselves like men."
+
+Elsalill kept still; she felt a sharp pain tearing at her heart.
+But Sir Archie hated her and delighted to torment her. "Then we
+took our belts and fastened them to the chest and began to draw
+it. But as the chest left tracks in the ice, we went ashore and
+gathered twigs of spruce and laid them under the chest. Then we
+took off our boots and went over the ice without leaving a trace
+behind us."
+
+Sir Archie paused to throw a scornful glance at Elsalill.
+
+"Although we had prospered in all this, we were yet in bad case.
+Wherever we went our bloodstained clothes would betray us and we
+should be seized. But now listen, Elsalill, so that you may tell
+all those who would be at the pains to give us chase, that they
+may understand we are not of a sort to be lightly taken! Listen to
+this: As we came over the ice toward Marstrand here, we met our
+comrades and countrymen, who had been banished by King John from
+his land. They had not been able to leave Marstrand because of the
+ice, and they helped us in our need, so that we got clothes. Since
+then we have gone about here in Marstrand and been in no danger.
+And no danger would threaten us now, if you had not been faithless
+and played me false."
+
+Elsalill sat still. This was too great a grief for her. She could
+scarce feel her heart beating.
+
+But Sir Archie sprang up and cried: "And no ill shall befall us
+tonight either. Of that you shall be witness, Elsalill!"
+
+In an instant he seized Elsalill in both his arms and raised her
+off her feet. And with Elsalill before him as a shield Sir Archie
+ran through the tavern to the doorway. And the men who were posted
+to guard the door levelled their long pikes at him, but they durst
+not use them for fear of hurting Elsalill.
+
+When Sir Archie reached the narrow stair and the lobby, he held
+Elsalill before him in the same way. And she protected him better
+than the strongest armour, for the pikemen who were drawn up there
+could make no use of their weapons. Thus he came a good way up the
+steps, and Elsalill could feel the free air of heaven blowing
+about her.
+
+But Elsalill's love for Sir Archie was changed to the most deadly
+hatred, and her only thought was that he was a villain and a
+murderer. And when she saw that her body shielded him, so that he
+was likely to escape, she stretched out her hand and took hold of
+one of the watchmen's pikes and aimed it at her heart. "Now I will
+serve my foster sister, so that her mission shall be fulfilled at
+last," thought Elsalill. And at the next step Sir Archie took up
+the stairs, the pike entered Elsalill's heart.
+
+But then Sir Archie was already at the top of the stairway. And
+the pikemen fell back when they saw that one of them had hurt the
+maid. And he ran past them. When Sir Archie came out into the
+market-place he heard a Scottish war cry from one of the lanes: "A
+rescue! A rescue! For Scotland! For Scotland!"
+
+It was Sir Philip and Sir Reginald, who had mustered the Scots and
+now came to relieve him.
+
+And Sir Archie ran toward them and cried in a loud voice: "Hither
+to me! For Scotland! For Scotland!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+OVER THE ICE
+
+As Sir Archie walked out over the ice he still held Elsalill on
+his arm.
+
+Sir Philip and Sir Reginald walked beside him. They tried to tell
+him how they had discovered the trap laid for them and how they
+had succeeded in getting the heavy treasure chest away to the
+gallias and in collecting their countrymen; but Sir Archie paid no
+heed to their words. He seemed to be conversing with her he
+carried on his arm.
+
+"Who is that you carry there?" asked Sir Reginald.
+
+"It is Elsalill," answered Sir Archie. "I shall take her with me
+to Scotland. I will not leave her behind. Here she would never be
+aught but a poor fish wench."
+
+"No, that is like enough," said Sir Reginald.
+
+"Here none would give her clothes but of the coarsest wool," said
+Sir Archie, "and a narrow bed of hard planks to sleep on. But I
+shall spread her couch with the softest cushions, and her
+resting-place shall be made of marble. I shall wrap her in the
+costliest furs, and on her feet she shall wear jewelled shoes."
+
+"You intend her great honour," said Sir Reginald.
+
+"I cannot let her stay behind here," said Sir Archie, "for who
+among them would be mindful of such a poor creature? She would be
+forgotten by all ere many months were past. None would visit her
+abode, none would relieve her loneliness. But when once I reach
+home, I shall rear a stately dwelling for her. There shall her
+name stand graven in the hard stone, that none may forget it.
+There I myself shall come to her every day, and all shall be so
+splendidly devised that folk from far away shall come to visit
+her. There shall be lamps and candles burning night and day, and
+the sound of music and song shall make it seem a perpetual
+festival."
+
+The gale blew violently in their faces as they walked over the
+ice. It tore Elsalill's cloak loose and made it flutter like a
+banner.
+
+"Will you help me to carry Elsalill a moment," said Sir Archie,
+"while I wind her cloak about her?"
+
+Sir Reginald took Elsalill in his arms, but as he did so he was so
+terrified that he let her slip between his hands on to the ice. "I
+knew not that Elsalill was dead," he said.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+THE ROAR OF THE WAVES
+
+All night the skipper of the great gallias walked back and forth
+on his lofty poop. It was dark, and the gale howled around him,
+lashing him with sleet and rain. But the ice still lay firm and
+fast about the vessel, so that the skipper might just as well have
+slept quietly in his berth.
+
+But he stayed up the whole night. Time after time he put his hand
+to his ear and listened.
+
+It was not easy to say what he was listening for. He had all his
+crew on board, as well as all the passengers he was to carry over
+to Scotland. Every one of them lay below decks fast asleep, and
+there was no sound of talk to which the skipper might be
+listening.
+
+As the storm came sweeping over the icebound gallias it threw
+itself upon the vessel, as though from old habit it would drive
+her through the water. And as the ship still stood fast the wind
+took hold of her again and again. It rattled all the little
+icicles that hung from her ropes and tackles, it made her timbers
+creak and groan. Her masts were strained and gave loud cracks, as
+though they would go by the board.
+
+It was no quiet night. There was a muffled rustling in the air, as
+the snow came whizzing past; there was a patter and splash as the
+rain came pelting down.
+
+And in the ice one crack after another opened with a noise like
+thunder, as though ships of war had been at sea exchanging heavy
+salvoes.
+
+But to none of this was the skipper listening.
+
+He stayed up the whole night, until a gray dawn spread over the
+sky; but still he did not hear the sound he was waiting for.
+
+At last a singing, monotonous murmur was borne upon the night air,
+a rocking, caressing sound as of distant music.
+
+Then the skipper hurried across the rowers' thwarts amidships to
+the lofty forecastle where his crew slept. "Turn out," he called
+to them, "and take your oars and boat-hooks! The time is almost
+come when we shall be free. I hear the roar of open water. I hear
+the song of the free waves."
+
+The men left sleeping and came out at once. They posted themselves
+along the ship's sides, while the day slowly dawned.
+
+When at last it was light enough for them to see what changes the
+night had brought, they found that all the creeks and channels
+were open far out to sea, but in the bay where they were frozen in
+not a fissure could be seen in the ice, which lay firm and
+unbroken.
+
+And in the channel which led out of this bay the ice had piled
+itself up into a high wall. The waves in their free play outside
+continually cast up floating ice upon it.
+
+In the sound between the skerries there was a swarm of sails. All
+the fishing-boats which had lain icebound off Marstrand were now
+streaming out. The sea ran high and blocks of ice still floated
+among the waves, but the fishermen seemed to think they had no
+time to wait for safe and calm water, and they had set sail. They
+stood in the bows of their boats and kept a sharp lookout. Small
+blocks of ice they fended off with an oar, but when the big ones
+came they put the helm over and bore away. On the high poop of the
+gallias the skipper stood and watched them. He could see that they
+had their troubles, but he saw too that one boat after another
+wriggled through and came out into the open sea.
+
+And when the skipper saw the sails gliding over the blue water, he
+felt his disappointment so bitterly that tears came into his eyes.
+
+But his ship lay still, and before him the wall of ice was piling
+up higher and higher.
+
+The sea outside bore not only ships and boats, but sometimes small
+white icebergs came floating past. They were big ice-floes that
+had been thrown one upon another and were now sailing southward.
+They shone like silver in the morning sun, and now and then they
+showed as pink as though they had been strewed with roses.
+
+But high up among the whistling of the wind loud cries were heard,
+now like singing voices, now like pealing trumpets. There was a
+sound of jubilation in these cries, swelling the heart of him who
+heard them. They came from a long flight of swans on their way
+from the south.
+
+But when the skipper saw the icebergs moving southward and the
+swans flying to the north such longing seized him that he wrung
+his hands. "Woe's me, that I must lie here!" he said. "Will the
+ice never break up in this bay? I may lie waiting here many days
+yet."
+
+Just as he said this, he saw a man come driving on the ice. He
+came out of a narrow channel on the Marstrand side, and he drove
+as calmly on the ice as if he did not know the waves had begun
+once more to carry ships and boats.
+
+As he drove under the stern of the gallias he hailed the skipper:
+"Ho, you there, frozen in the ice, do you lack food aboard? Will
+you buy my salt herring or dried ling or smoked eel?"
+
+The skipper did not trouble to answer him. He only shook his fist
+at him and swore.
+
+Then the fish hawker stepped off his load. He took a bunch of hay
+from the sledge and laid it in front of his horse. Then he climbed
+up on the deck of the gallias. When he faced the skipper he said
+to him very earnestly:
+
+"Today I have not come to sell fish. But I know that you are a
+God-fearing man. Therefore I have come to ask your help to find a
+maiden whom the Scotsmen brought out to your ship with them
+yester-night."
+
+"I know naught of their bringing any maiden with them," said the
+skipper. "I have heard no woman's voice aboard the ship tonight."
+
+"I am Torarin the fish hawker," said the other; "maybe you have
+heard of me? It was I who supped with Herr Arne at Solberga
+parsonage the same night he was murdered. Since then I have had
+Herr Arne's foster daughter under my roof, but last night she was
+stolen away by his murderers, and they have surely brought her
+with them to your vessel."
+
+"Are Herr Arne's murderers aboard my vessel?" asked the skipper in
+dismay.
+
+"You see that I am a poor and feeble man," said Torarin. "I have a
+palsied arm, and therefore I am fearful of taking upon myself any
+bold and hazardous thing. I have known these many days who were
+Herr Arne's murderers, but I have not dared to bring them to
+justice. And because I have held my peace they have made their
+escape and have found occasion to carry the maiden with them. But
+now I have said to myself that I will have no more of my
+conscience in this matter. At least I will try to save the little
+maid."
+
+"If Herr Arne's murderers are on board my ship, why does not the
+watch come out and arrest them?"
+
+"I have begged and prayed them all this night and morning," said
+Torarin, "but the watch durst not come out. They say there are a
+hundred men-at-arms on board, and with them they durst not
+contend. Then I thought, in God's name I must come out here alone
+and beg you help me to find the maiden, for I know you to be a
+God-fearing man."
+
+But the skipper paid no heed to his question of the maiden; his
+mind was full of the other matter. "What makes you sure that the
+murderers are on board?" he said.
+
+Torarin pointed to a great oaken chest which stood between the
+rowers' thwarts. "I have seen that chest too often in Herr Arne's
+house to be mistaken," he said. "In it is Herr Arne's money, and
+where his money is, there you will find his murderers."
+
+"That chest belongs to Sir Archie and his two friends, Sir
+Reginald and Sir Philip," said the skipper.
+
+"Ay," said Torarin, looking at him fixedly; "that is so. It
+belongs to Sir Archie and Sir Philip and Sir Reginald."
+
+The skipper stood silent awhile and looked this way and that.
+"When think you the ice will break up in this bay?" he said to
+Torarin.
+
+"There is something strange in it this year," said Torarin. "In
+this bay we have always seen the ice break up early, for there is
+a strong current. But as it shapes now you must have a care that
+you be not thrust against the land when the ice begins to move."
+
+"I think of naught else," said the skipper.
+
+Again he stood silent for a while and turned his face toward the
+sea. The morning sun shone high in the sky, and the waves
+reflected its radiance. The liberated vessels scudded this way and
+that, and the sea birds came flying from the south with joyous
+cries. The fish lay near the surface and glittered in the sun as
+they leapt high out of the water, wanton after their long
+imprisonment under the ice. The gulls, which had been circling out
+beyond the edge of the ice, came in great flocks toward land to
+fish in their old waters.
+
+The skipper could not endure this sight. "Shall I be counted the
+friend of murderers and evildoers?" he said. "Can I close my eyes
+and refuse to see why God keeps the gates of the sea barred
+against my vessel? Shall I be destroyed for the sake of the
+unrighteous who have taken refuge with me?"
+
+And the skipper went forward and said to his men: "Now I know why
+we have been held back while all other ships have put to sea. It
+is because we have murderers and evildoers on board."
+
+Then the skipper went to the Scottish men-at-arms, who still lay
+asleep in the ship's hold. "Listen," he said to them; "keep you
+quiet yet awhile, no matter what cries or tumult you may hear on
+board. We must follow God's commandment and not suffer evildoers
+amongst us. If you obey me I promise to bring you the chest which
+holds Herr Arne's money, and you shall share it among you."
+
+But to Torarin the skipper said: "Go down to your sledge and cast
+your fish out on the ice. You shall have other freight anon."
+
+Then the skipper and his men broke into the cabin where Sir Archie
+and his friends slept. And they threw themselves upon them to bind
+them while they still lay asleep.
+
+And when the three Scotsmen tried to defend themselves, they smote
+them hard with their axes and handspikes, and the skipper said to
+them: "You are murderers and evildoers. How could you think to
+escape punishment? Know you not that it is for your sake God keeps
+all the gates of the sea closed?"
+
+Then the three men cried aloud to their comrades, bidding them
+come and help them.
+
+"You need not call to them," said the skipper. "They will not
+come. They have gotten Herr Arne's hoard to share amongst them,
+and are even now measuring out silver coin in their hats. For the
+sake of this money the evil deed was done, and this money has now
+brought retribution upon you."
+
+And before Torarin had finished unloading the fish from his
+sledge, the skipper and his men came down on to the ice. They
+brought with them three men securely bound. They were grievously
+hurt and fainting from their wounds.
+
+"God has not called on me in vain," said the skipper. "As soon as
+His will was clear to me, I hearkened to it."
+
+They laid the prisoners on the sledge, and Torarin drove with them
+by creeks and narrow sounds where the ice still lay firm, until he
+came to Marstrand.
+
+Now late in the afternoon the skipper stood on the lofty poop of
+his vessel and looked out to seaward. Nothing was changed around
+the vessel, and the wall of ice towered ever higher before her.
+
+Then the skipper saw a long procession of people coming out to his
+ship. All the women of Marstrand were there, both young and old.
+They all wore mourning weeds, and they brought with them a group
+of boys who carried a bier.
+
+When they were come to the gallias, they said to the skipper: "We
+are come to fetch a young maiden who is dead. Those murderers have
+confessed that she gave her life to hinder their escape, and now
+we, all the women of Marstrand, are come to bring her to our town
+with all the honour that is her due."
+
+Then Elsalill was found and brought down to the ice and borne in
+to Marstrand; and all the women in the place wept over the young
+maid, who had loved an evildoer and given her life to destroy him
+she loved. But even as the line of women advanced, the wind and
+waves broke in behind them and tore up the ice over which they had
+but lately passed; and when they came to Marstrand with Elsalill,
+all the gates of the sea stood open.
+
+THE END
+
+
+FOREWORD
+
+
+
+
+The Treasure is an opposite fairy tale, presenting Prince Charming
+as he really is: an orphan girl is cleaning fish and foreseeing
+her life of poverty; a man well-dressed in seductive splendor woos
+her and offers her ... forever after. There is only one catch: she
+must betray her sister.
+
+Although Selma Lagerlof won the Nobel Prize for literature in
+1909, her name is known in this country--if at all--as author of a
+children's book only. All her other works, including novels and
+feminist essays, have been unavailable in English for almost fifty
+years.
+
+In 1911, she made a speech entitled "Home and State" to the
+International Woman Suffrage Alliance Congress. She argued, first,
+that the Home was the creation of woman and the place where the
+values of women were nourished and protected. The Home was a
+community where "punishment is not for the sake of revenge, but
+for training and education," where "there is a use for all
+talents, but [she] who is without can make [her] self as much
+loved as the cleverest." It was the "storehouse for the songs and
+legends of our fore-fathers," and, she said, "there is nothing
+more mobile, more merciful amongst the creations of [humankind]."
+Although not all homes are good, good and happy homes do sometimes
+exist. Men by themselves, on the other hand, were responsible for
+creating the State which "continually gives cause for discontent
+and bitterness." There has never been a State which could satisfy
+all its members, which did not ask to be reformed from its very
+foundations. Yet it is through the State that humankind will reach
+its highest hopes. Her conclusion: women must add their special
+virtues, what she calls "God's spirit," to the "law and order"
+goals of men.
+
+Selma Lagerlof's own home was a community of family and servants,
+within which she experienced profound affections--for the
+nursemaid who carried her as a crippled child upon her back, for
+the old housekeeper, her younger sister, her grandmother who told
+the children stories every afternoon. She never married; she spent
+her entire life within communities of women, and her career could
+be described as the author being handed up to greatness by a
+procession of women who gave encouragement, advice, editorial
+help, criticism, contacts, companionship. She called Frederika
+Bremer the first feminist and "last old Mamsell" of Sweden,
+meaning that Frederika Bremer's life's work had banished the "old
+maid" from the realm of pitiful figures. Selma Lagerlof was
+herself proof of her statement.
+
+In The Treasure, written midway between her farewell to Frederika
+Bremer and her plea for woman suffrage, the men are interested in
+money, murder, and revenge. They miss the evil apparent even to
+their dogs. When the old mistress (and who should know better that
+the home is threatened?) warns that knives are being sharpened two
+miles away, her lord refuses to believe that she could hear what
+he cannot. The fishpeddler's dog has instinct enough to balk and
+howl, sensing death; the fishpeddler's wife and the woman
+tavern-keeper respond to the supernatural however little they
+understand; the men turn their backs on understanding even when
+they are being implored.
+
+But the thrust of the story deals with the maiden Elsalill's
+painful struggle to choose between her dearest sister, who has had
+to wander so long on earth "she has worn her feet to bleeding" and
+can find grave's rest only if her murderer is apprehended; and Sir
+Archie, the murderer himself, whom Elsalill loves with all her
+heart.
+
+Sir Archie is a subtle Prince Charming; he understands innocence
+and tempts Elsalill mightily: "You are a poor orphan, so forlorn
+and friendless that none will care what becomes of you. But if you
+come with me, I will make you a noble lady. I am a powerful man in
+my own country. You shall be clad in silk and gold, and you shall
+tread a measure at the King's court."
+
+Even after Elsalill knows that her love is the murderer of her
+sister, she still hopes to escape the action this knowledge
+demands: she tries to persuade herself that because he wants to
+make up to Elsalill for the evil he did to her sister, she should
+give him a chance to save his soul. She thinks that her sister
+does not know he will atone for his sin and become a good man; her
+sister could not wish her unhappiness; how can she ask that
+Elsalill betray the man she loves?
+
+But she hears her sister weep and she sees her sister's blood on
+the snow, and she turns him in quickly, hoping that will be
+enough. It isn't. Her choice requires that she give her life.
+
+At the book's end Sir Archie, still clinging to his belief in
+money-power, still trying to use her saintliness to save his own
+soul, says he will erect a grand monument to her memory. He
+believes that if he leaves her body in Marstand she will have only
+a pauper's grave and be soon forgotten. An exactly opposite event
+occurs. A long procession walks out across the ice toward the
+ship; all the women of Marstand, young and old, are coming to
+retrieve Elsalill's body and carry her back "with all the honor
+that is her due."
+
+The Treasure is a fable, a fairytale, an allegory of sisterhood
+itself. There is good reason that this book has been out of print
+for two generations. Daughters, Inc. is proud to retrieve Selma
+Lagerlof and publish her in English once again--with all the honor
+that is her due.
+
+June Arnold Plainfield, Vermont 1973
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Treasure, by Selma Lagerlof
+
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Treasure, by Selma Lagerlof
+
+Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the
+copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing
+this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook.
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+**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971**
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+*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!*****
+
+
+Title: The Treasure
+
+Author: Selma Lagerlof
+
+Release Date: February, 2004  [EBook #5161]
+[This file was first posted on May 24, 2002]
+[Most recently updated: October 15, 2003]
+
+Edition: 10
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: US-ASCII
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE TREASURE ***
+
+
+
+
+E-text prepared by Nicole Apostola, Charles Franks, and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team. John Mark Ockerbloom provided additional
+information about the original edition.
+
+
+
+The Treasure
+
+By Selma Lagerlof
+
+
+Contents
+
+   I.  At Solberga Parsonage
+  II.  On the Quays
+ III.  The Messenger
+  IV.  In the Moonlight
+   V.  Haunted
+  VI.  In the Town Cellars
+ VII.  Unrest
+VIII.  Sir Archie's Flight
+  IX.  Over the Ice
+   X.  The Roar of the Waves
+
+Because the Foreword contains key elements about the end of the book,
+it is located at the end of the e-text.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+AT SOLBERGA PARSONAGE
+
+
+
+In the days when King Frederik the Second of Denmark ruled over
+Bohuslen [FOOTNOTE: Frederik the Second reigned from 1544 to
+1588.  At that time, Bohuslen, now a province of southwest Sweden,
+formed part of Norway and was under the Danish Crown.--Trans.]
+there dwelt at Marstrand a poor hawker of fish, whose name was
+Torarin. This man was infirm and of humble condition; he had a
+palsied arm, which made him unfit to take his place in a boat for
+fishing or pulling an oar. As he could not earn his livelihood at sea
+like all the other men of the skerries, he went about selling salted
+and dried fish among the people of the mainland. Not many days
+in the year did he spend at home; he was constantly on the road
+from one village to another with his load of fish.
+
+One February day, as dusk was drawing on, Torarin came driving
+along the road which led from Kungshall up to the parish of
+Solberga. The road was a lonely one, altogether deserted, but this
+was no reason for Torarin to hold his tongue. Beside him on the
+sledge he had a trusty friend with whom to chat. This was a little
+black dog with shaggy coat, and Torarin called him Grim. He lay
+still most of the time, with his head sunk between his feet, and
+answered only by blinking to all his master said. But if his ear
+caught anything that displeased him, he stood up on the load, put
+his nose in the air, and howled worse than a wolf.
+
+"Now I must tell you, Grim, my dog," said Torarin, "that I have
+heard great news today. They told me both at Kungshall and at
+Kareby that the sea was frozen. Fair, calm weather it has been
+this long while, as you well know, who have been out in it every
+day; and they say the sea is frozen fast not only in the creeks
+and sounds, but far out over the Cattegat. There is no fairway now
+for ship or boat among the islands, nothing but firm, hard ice, so
+that a man may drive with horse and sledge as far as Marstrand and
+Paternoster Skerries."
+
+To all this the dog listened, and it seemed not to displease him.
+He lay still and blinked at Torarin.
+
+"We have no great store of fish left on our load," said Torarin,
+as though trying to talk him over. "What would you say to turning
+aside at the next crossways and going westward where the sea lies?
+We shall pass by Solberga church and down to Odsmalskil, and after
+that I think we have but seven or eight miles to Marstrand. It
+would be a fine thing if we could reach home for once without
+calling for boat or ferry."
+
+They drove on over the long moor of Kareby, and although the
+weather had been calm all day, a chill breeze came sweeping across
+the moor, to the discomfort of the traveller.
+
+"It may seem like softness to go home now when trade is at its
+best," said Torarin, flinging out his arms to warm them. "But we
+have been on the road for many weeks, you and I, and have a claim
+to sit at home a day or two and thaw the cold out of our bodies."
+
+As the dog continued to lie still, Torarin seemed to grow more
+sure of his ground, and he went on in a more cheerful tone:
+
+"Mother has been left alone in the cottage these many days. I
+warrant she longs to see us. And Marstrand is a fine town in
+winter-time, Grim, with streets and alleys full of foreign
+fishermen and chapmen. There will be dancing in the wharves every
+night of the week. And all the ale that will be flowing in the
+taverns! That is a thing beyond your understanding."
+
+As Torarin said this he bent down over the dog to see whether he
+was listening to what was said to him.
+
+But as the dog lay there wide awake and made no sign of
+displeasure, Torarin turned off at the first road that led
+westward to the sea. He flicked the horse with the slack of the
+reins and made it quicken its pace.
+
+"Since we shall pass by Solberga parsonage," said Torarin, "I will
+even put in there and ask if it be true that the ice bears as far
+as to Marstrand. The folk there must know how it is."
+
+Torarin had said these words in a low voice, without thinking
+whether the dog was listening or not. But scarcely were the words
+uttered when the dog stood up on the load and raised a terrible
+howl.
+
+The horse made a bound to one side, and Torarin himself was
+startled and looked about him to see whether wolves were in
+pursuit. But when he found it was Grim who was howling, he tried
+to calm him.
+
+"What now?" he said to him. "How many times have you and I driven
+into the parson's yard at Solberga! I know not whether Herr Arne
+[FOOTNOTE: At the time of this story "Herr" was a title roughly
+corresponding to "Sir."--Trans.] can tell us how it is with the ice,
+but I will be bound he'll give us a good supper before we set out
+on our sea voyage."
+
+But his words were not able to quiet the dog, who raised his
+muzzle and howled more dismally than ever.
+
+At this Torarin himself was not far from yielding to an uncanny
+feeling. It had now grown almost dark, but still Torarin could see
+Solberga church and the wide plain around it, which was sheltered
+by broad wooded heights to landward and by bare, rounded rocks
+toward the sea. As he drove on in solitude over the vast white
+plain, he felt he was a wretched little worm, while from the dark
+forests and the mountain wastes came troops of great monsters and
+trolls of every kind venturing into the open country on the fall
+of darkness. And in the whole great plain there was none other for
+them to fall upon than poor Torarin.
+
+But at the same time he tried again to quiet the dog.
+
+"Bless me, what is your quarrel with Herr Arne? He is the richest
+man in the country. He is of noble birth, and had he not been a
+priest there would have been a great lord of him."
+
+But this could not avail to bring the dog to silence. Then Torarin
+lost patience, so that he took Grim by the scruff of the neck and
+threw him off the sledge.
+
+The dog did not follow him as he drove on, but stood still upon
+the road and howled without ceasing until Torarin drove under a
+dark archway into the yard of the parsonage, which was surrounded
+on its four sides by long, low wooden buildings.
+
+II
+
+At Solberga parsonage the priest, Herr Arne, sat at supper
+surrounded by all his household. There was no stranger present but
+Torarin.
+
+Herr Arne was an old white-haired man, but he was still powerful
+and erect. His wife sat beside him. To her the years had been
+unkind; her head and her hands trembled, and she was nearly deaf.
+On Herr Arne's other side sat his curate. He was a pale young man
+with a look of trouble in his face, as though he was unable to
+support all the learning he had gathered in during his years of
+study at Wittenberg.
+
+These three sat at the head of the table, a little apart from the
+rest. Below them sat Torarin, and then the servants, who were old
+like their master. There were three serving-men; their heads were
+bald, their backs bent, and their eyes blinked and watered. Of
+women there were but two. They were somewhat younger and more
+able-bodied than the men, yet they too had a fragile look and were
+afflicted with the infirmities of age.
+
+At the farthest end of the table sat two children. One of them was
+Herr Arne's niece, a child of no more than fourteen years. She was
+fair-haired and of delicate build; her face had not yet reached
+its fullness, but had a promise of beauty in it. She had another
+little maid sitting beside her, a poor orphan without father or
+mother, who had been given a home at the parsonage. The two sat
+close together on the bench, and it could be seen that there was
+great friendship between them.
+
+All these folk sat at meat in the deepest silence. Torarin looked
+from one to another, but none was disposed to talk during the
+meal. All the old servants thought to themselves: "It is a goodly
+thing to be given food and to be spared the sufferings of want and
+hunger, which we have known so often in our lives. While we are
+eating we ought to have no thought but of giving thanks to God for
+His goodness."
+
+Since Torarin found no one to talk to, his glance wandered up and
+down the room. He turned his eyes from the great stove, built up
+in many stages beside the entrance door, to the lofty four-post
+bed which stood in the farthest corner of the room. He looked from
+the fixed benches that ran round the room to the hole in the roof,
+through which the smoke escaped and wintry air poured in.
+
+As Torarin the fish hawker, who lived in the smallest and poorest
+cabin on the outer isles, looked upon all these things, he
+thought: "Were I a great man like Herr Arne I would not be content
+to live in an ancient homestead with only one room. I should build
+myself a house with high gables and many chambers, like those of
+the burgomasters and aldermen of Marstrand."
+
+But more often than not Torarin's eyes rested upon a great oaken
+chest which stood at the foot of the four-post bed. And he looked
+at it so long because he knew that in it Herr Arne kept all his
+silver moneys, and he had heard they were so many that they filled
+the chest to the very lid.
+
+And Torarin, who was so poor that he hardly ever had a silver
+piece in his pocket, said to himself: "And yet I would not have
+all that money. They say Herr Arne took it from the great convents
+that were in the land in former days, and that the old monks
+foretold that this money would bring him misfortune."
+
+While yet these thoughts were in the mind of Torarin, he saw the
+old mistress of the house put her hand to her ear to listen. And
+then she turned to Herr Arne and asked him: "Why are they whetting
+knives at Branehog?"
+
+So deep was the silence in the room that when the old lady asked
+this question all gave a start and looked up in fright. When they
+saw that she was listening for something, they kept their spoons
+quiet and strained their ears.
+
+For some moments there was dead stillness in the room, but while
+it lasted the old woman became more and more uneasy. She laid her
+hand on Herr Arne's arm and asked him: "How can it be that they
+are whetting such long knives at Branehog this evening?"
+
+Torarin saw that Herr Arne stroked her hand to calm her. But he
+was in no mind to answer and ate on calmly as before.
+
+The old woman still sat listening. Tears came into her eyes from
+terror, and her hands and her head trembled more and more
+violently.
+
+Then the two little maids who sat at the end of the table began to
+weep with fear. "Can you not hear them scraping and filing?" asked
+the old mistress. "Can you not hear them hissing and grating?"
+
+Herr Arne sat still, stroking his wife's hand. As long as he kept
+silence no other dared utter a word.
+
+But they were all assured that their old mistress had heard a
+thing that was terrifying and boded ill. All felt the blood
+curdling in their veins. No one at the table raised a bit of food
+to his mouth, except old Herr Arne himself.
+
+They were thinking of the old mistress, how it was she who for so
+many years had had charge of the household. She had always stayed
+at home and watched with wise and tender care over children and
+servants, goods and cattle, so that all had prospered. Now she was
+worn out and stricken in years, but still it was likely that she
+and none other should feel a danger that threatened the house.
+
+The old lady grew more and more terrified. She clasped her hands
+in her helplessness and began to weep so sorely that the big tears
+ran down her shrunken cheeks.
+
+"Is it nothing to you, Arne Arneson, that I am so sore afraid?"
+she complained.
+
+Herr Arne bent his head to her and said: "I know not what it is
+that affrights you."
+
+"I am in fear of the long knives they are whetting at Branehog,"
+she said.
+
+"How can you hear them whetting knives at Branehog?" said Herr
+Arne, smiling. "The place lies two miles from here. Take up your
+spoon again and let us finish our supper."
+
+The old woman made an effort to overcome her terror. She took up
+her spoon and dipped it in the milk bowl, but in doing it her hand
+shook so that all could hear the spoon rattle against the edge.
+She put it down again at once. "How can I eat?" she said. "Do I
+not hear the whining of the whetstone, do I not hear it grating?"
+
+At this Herr Arne thrust the milk bowl away from him and clasped
+his hands. All the others did the same, and the curate began to
+say grace.
+
+When this was ended, Herr Arne looked down at those who sat along
+the table, and when he saw that they were pale and frightened, he
+was angry.
+
+He began to speak to them of the days when he had lately come to
+Bohuslen to preach the Lutheran doctrine. Then he and his servants
+were forced to fly from the Papists like wild beasts before the
+hunter. "Have we not seen our enemies lie in wait for us as we
+were on our way to the house of God? Have we not been driven out
+of the parsonage, and have we not been compelled to take to the
+woods like outlaws? Does it beseem us to play the coward and give
+ourselves up for lost on account of an evil omen?"
+
+As Herr Arne said this he looked like a valiant champion, and the
+others took heart anew on hearing him.
+
+"Ay, it is true," they thought. "God has protected Herr Arne
+through the greatest perils. He holds His hand over him. He will
+not let His servant perish."
+
+III
+
+As soon as Torarin drove out upon the road his dog Grim came up to
+him and jumped up on to the load. When Torarin saw that the dog
+had been waiting outside the parsonage his uneasiness came back.
+"What, Grim, why do you stay outside the gate all the evening? Why
+did you not go into the house and have your supper?" he said to
+the dog. "Can there be aught of ill awaiting Herr Arne? Maybe I
+have seen him for the last time. But even a strong man like him
+must one day die, and he is near ninety years old."
+
+He guided his horse into a road which led past the farm of
+Branehog to Odsmalskil.
+
+When he was come to Branehog he saw sledges standing in the yard
+and lights shining through the cracks of the closed shutters.
+
+Then Torarin said to Grim: "These folks are still up. I will go in
+and ask if they have been sharpening knives here tonight."
+
+He drove into the farmyard, but when he opened the door of the
+house he saw that a feast was being held. Upon the benches by the
+wall sat old men drinking ale, and in the middle of the room the
+young people played and sang.
+
+Torarin saw at once that no man here thought of making his weapon
+ready for a deed of blood. He slammed the door again and would
+have gone his way, but the host came after him. He asked Torarin
+to stay, since he had come, and led him into the room.
+
+Torarin sat for a good while enjoying himself and chatting with
+the peasants. They were in high good humour, and Torarin was glad
+to be rid of all his gloomy thoughts.
+
+But Torarin was not the only latecomer to the feast that evening.
+Long after him a man and a woman entered the door. They were
+poorly clad and lingered bashfully in the corner between door and
+fireplace.
+
+The host at once came forward to his two guests. He took the hand
+of each and led them up the room. Then he said to the others: "Is
+it not truly said that the shorter the way the more the delay?
+These are our nearest neighbors. Branehog had no other tenants
+besides them and me."
+
+"Say rather there are none but you," said the man. "You cannot
+call me a tenant. I am only a poor charcoal-burner whom you have
+allowed to settle on your land."
+
+The man seated himself beside Torarin and they began to converse.
+The newcomer told Torarin how it was he came so late to the feast.
+It was because their cabin had been visited by three strangers
+whom they durst not leave, three journeymen tanners who had been
+with them all day. When they came in the morning they were worn
+out and ailing; they said they had lost their way in the forest
+and had wandered about for a whole week. But after they had eaten
+and slept they soon recovered their strength, and when evening
+came they had asked which was the greatest and richest house
+thereabout, for thither they would go and seek for work. The wife
+had answered that the parsonage, where Herr Arne dwelt, was the
+best place. Then at once they had taken long knives out of their
+packs and begun to sharpen them. They were at this a good while,
+with such ferocious looks that the charcoal-burner and his wife
+durst not leave their home. "I can still see them as they sat
+grinding their knives," said the man. "They looked terrible with
+their great beards that had not been cut or tended for many a day,
+and they were clad in rough coats of skin, which were tattered and
+befouled. I thought I had three werewolves in the house with me,
+and I was glad when at last they took themselves off."
+
+When Torarin heard this he told the charcoal-burner what he
+himself had witnessed at the parsonage.
+
+"So it was true enough that this night they whetted knives at
+Branehog," said Torarin, laughing. He had drunk deeply, because of
+the sorrow and heaviness that were upon him when he came, seeking
+to comfort himself as best he could. "Now I am of good cheer
+again," said he, "since I am well assured it was no evil omen the
+parson's lady heard, but only these tanners making ready their
+gear."
+
+IV
+
+Long after midnight a couple of men came out of the house at
+Branehog to harness their horses and drive home.
+
+When they had come into the yard they saw a great fire flaring up
+against the sky in the north. They hastened back into the house
+and cried out: "Come out! Come out! Solberga parsonage is on
+fire!"
+
+There were many folks at the feast, and those who had a horse
+leapt upon his back and made haste to the parsonage; but those who
+had to run with their own swift feet were there almost as soon.
+
+When the people came to the parsonage nobody was to be seen, nor
+was there any sign of movement; all seemed to be asleep, though
+the flames rose high into the air.
+
+Yet it was none of the houses that burned, but a great pile of
+wood and straw and faggots that had been stacked against the wall
+of the old dwelling. It had not been burning long. The flames had
+done no more than blacken the sound timber of the wall and melt
+the snow on the thatched roof. But now they had begun to take hold
+of the thatch.
+
+Everyone saw at once that this was arson. They began to wonder
+whether Herr Arne and his wife were really asleep, or whether some
+evil had befallen them.
+
+But before the rescuers entered the house they took long poles and
+pulled away the burning faggots from the wall and clambered up to
+the roof to tear off the thatch, which had begun to smoke and was
+ready to catch fire.
+
+Then some of the men went to the door of the house to enter and
+call Herr Arne; but when the first man came to the threshold he
+turned aside and made way for him who came next.
+
+The second man took a step forward, but as he was about to grasp
+the door-handle he turned away and made room for those who stood
+behind him.
+
+It seemed a ghastly door to open, for a broad stream of blood
+trickled over the threshold and the handle was besmeared with
+blood.
+
+Then the door opened in their faces and Herr Arne's curate came
+out. He staggered toward the men with a deep wound in his head,
+and he was drenched with blood. For an instant he stood upright
+and raised his hand to command silence. Whereupon he spoke with
+the death rattle in his voice: "This night Herr Arne and all his
+household have been murdered by three men who climbed down through
+the smoke-hole in the roof and were clad in rough skins. They
+threw themselves upon us like wild beasts and slew us."
+
+He could utter no more. He fell down at the men's feet and was
+dead.
+
+They then entered the room and found all as the curate had said.
+
+The great oaken chest in which Herr Arne kept his money was gone,
+and Herr Arne's horse had been taken from the stable and his
+sledge from the shed.
+
+Sledge tracks led from the yard across the glebe meadows down to
+the sea, and twenty men hastened away to seize the murderers. But
+the women set themselves to laying out the dead and carried them
+from the bloody room out upon the pure snow.
+
+Not all of Herr Arne's household could be found; there was one
+missing. It was the poor little maid whom Herr Arne had taken into
+his house. There was much wondering whether, perchance, she had
+been able to escape, or whether the robbers had taken her with
+them.
+
+But when they made careful search through the room they found her
+hidden away between the great stove and the wall. She had kept
+herself concealed there throughout the struggle and had taken no
+hurt at all, but she was so sick with terror that she could
+neither speak nor answer a question.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+ON THE QUAYS
+
+
+
+The poor maid who had escaped the butchery had been taken by
+Torarin to Marstrand. He had conceived so great pity for her that
+he had offered her lodging in his cramped cabin and a share of the
+food which he and his mother ate.
+
+"This is the only thing I can do for Herr Arne," thought Torarin,
+"in return for all the times he has bought my fish and allowed me
+to sit at his table."
+
+"Poor and lowly as I am," thought Torarin, "it is better for the
+maid that she go with me to the town than that she stay here among
+the country folk. In Marstrand are many rich burgesses, and
+perhaps the young maid may take service with one of them and so be
+well cared for."
+
+When first the girl came to the town she sat and wept from morning
+to night. She bewailed Herr Arne and his household, and lamented
+that she had lost all who were dear to her. Most of all she wept
+for her foster sister, and said she wished she had not hidden
+herself against the wall, so that she might have shared death with
+her.
+
+Torarin's mother said nothing to this so long as her son was at
+home. But when he had gone on his travels again she said one
+morning to the girl:
+
+"I am not rich enough, Elsalill, to give you food and clothing
+that you may sit with your hands in your lap and nurse your
+sorrow. Come with me down to the quays and learn to clean fish."
+
+So Elsalill went with her down to the quays and stood all day
+working among the other fish cleaners.
+
+But most of the women on the quays were young and merry. They
+began to talk to Elsalill and asked her why she was so silent and
+sorrowful.
+
+Then Elsalill began to tell them of the terrible thing that had
+befallen her no more than three nights ago. She spoke of the three
+robbers who had broken into the house by the smoke-hole in the
+roof and murdered all who were near and dear to her.
+
+As Elsalill told her tale a black shadow fell across the table at
+which she worked. And when she looked up three fine gentlemen
+stood before her, wearing broad hats with long feathers and velvet
+clothes with great puffs, embroidered in silk and gold.
+
+One of them seemed to be of higher rank than the others; he was
+very pale, his chin was shaven, and his eyes sat deep in his head.
+He looked as though he had lately been ill. But in all else he
+seemed a gay and bold-faced cavalier, who walked on the sunny
+quays to show his fine clothes and his handsome face.
+
+Elsalill broke off both work and story. She stood looking at him
+with open mouth and staring eyes. And he smiled at her.
+
+"We are not come hither to frighten you, mistress," said he, "but
+to beg that we too may listen to your tale."
+
+Poor Elsalill! Never in her life had she seen such a man. She felt
+she could not speak in his presence; she merely held her peace and
+cast her eyes upon her work.
+
+The stranger began again: "Be not afraid of us, mistress! We are
+Scotsmen who have been in the service of King John of Sweden ten
+full years, but now have taken our discharge and are bound for
+home. We have come to Marstrand to find a ship for Scotland, but
+when we came hither we found every channel and firth frozen over,
+and here we must bide and wait. We have no business to employ us,
+and therefore we range about the quays to meet whom we may. We
+should be happy, mistress, if you would let us hear your tale."
+
+Elsalill knew that he had talked thus long to let her recover from
+her emotion. At last she thought to herself: "You can surely show
+that you are not too homely to speak to a noble gentleman,
+Elsalill! For you are a maiden of good birth and no fisher lass."
+
+"I was but telling of the great butchery at Solberga parsonage,"
+said Elsalill. "There are so many who have heard that story."
+
+"Yes," said the stranger, "but I did not know till now that any of
+Herr Arne's household had escaped alive."
+
+Then Elsalill told once more of the wild robbers' deed. She spoke
+of how the old serving-men had gathered about Herr Arne to protect
+him and how Herr Arne himself had snatched his sword from the wall
+and pressed upon the robbers, but they had overcome them all. And
+the old mistress had taken up her husband's sword and set upon the
+robbers, but they had only laughed at her and felled her to the
+floor with a billet of wood. And all the other women had crouched
+against the wall of the stove, but when the men were dead the
+robbers came and pulled them down and slew them. "The last they
+slew," said Elsalill, "was my dear foster sister. She begged for
+life so piteously, and two of them would have let her live; but
+the third said that all must die, and he thrust his knife into her
+heart."
+
+While Elsalill was speaking of murder and blood the three men
+stood still before her. They did not exchange a glance with each
+other, but their ears grew long with listening, and their eyes
+sparkled, and sometimes their lips parted so that the teeth
+glistened.
+
+Elsalill's eyes were full of tears; not once did she look up
+whilst she was speaking. She did not see that the man before her
+had the eyes and teeth of a wolf. Only when she had finished
+speaking did she dry her eyes and look up at him.
+
+But when he met Elsalill's glance his face changed in an instant.
+"Since you have seen the murderers so well, mistress," said he,
+"you would doubtless know them again if you met them?"
+
+"I have no more than seen them by the light of the brands they
+snatched from the hearth to light their murdering," said Elsalill;
+"but with God's help I'll surely know them again. And I pray to
+God daily that I may meet them." "What mean you by that,
+mistress?" asked the stranger. "Is it not true that the murderous
+vagabonds are dead?"
+
+"Indeed, I have heard so," said Elsalill. "The peasants who set
+out after them followed their tracks from the parsonage down to a
+hole in the ice. Thus far they saw tracks of sledge-runners upon
+the smooth ice, tracks of a horse's hoofs, tracks of men with
+heavy nailed boots. But beyond the hole no tracks led on across
+the ice, and therefore the peasants supposed them all dead."
+
+"And do you not believe them dead, Elsalill?" asked the stranger.
+
+"Oh, yes, I think they must be drowned," said Elsalill; "and yet I
+pray to God daily that they may have escaped. I speak to God in
+this wise: 'Let it be so that they have only driven the horse and
+the sledge into the hole, but have themselves escaped.'"
+
+"Why do you wish this, Elsalill?" asked the stranger.
+
+The tender maid Elsalill, she flung back her head and her eyes
+shone like fire. "I would they were alive that I might find them
+out and seize them. I would they were alive that I might tear
+their hearts out. I would they were alive that I might see their
+bodies quartered and spiked upon the wheel."
+
+"How do you think to bring all this about?" said the stranger.
+"For you are only a weak little maid."
+
+"If they were living," said Elsalill, "I should surely bring their
+punishment upon them. Rather would I go to my death than let them
+go free. Strong and mighty they may be, I know it, but they would
+not be able to escape me."
+
+At this the stranger smiled upon her, but Elsalill stamped her
+foot.
+
+"If they were living, should I not remember that they have taken
+my home from me, so that I am now a poor lass, compelled to stand
+here on the cold quay and clean fish? Should I not remember that
+they have slain all those near to me, and should I not remember
+most of all the man who plucked my foster sister from the wall and
+slew her who was so dear to me?"
+
+But when the tender little maid gave proof of such great wrath,
+the three Scottish campaigners burst out laughing. So full of
+merriment were they that they went off, lest Elsalill might take
+offence. They walked across the harbour and up a narrow alley
+which led to the market-place. But long after they were out of
+sight Elsalill heard their roars of loud and scornful laughter.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+THE MESSENGER
+
+
+
+A week after his death Herr Arne was buried in Solberga church,
+and on the same day an inquest was held upon the murder in the
+assize house at Branehog.
+
+Now Herr Arne's fame was such throughout Bohuslen, and so many
+people came together on the day of his funeral, both from the
+mainland and the islands, that it was as though an army had
+assembled about its leader. And so great a concourse moved between
+Solberga church and Branehog that toward evening not an inch of
+snow could be seen that had not been trampled by men's feet.
+
+But late in the evening, when all had gone their ways, came
+Torarin the fish hawker driving along the road from Branehog to
+Solberga.
+
+Torarin had talked with many men in the course of the day; again
+and again had he told the story of Herr Arne's death. He had been
+well entertained too at the assize and had been made to empty many
+a mug of ale with travellers from afar.
+
+Torarin felt dull and heavy and lay down upon his load. It
+saddened him to think that Herr Arne was gone, and as he
+approached the parsonage a yet more grievous thought began to
+torment him. "Grim, my dog," he said, "had I believed that warning
+of the knives I might have warded off the whole disaster. I often
+think of that, Grim, my dog. It disquiets my spirit, I feel as
+though I had had a part in taking Herr Arne's life. Now remember
+what I say--next time I hear such a thing I will hold it true and
+be guided by it!"
+
+Now while Torarin lay dozing upon his load with eyes half closed,
+his horse went on as he pleased, and on coming to Solberga
+parsonage he turned into the yard from old habit and went up to
+the stable door, Torarin being all unwitting. Only with the
+stopping of the sledge did he rise up and look about him; and then
+he fell a-shuddering, when he saw that he was in the yard of a
+house where so many people had been murdered no more than a week
+before.
+
+He seized the reins at once to turn his horse and drive into the
+road again, but at that moment he felt a hand upon his shoulder
+and looked round. Beside him stood old Olof the groom, who had
+served at the parsonage as long as Torarin could remember.
+
+"Have you such haste to leave our house tonight, Torarin?" said
+the man. "Let be and come indoors! Herr Arne sits there waiting
+for you."
+
+A thousand thoughts came into Torarin's head. He knew not whether
+he was dreaming or awake. Olof the groom, whom he saw standing
+alive and well beside him, he had seen a week before lying dead
+amongst the others with a great wound in his throat.
+
+Torarin took a firmer hold of the reins. He thought the best thing
+for him was to make off as soon as he could. But Olof the groom's
+hand still lay upon his shoulder, and the old fellow gave him no
+peace.
+
+Torarin racked his brains to find an excuse. "I had no thought of
+coming to disturb Herr Arne so late in the evening," said he. "My
+horse turned in here whilst I was unaware. I will go now and find
+a lodging for the night. If Herr Arne wishes to see me, I can well
+come again tomorrow."
+
+With this Torarin bent forward and struck his horse with the slack
+of the reins to make him move off.
+
+But at the same instant the parson's man was at the horse's head;
+he caught him by the bridle and forced him to stand still. "Cease
+your obstinacy, Torarin!" said the man. "Herr Arne is not yet gone
+to bed, he sits waiting for you. And you should know full well
+that you can have as good a night's lodging here as anywhere in
+the parish."
+
+Torarin was about to answer that he could not be served with
+lodging in a roofless house. But before speaking he raised his
+eyes to the dwelling house, and then he saw that the old timber
+hall stood unharmed and stately as before the fire. And yet that
+very morning Torarin had seen the naked rafters thrusting out into
+the air.
+
+He looked and looked and rubbed his eyes, but there was no doubt
+of it, the parsonage stood there unharmed, with thatch and snow
+upon its roof. He saw smoke and sparks streaming up through the
+louver, and rays of light gleaming through the illclosed shutters
+upon the snow.
+
+A man who travels far and wide on the cold highway knows no better
+sight than the gleam that steals out of a warm room. But the sight
+made Torarin even more terrified than before. He whipped up his
+horse till he reared and kicked, but not a step would he go from
+the stable door.
+
+"Come in with me, Torarin!" said the groom. "I thought you had
+enough remorse already over this business."
+
+Then Torarin remembered the promise he had made himself on the
+road and, though a moment before he had stood up and lashed his
+horse furiously, he was now meek as a lamb.
+
+"Well, Olof groom, here am I!" he said, and sprang down from the
+sledge. "It is true that I wish to have no more remorse over this
+business. Take me in to Herr Arne!"
+
+But it was with the heaviest steps he had ever known that Torarin
+went across the yard to the house.
+
+When the door was opened Torarin closed his eyes to avoid looking
+into the room, but he tried to take heart by thinking of Herr
+Arne. "He has given you many a good meal. He has bought your fish,
+even when his own larder was full. He has always shown you
+kindness in his lifetime, and assuredly he will not harm you after
+death. Mayhap he has a service to ask of you. You must not forget,
+Torarin, that we are to show gratitude to the dead as to the
+living."
+
+Torarin opened his eyes and looked down the room. He saw the great
+hall just as he had seen it before. He recognized the high brick
+stove and the woven tapestries that hung upon the walls. But he
+glanced many times from wall to wall before daring to raise his
+eyes to the table and the bench where Herr Arne had been wont to
+sit.
+
+At last he looked there, and then he saw Herr Arne himself sitting
+in the flesh at the head of the table with his wife on one side
+and his curate on the other, as he had seen him a week before. He
+seemed to have just finished his meal, the dish was thrust away,
+and his spoon lay on the table before him. All the old men and
+women servants were sitting at the table, but only one of the
+young maids.
+
+Torarin stood still a long time by the door and watched them that
+sat at table. They all looked anxious and mournful, and even Herr
+Arne was gloomy as the rest and supported his head in his hand.
+
+At last Torarin saw him raise his head.
+
+"Have you brought a stranger into the house with you, Olof groom?"
+
+"Yes," answered the man, "it is Torarin the fish hawker, who has
+been this day at the assize at Branehog."
+
+Herr Arne's looks seemed to grow more cheerful at this, and
+Torarin heard him say: "Come forward then, Torarin, and give us
+news of the assize! I have sat here and waited for half the
+night."
+
+All this had such a real and natural air that Torarin began to
+feel more and more courageous. He walked quite boldly across the
+room to Herr Arne, asking himself whether the murder was not an
+evil dream and whether Herr Arne was not in truth alive.
+
+But as Torarin crossed the room, his eyes from old habit sought
+the four-post bed, beside which the great money chest used to
+stand. But the ironbound chest was no longer in its place, and
+when Torarin saw that a shudder again passed through him.
+
+"Now Torarin is to tell us how things went at the assize today,"
+said Herr Arne.
+
+Torarin tried to do as he was bid and tell of the assize and the
+inquest, but he could command neither his lips nor his tongue, and
+his speech was faulty and stammering, so that Herr Arne stopped
+him at once. "Tell me only the main thing, Torarin. Were our
+murderers found and punished?"
+
+"No, Herr Arne," Torarin had the boldness to answer. "Your
+murderers lie at the bottom of Hakefjord. How would you have any
+take revenge on them?"
+
+When Torarin returned this answer Herr Arne's old temper seemed to
+be kindled within him and he smote the table hard. "What is that
+you say, Torarin? Has the Governor of Bohus been here with judges
+and clerks and held assize and has no man had the wit to tell him
+where he may find my murderers?"
+
+"No, Herr Arne," answered Torarin. "None among the living can tell
+him that."
+
+Herr Arne sat awhile with a frown on his brow, staring dismally
+before him. Then he turned once more to Torarin.
+
+"I know that you bear me affection, Torarin. Can you tell me how I
+may be revenged upon my murderers?"
+
+"I can well understand, Herr Arne," said Torarin, "that you wish
+to be revenged upon those who so cruelly have deprived you of your
+life. But there is none amongst us who walk God's earth that can
+help you in this."
+
+Herr Arne fell into a deep brooding when he heard this answer.
+
+There was a long silence. After a while Torarin ventured to put
+forward a request. "I have now fulfilled your desire, Herr Arne,
+and told you how it went at the assize. Have you aught else to ask
+me, or will you now let me go?"
+
+"You are not to go, Torarin," said Herr Arne, "until you have
+answered me once more whether none of the living can give us
+vengeance."
+
+"Not if all the men in Bohuslen and Norway came together to be
+revenged upon your murderers would they be able to find them,"
+said Torarin.
+
+Then said Herr Arne: "If the living cannot help us, we must help
+ourselves."
+
+With this Herr Arne began in a loud voice to say a paternoster,
+not in Norse but in Latin, as had been the use of the country
+before his time. And as he uttered each word of the prayer he
+pointed with his finger at one of those who sat with him at the
+table. He went through them all in this way many times, until he
+came to Amen. And as he spoke this word his finger pointed at the
+young maid who was his niece.
+
+The young maid rose at once from the bench, and Herr Arne said to
+her: "You know what you have to do."
+
+Then the young maiden lamented and said: "Do not send me upon this
+errand! It is too heavy a charge to lay upon so tender a maid as
+I."
+
+"You shall assuredly go," said Herr Arne. "It is right that you
+go, since you have most to revenge. None of us has been robbed of
+so many years of life as you, who are the youngest among us."
+
+"I desire not to be revenged on any man," said the maiden.
+
+"You are to go at once," said Herr Arne. "And you will not be
+alone. You know that there are two among the living who sat with
+us here at table a week ago."
+
+But when Torarin heard these words he thought they meant that Herr
+Arne charged him to contend with malefactors and murderers, and he
+cried out: "By the mercy of God I conjure you, Herr Arne--"
+
+At that moment it seemed to Torarin that both Herr Arne and the
+parsonage vanished in a mist, and he himself sank down as though
+he had fallen from a giddy height, and with that he lost
+consciousness.
+
+When he came to himself again dawn was breaking and he saw that he
+was lying on the ground in the yard of Solberga parsonage. His
+horse stood beside him with the sledge, and Grim barked and howled
+over him.
+
+"It was all but a dream," said Torarin; "now I see that. The house
+is deserted and in ruin. I have seen neither Herr Arne nor any
+other. But I was so startled by the dream that I fell off the
+load."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+IN THE MOONLIGHT
+
+
+
+When Herr Arne had been dead a fortnight there came some nights of
+clear, bright moonlight, and one evening Torarin was out with his
+sledge. He checked his horse time after time, as though he had
+difficulty in finding the way. Yet he was not driving through any
+trackless forest, but upon what looked like a wide and open plain,
+above which rose a number of rocky knolls.
+
+The whole tract was covered with glittering white snow. It had
+fallen in calm weather and lay evenly, not in drifts and eddies.
+As far as the eye could see there was nothing but the same even
+plain and the same rocky knolls.
+
+"Grim, my dog," said Torarin, "if we saw this tonight for the
+first time we should think we were driving over a great heath. But
+still we should wonder that the ground was so even and the road
+free from stones and ruts. What sort of tract can this be, we
+should say, where there are neither ditches nor fences, and how
+comes it that no grass or bushes stick up through the snow? And
+why do we see no rivers and streams, which elsewhere are wont to
+draw their black furrows through the white fields even in the
+hardest frost?"
+
+Torarin was delighted with these fancies, and Grim too found
+pleasure in them. He did not move from his place on the load, but
+lay still and blinked.
+
+But just as Torarin had finished speaking he drove past a lofty
+pole to which a broom was fastened.
+
+"If we were strangers here, Grim, my dog," said Torarin, "we might
+well ask ourselves what sort of heath this was, where they set up
+such marks as we use at sea. 'This can never be the sea itself?'
+we should say at last. But we should think it utterly impossible.
+This that lies so firm and fast, can this be only water? And all
+the rocky knolls that we see so firmly united, can they be only
+holms and skerries parted by the rolling waves? No, we should
+never believe it was possible, Grim, my dog."
+
+Torarin laughed and Grim still lay quiet and did not stir. Torarin
+drove on, until he rounded a high knoll. Then he gave a cry as
+though he had seen something strange. He put on an air of great
+surprise, dropped the reins and clapped his hands.
+
+"Grim, my dog, so you would not believe this was the sea! Now you
+can tell what it is. Stand up, and then you will see that there is
+a big ship lying before us! You would not recognize the beacons,
+but this you cannot mistake. Now I think you will not deny that
+this is the sea itself we are driving over."
+
+Torarin stayed still awhile longer as he gazed at a great vessel
+which lay frozen in. She looked altogether out of place as she lay
+with the smooth and even snowfields all about her.
+
+But when Torarin saw a thin column of smoke rising from the
+vessel's poop he drove up and hailed the skipper to hear if he
+would buy his fish. He had but a few codfish left at the bottom of
+his load, since in the course of the day he had been round to all
+the vessels which were frozen in among the islands, and sold off
+his stock.
+
+On board were the skipper and his crew, and time was heavy on
+their hands. They bought fish of the hawker, not because they
+needed it, but to have someone to talk to. When they came down on
+to the ice, Torarin put on an innocent air.
+
+He began to speak of the weather. "In the memory of man there has
+not been such fine weather as this year," said Torarin. "For
+wellnigh three weeks we have had calm weather and hard frost. This
+is not what we are used to in the islands."
+
+But the skipper, who lay there with his great gallias full-laden
+with herring barrels, and who had been caught by the ice in a bay
+near Marstrand just as he was ready to put to sea, gave Torarin a
+sharp look and said: "So then you call this fine weather?"
+
+"What should I call it else?" said Torarin, looking as innocent as
+a child. "The sky is clear and calm and blue, and the night is
+fair as the day. Never before have I known the time when I could
+drive about the ice week after week. It is not often the sea
+freezes out here, and if once and again the ice has formed, there
+has always come a storm to break it up a few days after."
+
+The skipper still looked black and glum; he made no answer to all
+Torarin's chat. Then Torarin began asking him why he never found
+his way to Marstrand. "It is no more than an hour's walk over the
+ice," said Torarin. But again he received no answer. Torarin could
+see that the man feared to leave his ship an instant, lest he
+might not be at hand when the ice broke up. "Seldom have I seen
+eyes so sick with longing," thought Torarin.
+
+But the skipper, who had been held ice-bound among the skerries
+day after day, unable to hoist his sails and put to sea, had been
+busy the while with many thoughts, and he said to Torarin: "You
+are a man who travels much abroad and hears much news of all that
+happens: can you tell me why God has barred the way to the sea so
+long this year, keeping us all in captivity?"
+
+As he said this Torarin ceased to smile, but put on an ignorant
+air and said: "I cannot see what you mean by that."
+
+"Well," said the skipper, "I once lay in the harbour of Bergen a
+whole month, and a contrary wind blew all that time, so that no
+ship could come out. But on board one of the ships that lay there
+wind-bound was a man who had robbed churches, and he would have
+gone free but for the storm. Now they had time to search him out,
+and as soon as he had been taken ashore there came good weather
+and a fair wind. Now do you understand what I mean when I ask you
+to tell me why God keeps the gates of the sea barred?"
+
+Torarin was silent awhile. He had a look as though he would make
+an earnest answer. But he turned it aside and said: "You have
+caught the melancholy with sitting here a prisoner among the
+skerries. Why do you not come in to Marstrand? I can tell you
+there is a merry life with hundreds of strangers in the town. They
+have naught else to do but drink and dance."
+
+"How can it be they are so merry there?" asked the skipper.
+
+"Oh," said Torarin, "there are all the seamen whose ships are
+frozen in like yours. There is a crowd of fishermen who had just
+finished their herring catch when the ice stayed them from sailing
+home. And there are a hundred Scottish mercenaries discharged from
+service, who lie here waiting for a ship to carry them home to
+Scotland. Do you think all these men would hang their heads and
+lose the chance of making merry?"
+
+"Ay, it may well be that they can divert themselves, but, as for
+me, I have a mind to stay out here."
+
+Torarin gave him a rapid glance. The skipper was a tall man and
+thin; his eyes were bright and clear as water, with a melancholy
+look in them. "To make that man merry is more than I or any other
+can do," thought Torarin.
+
+Again the skipper began of his own accord to ask a question.
+"These Scotsmen," he said, "are they honest folk?"
+
+"Is it you, maybe, that are to take them over to Scotland?" asked
+Torarin.
+
+"Well," said the skipper, "I have a cargo for Edinburgh, and one
+of them was here but now and asked me would I take them. But I
+have small liking to sail with such wild companions aboard and I
+asked for time to think on it. Have you heard aught of them? Think
+you I may venture to take them?"
+
+"I have heard no more of them but that they are brave men. I doubt
+not but you may safely take them."
+
+But no sooner had Torarin said this than his dog rose from the
+sledge, threw his nose in the air, and began to howl.
+
+Torarin broke off his praises of the Scotsmen at once. "What ails
+you now, Grim, my dog?" he said. "Do you think I stay here too
+long, wasting the time in talk?"
+
+He made ready to drive off. "Well, God be with you all!" he cried.
+
+Torarin drove in to Marstrand by the narrow channel between
+Klovero and Koo. When he had come within sight of the town, he
+noticed that he was not alone on the ice.
+
+In the bright moonlight he saw a tall man of proud bearing walking
+in the snow. He could see that he wore a plumed hat and rich
+clothes with ample puffs. "Hallo!" said Torarin to himself; "there
+goes Sir Archie, the leader of the Scots, who has been out this
+evening to bespeak a passage to Scotland."
+
+Torarin was so near to the man that he drove into the long shadow
+that followed him. His horse's hoofs were just touching the shadow
+of the hat plumes.
+
+"Grim," said Torarin, "shall we ask if he will drive with us to
+Marstrand?"
+
+The dog began to bristle up at once, but Torarin laid his hand
+upon his back. "Be quiet, Grim, my dog! I can see that you have no
+love for the Scotsmen."
+
+Sir Archie had not noticed that any one was so close to him. He
+walked on without looking round. Torarin turned very quietly to
+one side in order to pass him.
+
+But at that moment Torarin saw behind the Scottish gallant
+something that looked like another shadow. He saw something long
+and thin and gray, which floated over the white surface without
+leaving footprints in the snow or making it crunch.
+
+The Scotsman advanced with long and rapid strides, looking neither
+to the right hand nor to the left. But the gray shadow glided on
+behind him, so near that it seemed as though it would whisper
+something in his ear.
+
+Torarin drove slowly on till he came abreast of them. Then he
+could see the Scotsman's face in the bright moonlight. He walked
+with a frown on his brow and seemed vexed, as though full of
+thoughts that displeased him.
+
+Just as Torarin drove past, he turned about and looked behind him
+as though aware of someone following.
+
+Torarin saw plainly that behind Sir Archie stole a young maid in a
+long gray garment, but Sir Archie did not see her. When he turned
+his head she stood motionless, and Sir Archie's own shadow fell
+upon her, dark and broad, and hid her.
+
+Sir Archie turned again at once and pursued his way, and again the
+maiden hurried forward and made as though she would whisper in his
+ear.
+
+But when Torarin saw this his terror was more than he could bear.
+He cried aloud and whipped up his horse, so that it brought him at
+full gallop and dripping with sweat to the door of his cabin.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+HAUNTED
+
+
+
+The town with all its houses and buildings stood upon that side of
+Marstrand island which looked to landward and was protected by a
+wreath of holms and islets. There people swarmed in its streets
+and alleys; there lay the harbour, full of ships and boats, the
+quays, with folk busy gutting and salting fish; there lay the
+church and churchyard, the market and town hall, and there stood
+many a lofty tree and waved its green branches in summer time.
+
+But upon that half of Marstrand island which looked westward to
+the sea, unguarded by isles or skerries, there was nothing but
+bare and barren rocks and ragged headlands thrust out into the
+waves. Heather there was in brown tufts and prickly thorn bushes,
+holes of the otter and the fox, but never a path, never a house or
+any sign of man.
+
+Torarin's cabin stood high up on the ridge of the island, so that
+it had the town on one side and the wilderness on the other. And
+when Elsalill opened her door she came out upon broad, naked slabs
+of rock, from which she had a wide view to the westward, even to
+the dark horizon of the open sea.
+
+All the seamen and fishermen who lay icebound at Marstrand used to
+pass Torarin's cabin to climb the rocks and look for any sign of
+the ice parting in the coves and sounds.
+
+Elsalill stood many a time at the cottage door and followed with
+her eyes the men who mounted the ridge. She was sick at heart from
+the great sorrow that had befallen her, and she said to herself:
+"I think everyone is happy who has something to look for. But I
+have nothing in the wide world on which to fix my hopes."
+
+One evening Elsalill saw a tall man, who wore a broad-brimmed hat
+with a great feather, standing upon the rocks and gazing westward
+over the sea like all the others.
+
+And Elsalill knew at once that the man was Sir Archie, the leader
+of the Scots, who had talked with her on the quay.
+
+As he passed the cabin on his way home to the town, Elsalill was
+still standing in the doorway, and she was weeping.
+
+"Why do you weep?" he asked, stopping before her.
+
+"I weep because I have nothing to long for," said Elsalill. "When
+I saw you standing upon the rocks and looking out over the sea, I
+thought: 'He has surely a home beyond the water, and there he is
+going.'"
+
+Then Sir Archie's heart was softened, and it made him say: "It is
+many a year since any spoke to me of my home. God knows how it
+fares with my father's house. I left it when I was seventeen to
+serve in the wars abroad."
+
+On saying this Sir Archie entered the cottage with Elsalill and
+began to talk to her of his home.
+
+And Elsalill sat and listened to Sir Archie, who spoke both long
+and well. Each word that came from his lips made her feel happy.
+But when the time drew on for Sir Archie to go, he asked if he
+might kiss her.
+
+Then Elsalill said No, and would have slipped out of the door, but
+Sir Archie stood in her way and would have made her kiss him.
+
+At that moment the door of the cottage opened, and its mistress
+came in in great haste.
+
+Then Sir Archie drew back from Elsalill. He simply gave her his
+hand in farewell and hurried away.
+
+But Torarin's mother said to Elsalill: "It was well that you sent
+for me, for it is not fitting for a maid to sit alone in the house
+with such a man as Sir Archie. You know full well that a soldier
+of fortune has neither honour nor conscience."
+
+"Did I send for you?" asked Elsalill, astonished.
+
+"Yes," answered the old woman. "As I stood at work on the quay
+there came a little maid I had never seen before, and brought me
+word that you begged me to go home."
+
+"How did this maid look?" asked Elsalill.
+
+"I heeded her not so closely that I can tell you how she looked,"
+said the old woman. "But one thing I marked; she went so lightly
+upon the snow that not a sound was heard."
+
+When Elsalill heard this she turned very pale and said: "Then it
+must have been an angel from heaven who brought you the message
+and led you home."
+
+II
+
+Another time Sir Archie sat in Torarin's cabin and talked with
+Elsalill.
+
+There was no one beside them; they talked gaily together and were
+very cheerful.
+
+Sir Archie was telling Elsalill that she must go home with him to
+Scotland. There he would build her a castle and make her a fine
+lady. He told her she should have a hundred serving-maids to wait
+upon her, and she should dance at the court of the King.
+
+Elsalill sat silently listening to every word Sir Archie said to
+her, and she believed them all. And Sir Archie thought that never
+had he met a damsel so easy to beguile as Elsalill.
+
+Suddenly Sir Archie ceased speaking and looked down at his left
+hand.
+
+"What is it, Sir Archie? Why do you say no more?" asked Elsalill.
+
+Sir Archie opened and closed his hand convulsively. He turned it
+this way and that.
+
+"What is it, Sir Archie?" asked Elsalill. "Does your hand pain you
+on a sudden?"
+
+Then Sir Archie turned to Elsalill with a startled face and said:
+"Do you see this hair, Elsalill, that is wound about my hand? Do
+you see this lock of fair hair?"
+
+When he began to speak the girl saw nothing, but ere he had
+finished she saw a coil of fine, fair hair wind itself twice about
+Sir Archie's hand.
+
+And Elsalill sprang up in terror and cried out: "Sir Archie, whose
+hair is it that is bound about your hand?"
+
+Sir Archie looked at her in confusion, not knowing what to say.
+"It is real hair, Elsalill, I can feel it. It lies soft and cool
+about my hand. But whence did it come?"
+
+The maid sat staring at his hand, and it seemed that her eyes
+would fall out of her head.
+
+"So was it that my foster sister's hair was wound about the hand
+of him who murdered her," she said.
+
+But now Sir Archie burst into a laugh. He quickly drew back his
+hand.
+
+"Why," said he, "you and I, Elsalill, we are frightening ourselves
+like little children. It was nothing more than a bright sunbeam
+falling through the window."
+
+But the girl fell to weeping and said: "Now methinks I am
+crouching again by the stove and I can see the murderers at their
+work. Ah, but I hoped to the last they would not find my dear
+foster sister, but then one of them came and plucked her from the
+wall, and when she sought to escape he twined her hair about his
+hand and held her fast. And she fell on her knees before him and
+said: 'Have pity on my youth! Spare my life, let me live long
+enough to know why I have come into the world! I have done you no
+ill, why would you kill me? Why would you deny me my life?' But he
+paid no heed to her words and killed her."
+
+While Elsalill said this Sir Archie stood with a frown on his brow
+and turned his eyes away.
+
+"Ah, if I might one day meet that man!" said Elsalill. She stood
+before Sir Archie with clenched fists.
+
+"You cannot meet the man," said Sir Archie. "He is dead."
+
+But the maid threw herself upon the bench and sobbed. "Sir Archie,
+Sir Archie, why have you brought the dead into my thoughts? Now I
+must weep all evening and all night. Leave me, Sir Archie, for now
+I have no thought for any but the dead. Now I can only think upon
+my foster sister and how dear she was to me."
+
+And Sir Archie had no power to console her, but was banished by
+her tears and wailing and went back to his companions.
+
+III
+
+Sir Archie could not understand why his mind was always so full of
+heavy thoughts. He could never escape them, whether he drank with
+his companions, or whether he sat in talk with Elsalill. If he
+danced all night at the wharves they were still with him, and if
+he walked far and wide over the frozen sea, they followed him
+there.
+
+"Why am I ever forced to remember what I would fain forget?" Sir
+Archie asked himself. "It is as though someone were always
+stealing behind me and whispering in my ear.
+
+"It is as though someone were weaving a net about me," said Sir
+Archie, "to catch all my own thoughts and leave me none but this.
+I cannot see the pursuer who casts the net, but I can hear his
+step as he comes stealing after me."
+
+"It is as though a painter went before me and painted the same
+picture wherever my eyes may rest," said Sir Archie. "Whether I
+look to heaven or to earth I see naught else but this one thing."
+
+"It is as though a mason sat within my heart and chiselled out the
+same heavy care," said Sir Archie. "I cannot see this mason, but
+day and night I can hear the blows of his mallet as he hammers at
+my heart. 'Heart of stone, heart of stone,' he says, 'now you
+shall yield. Now I shall hammer into you a lasting care.'"
+
+Sir Archie had two friends, Sir Philip and Sir Reginald, who
+followed him wherever he went. They were grieved that he was
+always cast down and that nothing could avail to cheer him.
+
+"What is it that ails you?" they would say. "What makes your eyes
+burn so, and why are your cheeks so pale?"
+
+Sir Archie would not tell them what it was that tormented him. He
+thought: "What would my comrades say of me if they knew I yielded
+to these unmanly thoughts? They would no longer obey me if they
+found out that I was racked with remorse for a deed there was no
+avoiding."
+
+As they continued to press him, he said at last, to throw them off
+the scent: "Fortune is playing me strange tricks in these days.
+There is a girl I have a mind to win, but I cannot come at her.
+Something always stands in my way."
+
+"Maybe the maiden does not love you?" said Sir Reginald.
+
+"I surely think her heart is disposed toward me," said Sir Archie;
+"but there is something watching over her, so that I cannot win
+her."
+
+Then Sir Reginald and Sir Philip began to laugh and said: "Never
+fear, we'll get you the girl."
+
+That evening Elsalill was walking alone up the lane, coming from
+her work. She was tired and thought to herself: "This is a hard
+life and I find no joy in it. It sickens me to stand all day in
+the reek of fish. It sickens me to hear the other women laugh and
+jest in their rude voices. It sickens me to see the hungry gulls
+fly above the tables trying to snatch the fish out of my hands.
+Oh, that someone would come and take me away from here! I would
+follow him to the world's end."
+
+When Elsalill had reached the darkest part of the lane, Sir
+Reginald and Sir Philip came out of the shadow and greeted her.
+
+"Mistress Elsalill," they said, "we have a message for you from
+Sir Archie. He is lying sick at the inn. He longs to speak with
+you and begs you to accompany us home."
+
+Elsalill began to fear that Sir Archie might be grievously sick,
+and she turned at once and went with the two Scottish gallants who
+were to bring her to him.
+
+Sir Philip and Sir Reginald walked one on each side of her. They
+smiled at one another and thought that nothing could be easier
+than to delude Elsalill.
+
+Elsalill was in great haste; she almost ran down the lane. Sir
+Philip and Sir Reginald had to take long strides to keep up with
+her.
+
+But as Elsalill was making such haste to reach the inn, something
+began to roll before her feet. It seemed to have been thrown down
+in front of her, and she nearly stumbled over it.
+
+"What can it be that rolls on and on before my feet?" thought
+Elsalill. "It must be a stone that I have kicked from the ground
+and sent rolling down the hill."
+
+She was in such a hurry to reach Sir Archie that she did not like
+being hindered by the thing that rolled close before her feet. She
+kicked it aside, but it came back at once and rolled before her
+down the lane.
+
+Elsalill heard it ring like silver when she kicked it away, and
+she saw that it was bright and shining.
+
+"It is no common stone," she thought. "I believe it is a coin of
+silver." But she was in such haste to reach Sir Archie that she
+thought she had no time to pick it up.
+
+But again and again it rolled before her feet, and she thought:
+"You will go on the faster if you stoop down and pick it up. You
+can throw it far away if it is nothing."
+
+She stooped down and picked it up. It was a big silver coin and it
+shone white in her hand.
+
+"What is it that you have found in the street, mistress?" asked
+Sir Reginald. "It shines so white in the moonlight."
+
+At that moment they were passing one of the great storehouses,
+where foreign fisher-folk lodged while they lay at Marstrand.
+Before the entrance hung a lantern, which threw a feeble light
+upon the street.
+
+"Let us see what you have found, mistress," said Sir Philip,
+standing under the light.
+
+Elsalill held up the coin to the lantern, and hardly had she cast
+eye upon it when she cried out: "This is Herr Arne's money! I know
+it well. This is Herr Arne's money!"
+
+"What's that you say, mistress?" asked Sir Reginald. "What makes
+you say it is Herr Arne's money?"
+
+"I know the coin," said Elsalill. "I have often seen it in Herr
+Arne's hand. Yes, it is surely Herr Arne's money."
+
+"Shout not so loudly, mistress!" said Sir Philip. "People run here
+already to know the cause of this outcry."
+
+But Elsalill paid no heed to Sir Philip. She saw that the door of
+the warehouse stood open. A fire blazed in the midst of the floor
+and round about it sat a number of men conversing quietly and at
+leisure.
+
+Elsalill hastened in to them, holding the coin aloft. "Listen to
+me, every man!" she cried. "Now I know that Herr Arne's murderers
+are alive. Look here! I have found one of Herr Arne's coins."
+
+All the men turned toward her. She saw that Torarin the fish
+hawker sat among them.
+
+"What is that you tell us so noisily, my girl?" Torarin asked.
+"How can you know Herr Arne's moneys from any other?"
+
+"Well may I know this very piece of silver from any other," said
+Elsalill. "It is old and heavy, and it is chipped at the edge.
+Herr Arne told us that it came from the time of the old kings of
+Norway, and never would he part with it when he counted out money
+to pay for his goods."
+
+"Now you must tell us where you have found it, mistress," said
+another of the fishermen.
+
+"I found it rolling before me in the street," said Elsalill. "One
+of the murderers has surely dropped it there."
+
+"It may be as you say," said Torarin, "but what can we do in this
+matter? We cannot find the murderers by this alone, that you know
+they have walked in one of our streets."
+
+The fishermen were agreed that Torarin had spoken wisely. They
+settled themselves again about the fire.
+
+"Come home with me, Elsalill," said Torarin. "This is not an hour
+for a young maid to run about the streets of the town."
+
+As Torarin said this, Elsalill looked about for her companions.
+But Sir Reginald and Sir Philip had stolen away without her
+noticing their departure.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+IN THE TOWN CELLARS
+
+
+
+One morning the hostess of the Town Cellars at Marstrand threw
+open her doors to sweep the steps and the lobby, and then she
+caught sight of a young maid sitting on one of the steps and
+waiting. She was dressed in a long gray garment which was fastened
+with a belt at the waist. Her hair was fair, and it was neither
+bound nor braided, but hung down on either side of her face.
+
+As the door opened she went down the steps into the lobby, but it
+seemed to the hostess that she moved as though walking in her
+sleep. And all the time she kept her eyelids lowered and her arms
+pressed close to her side. The nearer she came, the more
+astonished was the hostess at the fragile slenderness of her form.
+Her face was fair, but it was delicate and transparent, as though
+it had been made of brittle glass.
+
+When she came down to the hostess she asked whether there was any
+work she could do, and offered her services.
+
+Then the hostess thought of all the wild companions whose habit it
+was to sit drinking ale and wine in her tavern, and she could not
+help smiling. "No, there is no place here for a little maid like
+you," she said.
+
+The maiden did not raise her eyes nor make the slightest movement,
+but she asked again to be taken into service. She desired neither
+board nor wages, she said, only to have a task to perform.
+
+"No," said the hostess, "if my own daughter were as you are, I
+should refuse her this. I wish you a better lot than to be servant
+here."
+
+The young maid went quietly up the steps, and the hostess stood
+watching her. She looked so small and helpless that the woman took
+pity on her.
+
+She called her back and said to her: "Maybe you run greater risks
+if you wander alone about the streets and alleys than if you come
+to me. You may stay with me today and wash the cups and dishes,
+and then I shall see what you are fit for."
+
+The hostess took her to a little closet she had contrived beyond
+the hall of the tavern. It was no bigger than a cupboard and had
+neither window nor loophole, but was only lighted by a hatch in
+the wall of the public room.
+
+"Stand here today," said the hostess to the maid, "and wash me all
+the cups and dishes I pass you through this hatch, then I shall
+see whether I can keep you in my service."
+
+The maiden went into the closet, and she moved so silently that
+the hostess thought it was like a dead woman slipping into her
+grave.
+
+She stood the whole day and spoke to none, nor ever leaned her
+head through the hatch to look at the folk who came and went in
+the tavern. And she did not touch the food that was set before
+her. Nobody heard her make a clatter as she washed, but whenever
+the hostess held out her hand to the hatch, she passed out clean
+cups and dishes without a speck on them.
+
+But when the hostess took them to set them out on the table, they
+were so cold that she thought they would sear the skin off her
+fingers. And she shuddered and said: "It is as though I took them
+from the cold hands of Death himself."
+
+II
+
+One day there had been no fish to clean on the quays, so that
+Elsalill had stayed at home. She sat at the spinning-wheel and was
+alone in the cottage. A good fire was burning on the hearth, and
+it was light enough in the room.
+
+In the midst of her work she felt a light breath, as though a cold
+breeze had swept over her forehead. She looked up and saw her dead
+foster sister standing beside her.
+
+Elsalill laid her hand on the wheel to stop it, and sat still,
+looking at her foster sister. At first she was afraid, but she
+thought to herself: "It is unworthy of me to be afraid of my
+foster sister. Whether she be dead or alive, I am still glad to
+see her."
+
+"Dear sister," she said to the dead girl, "is there aught you
+would have me do?"
+
+The other said to her in a voice that had neither strength nor
+tone: "My sister Elsalill, I am in service at the tavern, and the
+hostess has made me stand and wash cups and dishes all day. Now
+the evening is come and I am so tired that I can hold out no
+longer. I have come hither to ask if you will not give me your
+help."
+
+When Elsalill heard this it was as though a veil was drawn over
+her mind. She could no longer think nor wonder nor feel any fear.
+She only knew joy at seeing her foster sister again, and she
+answered: "Yes, dear sister, I will come straight and help you."
+
+Then the dead girl went to the door, and Elsalill followed her.
+But as they stood on the threshold her foster sister paused and
+said to Elsalill: "You must put on your cloak. There is a strong
+wind outside." And as she said this her voice sounded clearer and
+less muffled than before.
+
+Elsalill then took her cloak from the wall and wrapped it around
+her. She thought to herself: "My foster sister loves me still. She
+wishes me no evil. I am only happy that I may go with her wherever
+she may take me."
+
+And then she followed the dead girl through many streets, all the
+way from Torarin's cabin, which stood on a rocky slope, down to
+the level streets about the harbour and the market place.
+
+The dead girl always walked two paces in front of Elsalill. A
+heavy gale was blowing that evening, howling through the streets,
+and Elsalill noticed that when a violent gust would have flung her
+against the wall, the dead girl placed herself between her and the
+wind and screened her as well as she could with her slender body.
+
+When at last they came to the town hall the dead girl went down
+the cellar steps and beckoned Elsalill to follow her. But as they
+were going down the wind blew out the light in the lantern that
+hung in the lobby and they were in darkness. Then Elsalill did not
+know where to turn her steps and the dead girl had to put her hand
+on hers to lead her. But the dead girl's hand was so cold that
+Elsalill started and began to quake with fear. Then the dead girl
+drew her hand away and wound it in a corner of Elsalill's cloak
+before she led her on again. But Elsalill felt the icy chill
+through fur and lining.
+
+Now the dead girl led Elsalill through a long corridor and opened
+a door for her. They came into a little dark closet where a feeble
+light fell through a hatch in the wall. Elsalill saw that they
+were in a room where the scullery wench stood and scoured cups and
+dishes for the hostess to set out on the tables for her customers.
+Elsalill could just see that a pail of water stood upon a stool,
+and in the hatch were many cups and goblets that wanted rinsing.
+
+"Will you help me with this work tonight, Elsalill?" said the dead
+girl.
+
+"Yes, dear sister," said Elsalill, "you know I will help you with
+whatsoever you wish."
+
+Elsalill then took off her cloak, rolled up her sleeves and began
+the work.
+
+"Will you be very quiet and silent in here, Elsalill, so that the
+hostess may not know that I have found help?"
+
+"Yes, dear sister," said Elsalill; "you may be sure I will."
+
+"Then farewell, Elsalill," said the dead girl. "I have only one
+more thing to ask of you. And it is that you be not too angry with
+me for this thing."
+
+"Wherefore do you bid me farewell?" said Elsalill. "I will gladly
+come every evening and help you."
+
+"No, there is no need for you to come after this evening," said
+the dead girl. "I have good hope that tonight you will give me
+such help that my mission will now be ended."
+
+As they spoke thus Elsalill was already leaning over her work. All
+was still for a while, but then she felt a light breath on her
+forehead, as when the dead girl had come to her in Torarin's
+cabin. She looked up and saw that she was alone. Then she knew
+what it was that had felt like a faint breeze upon her face, and
+said to herself: "My dead foster sister has kissed my forehead
+before she parted from me."
+
+Elsalill now turned to her work and finished it. She rinsed out
+all the bowls and tankards and dried them. Then she looked in the
+hatch whether any more had been set in there, and finding none she
+stood at the hatch and looked out into the tavern.
+
+It was an hour of the day when there was usually little custom in
+the cellars. The hostess was absent from her bar and none of her
+tapsters was to be seen in the room. The place was empty, save for
+three men, who sat at the end of a long table. They were guests,
+but they seemed well at their ease, for one of them, who had
+emptied his tankard, went to the bar, filled it from one of the
+great tuns of ale and wine that stood there, and sat down again to
+drink.
+
+Elsalill felt as though she had come here from a strange world.
+Her thoughts were with her dead foster sister, and she could not
+clearly take in what she saw. It was a long while before she was
+aware that the three men at the table were well known and dear to
+her. For they who sat there were none other than Sir Archie and
+his two friends Sir Reginald and Sir Philip.
+
+For some days past Sir Archie had not visited Elsalill, and she
+was glad to see him. She was on the point of calling to him that
+she was there at hand; but then the thought came to her, how
+strange it was that he had ceased to visit her, and she kept
+silence. "Maybe his fancy has turned to another," thought
+Elsalill. "Maybe it is of her he is thinking."
+
+For Sir Archie sat a little apart from the others. He was silent
+and gazed steadily before him, without touching his drink. He took
+no part in the talk, and when his friends addressed a word to him,
+he was seldom at the pains to make them an answer.
+
+Elsalill could hear that the others were trying to put life into
+him. They asked him why he had left drinking, and even sought to
+persuade him that he should go and talk with Elsalill and so
+recover his good humour.
+
+"You are to pay no heed to me," said Sir Archie. "There is another
+that fills my thoughts. Still do I see her before me, and still do
+I hear the sound of her voice in my ears."
+
+And then Elsalill saw that Sir Archie was gazing at one of the
+massive pillars that upheld the cellar roof. She saw, too, what
+till then she had not marked, that her foster sister stood beside
+that pillar and looked upon Sir Archie. She stood there quite
+motionless in her gray habit, and it was not easy to discover her,
+as she stood so close against the pillar.
+
+Elsalill stood quite still looking into the room. She noted that
+her foster sister kept her eyes raised when she looked upon Sir
+Archie. During the whole time she was with Elsalill she had walked
+with her eyes upon the ground.
+
+Now her eyes were the only thing about her that was ghastly.
+Elsalill saw that they were dim and filmed. They had no glance,
+and the light was not mirrored in them any more.
+
+After a while Sir Archie began again to lament. "I see her every
+hour. She follows me wherever I go," he said.
+
+He sat with his face toward the pillar where the dead girl stood,
+and stared at her. But Elsalill was sure that he did not see her.
+It was not of her he spoke, but of one who was ever in his
+thoughts.
+
+Elsalill never left the hatch and followed with her eyes all that
+took place, thinking that most of all she wished to find out who
+it was that filled Sir Archie's thoughts.
+
+Suddenly she was aware that the dead girl had taken her place on
+the bench beside Sir Archie and was whispering in his ear.
+
+But still Sir Archie knew nothing of her being so close to him or
+of her whispering in his ear. He was only aware of her presence in
+the mortal dread that came over him.
+
+Elsalill saw that when the dead girl had sat for a few moments
+whispering to Sir Archie, he hid his face in his hands and wept.
+"Alas, would I had never found the maid!" he said. "I regret
+nothing else but that I did not let the maiden go when she begged
+me."
+
+The other two Scotsmen ceased drinking and looked in alarm at Sir
+Archie, who thus laid aside all his manliness and yielded to
+remorse. For a moment they were perplexed, but then one of them
+went up to the bar, took the tallest tankard that stood there and
+filled it with red wine. He brought it to Sir Archie, clapped him
+on the shoulder and said: "Drink, brother! Herr Arne's hoard is
+not yet done. So long as we have coin to buy such wine as this, no
+cares need sit upon us."
+
+But in the same instant as these words were spoken: "Drink,
+brother! Herr Arne's hoard is not yet done," Elsalill saw the dead
+girl rise from the bench and vanish.
+
+And in that moment Elsalill saw before her eyes three men with
+great beards and rough coats of skin, struggling with Herr Arne's
+servants. And now it was plain to her that they were the three who
+sat in the cellar--Sir Archie, Sir Philip, and Sir Reginald.
+
+III
+
+Elsalill came out of the closet where she had stood and rinsed the
+hostess's cups, and softly closed the door behind her. In the
+narrow corridor outside she stopped and stood motionless leaning
+against the wall for nearly an hour.
+
+As she stood there she thought to herself: "I cannot betray him.
+Let him be guilty of what evil he may, I love him with all my
+heart. I cannot send him to be broken upon the wheel. I cannot see
+them burn away his hands and feet."
+
+The storm that had raged all day became more and more violent as
+evening wore on, and Elsalill could hear its roar as she stood in
+the darkness.
+
+"Now the first storms of spring have come," she thought. "Now they
+have come in all their might to set the waters free and break up
+the ice. In a few days we shall have open sea, and then Sir Archie
+will sail from hence, never to return. No more misdeeds can he
+commit in this land. What profits it then if he be taken and
+suffer for his crime? Neither the dead nor the living have any
+comfort of it."
+
+Elsalill drew her cloak about her. She thought she would go home
+and sit quietly at her work without betraying her secret to any
+one.
+
+But before she had raised a foot to go, she changed her purpose
+and stayed.
+
+She stood still listening to the roaring of the gale. Again she
+thought of the coming of spring. The snow would disappear and the
+earth put on its garment of green.
+
+"Merciful heaven, what a spring will this be for me!" thought
+Elsalill. "No joy and no happiness can bloom for me after the
+chills of this winter.
+
+"No more than a year ago I was so happy when winter was past and
+spring came," she thought. "I remember one evening which was so
+fair that I could not sit within doors. So I took my foster sister
+by the hand, and we went out into the fields to fetch green
+boughs and deck the stove.
+
+She recalled to mind how she and her foster sister had walked along
+a green pathway.  And there by the side of the way they had seen a
+young birch that had been cut down.  The wood showed that it had
+been cut many days before.  But now they saw that the poor lopped
+tree had begun to put forth leaves and its buds were bursting.
+
+Then her foster sister had stopped and bent over the tree. "Ah,
+poor tree," she said, "what evil can you have done, that you are
+not suffered to die, though you are cut down?  What makes you put
+forth leaves, as though you still lived?"
+
+And Elsalill had laughed at her and answered: "Maybe it grows so
+sweet and green that he who cut it down may see the harm he has
+wrought and feel remorse."
+
+But her foster sister did not laugh with her, and there were tears
+in her eyes. "It is terrible for a dead man if he cannot rest in
+his grave.  They who are dead have small comfort to look for;
+neither love nor happiness can reach them. All the good they yet
+desire is that they may be left to sleep in peace. Well may I weep
+when you say this birch cannot die for thinking of its murderer.
+The hardest fate for one deprived of life is that he may not sleep
+in peace but must pursue his murderer. The dead have naught to
+long for but to be left to sleep in peace."
+
+When Elsalill recalled these words she began to weep and wring her
+hands.
+
+"My foster sister will not find rest in her grave," she said,
+"unless I betray my beloved. If I do not aid her in this, she must
+roam above ground without respite or repose. My poor foster
+sister, she has nothing more to hope for but to find peace in her
+grave, and that I cannot give her unless I send the man I love to
+be broken on the wheel."
+
+IV
+
+Sir Archie came out of the tavern and went through the long
+corridor. The lantern hanging from the roof had now been lighted
+again, and by its light he saw that a young maid stood leaning
+against the wall.
+
+She was so pale and stood so still that Sir Archie was afraid and
+thought: "There at last before my eyes stands the dead girl who
+haunts me every day."
+
+As Sir Archie went past Elsalill he laid his hand on hers to feel
+if it was really a dead girl standing there. And her hand was so
+cold that he could not say whether it belonged to the living or
+the dead.
+
+But as Sir Archie touched Elsalill's hand she drew it back, and
+then Sir Archie knew her again.
+
+He thought she had come there for his sake, and great was his joy
+to see her. At once a thought came to him: "Now I know what I will
+do, that the dead girl may be appeased and cease to haunt me."
+
+He took Elsalill's hands within his own and raised them to his
+lips. "God bless you for coming to me this evening, Elsalill!" he
+said.
+
+But Elsalill's heart was sore afflicted. She could not speak for
+tears, even so much as to tell Sir Archie she had not come there
+to meet him.
+
+Sir Archie stood silent a long while, but he held Elsalill's hands
+in his the whole time. And the longer he stood thus, the clearer
+and more handsome did his face become.
+
+"Elsalill," said Sir Archie, and he spoke very earnestly, "for
+many days I have not been able to see you, because I have been
+tormented by heavy thoughts. They have left me no peace, and I
+believed I should soon go out of my mind. But tonight it goes
+better with me and I no longer see before me the image that
+tormented me. And when I found you here, my heart told me what I
+had to do to be rid of my torment for all time."
+
+He bent down to look into Elsalill's eyes, but as she stood with
+drooping eyelids he went on: "You are angry with me, Elsalill,
+because I have not been to see you for many days. But I could not
+come, for when I saw you I was reminded even more of what tortured
+me. When I saw you I was forced to think even more of a young maid
+to whom I have done wrong. Many others have I wronged in my
+lifetime, Elsalill, but my conscience plagues me for naught else
+but what I did to this young maid."
+
+As Elsalill still said nothing, he took her hands again and raised
+them to his lips and kissed them.
+
+"Now, listen, Elsalill, to what my heart said to me when I saw you
+standing here and waiting for me. 'You have done injury to one
+maiden,' it said, 'and for what you have made her suffer, you must
+atone to another. You shall take her to wife, and you shall be so
+good to her that she shall never know sorrow. Such faithfulness
+shall you show her that your love will be greater on the day of
+your death than on your wedding day.'"
+
+Elsalill stood still as before with downcast eyes. Then Sir Archie
+laid his hand on her head and raised it. "You must tell me,
+Elsalill, whether you hear what I say," he said.
+
+Then he saw that Elsalill was weeping so violently that great
+tears ran down her cheeks.
+
+"Why do you weep, Elsalill?" asked Sir Archie.
+
+"I weep, Sir Archie," said Elsalill, "because I have too great
+love for you in my heart."
+
+Then Sir Archie came yet closer to Elsalill and put his arm around
+her. "Do you hear how the wind howls without?" said he. "That
+means that soon the ice will break up, and that ships again will
+be free to sail over to my native land. Tell me now, Elsalill,
+will you come with me, so that I may make good to you the evil I
+have done to another?"
+
+Sir Archie continued to whisper to Elsalill of the glorious life
+that awaited her, and Elsalill began to think to herself: "Alas,
+if only I did not know what evil he had done! Then I would go with
+him and live happily."
+
+Sir Archie came closer and closer to her, and when Elsalill looked
+up she saw that his face was bending over her and that he was
+about to kiss her on the forehead. Then she remembered the dead
+girl who had so lately been with her and kissed her. She tore
+herself free from Sir Archie and said: "No, Sir Archie, I will
+never go with you."
+
+"Yes," said Sir Archie, "you must come with me, Elsalill, or else
+I shall be drawn down to my destruction."
+
+He began to whisper to the girl ever more tenderly, and again she
+thought to herself: "Were it not more pleasing to God and men that
+he be allowed to atone for his evil life and become a righteous
+man? Whom can it profit if he be punished with death?"
+
+As these thoughts were in Elsalill's mind two men came by on their
+way to the tavern. When Sir Archie marked that they cast curious
+eyes on him and the maid, he said to her: "Come, Elsalill, I will
+take you home. I would not that any should see you had come to the
+tavern for me."
+
+Then Elsalill looked up, as though suddenly calling to mind that
+she had another duty to perform than that of listening to Sir
+Archie. But her heart smote her when she thought of betraying his
+crime. "If you deliver him to the hangman, I must break," her
+heart said to her. And Sir Archie drew the girl's cloak more
+tightly about her and led her out into the street. He walked with
+her all the way to Torarin's cabin, and she noticed that whenever
+the storm blew fiercely in their faces, he placed himself before
+her and screened her.
+
+Elsalill thought, all the time they were walking: "My dead foster
+sister knew nothing of this, that he would atone for his crime and
+become a good man."
+
+Sir Archie still whispered the tenderest words in Elsalill's ear.
+And the longer she listened to him, the more firmly she believed
+in him.
+
+"It must have been that I might hear Sir Archie whisper such words
+as these in my ear that my foster sister called me forth," she
+thought. "She loves me so dearly. She desires not my unhappiness
+but my happiness."
+
+And as they stopped before the cabin, Sir Archie asked Elsalill
+once more whether she would go with him across the sea. And
+Elsalill answered that with God's help she would go.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+UNREST
+
+
+
+Next day the storm had ceased. The weather was now milder, but it
+had caused little shrinking of the ice and the sea was closed as
+fast as ever.
+
+When Elsalill awoke in the morning she thought: "It is surely
+better that a wicked man repent and live according to God's
+commandments than that he be punished with death."
+
+That day Sir Archie sent a messenger to Elsalill, and he brought
+her a heavy armlet of gold.
+
+And Elsalill was glad that Sir Archie had thought of giving her
+pleasure, and she thanked the messenger and accepted the gift.
+
+But when he was gone she fell to thinking that this armlet had
+been bought for her with Herr Arne's money. When she thought of
+this she could not endure to look on it. She plucked it from her
+arm and threw it far away.
+
+"What will my life be, if I must always call to mind that I am
+living on Herr Arne's money?" she thought. "If I put a mouthful of
+food to my lips, must I not think of the stolen money? And if I
+have a new gown, will it not ring in my ears that it is bought
+with ill-gotten gold? Now at last I see that it is impossible for
+me to go with Sir Archie and join my life to his. I shall tell him
+this when he comes."
+
+When evening was drawing on, Sir Archie came to her. He was in
+cheerful mood, he had not been plagued with evil thoughts, and he
+believed it was owing to his promise to make good to one maiden
+the wrong he had done another.
+
+When Elsalill saw him and heard him speak she could not bring
+herself to tell him that she was sad at heart and would part from
+him.
+
+All the sorrows which gnawed at her were forgotten as she sat
+listening to Sir Archie.
+
+The next day was a Sunday, and Elsalill went to church. She was
+there both in the morning and in the evening.
+
+As she sat during the morning service listening to the sermon, she
+heard someone weeping and sobbing close by.
+
+She thought it was one of those who sat beside her in the pew, but
+whether she looked to right or left she saw none but calm and
+devout worshippers.
+
+Nevertheless, she plainly heard a sound of weeping, and it seemed
+so near to her that she might have touched the one who wept by
+putting out her hand.
+
+Elsalill sat listening to the sighing and sobbing, and thought to
+herself that she had never heard so sorrowful a sound.
+
+"Who is it that is afflicted with such deep grief that she must
+shed these bitter tears?" thought Elsalill.
+
+She looked behind her, and she leaned forward over the next pew to
+see. But all were sitting in silence, and no face was wet with
+tears.
+
+Then Elsalill thought there was no need to ask or wonder, for
+indeed she had known from the first who it was that wept beside
+her. "Dear sister," she whispered, "why do you not show yourself
+to me, as you did but lately? For you must know that I would
+gladly do all I may to dry your tears."
+
+She listened for an answer, but none came. All she heard was the
+sobbing of the dead girl beside her.
+
+Elsalill tried to hearken to what the preacher was saying in the
+pulpit, but she could follow little of it. And she grew impatient
+and whispered: "I know one who has more cause to weep than any,
+and that is myself. Had not my foster sister revealed her murderer
+to me I might have sat here with a heart full of joy."
+
+As she listened to the weeping she became more and more resentful,
+so that she thought: "How can my dead foster sister require of me
+that I shall betray the man I love? Never would she herself have
+done such a thing, if she had lived."
+
+She was shut up in the pew, but she could scarcely sit still. She
+rocked backward and forward and wrung her hands. "Now this will
+follow me all day," she thought. "Who knows," she went on, growing
+more and more anxious, "who knows whether it will not follow me
+through life?"
+
+But the sobbing beside her grew ever deeper and sadder, and at
+last her heart was touched in spite of herself, and she too began
+to weep. "She who weeps so must have a terribly heavy grief," she
+thought. "She must have to bear suffering heavier than any of the
+living can conceive."
+
+When the service was over and Elsalill had come out of church, she
+heard the sobbing no longer. But all the way home she wept to
+herself because her foster sister could find no peace in her
+grave.
+
+When the time of evensong came Elsalill went again to the church,
+being constrained to know whether her foster sister still sat
+there weeping.
+
+And as soon as Elsalill entered the church she heard her, and her
+soul trembled within her when she caught the sound of the sobbing.
+She felt her strength forsaking her and she had but one desire--to
+help the dead girl who was wandering among the living and knew no
+rest.
+
+When Elsalill came out of church it was still light enough for her
+to see that one of those who walked before her left bloody
+footprints in the snow.
+
+"Who can it be so poor that he goes barefoot and leaves bloody
+footprints in the snow?" she thought.
+
+All those who walked before her seemed to be well-to-do folk. They
+were neatly dressed and well shod.
+
+But the red footprints were not old. Elsalill could see they were
+made by one of the group that walked before her. "It is someone
+who is footsore from a long journey," she thought. "God grant he
+may not have far to go ere he find shelter and rest."
+
+She had a strong desire to know who it was that had made this
+weary pilgrimage, and she followed the footprints, though they led
+her away from her home.
+
+But suddenly she saw that all the church-goers had gone another
+way and that she was alone in the street. Nevertheless, the blood-
+red footprints were there as plain as before. "It is my poor
+foster sister who is going before me," she thought; and she owned
+to herself that she had guessed it all the time.
+
+"Alas, my poor foster sister, I thought you went so lightly upon
+earth that your feet did not touch the ground. But none among the
+living can know how painful your pilgrimage must be."
+
+The tears started to her eyes, and she sighed: "Could she but find
+peace in her grave! Woe is me that she must wander here so long,
+till she has worn her feet to bleeding!"
+
+"Stay, my dear foster sister!" she cried. "Stay, that I may speak
+to you!"
+
+But as she cried thus, she saw that the footprints fell yet faster
+in the snow, as though the dead girl were hastening her steps.
+
+"Now she flies from me. She looks no more for help from me," said
+Elsalill.
+
+The bloody footprints made her quite frantic, and she cried out:
+"My dear foster sister, I will do all you ask if only you may find
+rest in your grave!"
+
+So soon as Elsalill had uttered these words a tall, big woman who
+had followed her came up and laid a hand on her arm.
+
+"Who may you be, crying and wringing your hands here in the
+street?" the woman asked. "You call to my mind a little maid who
+came to me on Friday looking for a place and then ran away from
+me. Or perhaps you are the same?"
+
+"No, I am not the same," said Elsalill, but if, as I think, you
+are the hostess of the Town Cellars, then I know what maid it is
+you speak of."
+
+"Then you can tell me why she took herself off and has not come
+back," said the hostess.
+
+"She left you," said Elsalill, "because she did not choose to hear
+the talk of all the evildoers who gather in your tavern."
+
+"Many a wild companion comes to my tavern," said the hostess, "but
+among them are no evildoers."
+
+"Yet the maid heard three that sat there talking among
+themselves," said Elsalill, "and one of them said: 'Drink,
+brother! Herr Arne's hoard is not yet done.'"
+
+When Elsalill had said these words she thought: "Now I have helped
+my foster sister and told what I heard. Now may God help me that
+this woman pay no heed to my words; so I shall be quit."
+
+But when she saw in the hostess's face that she believed her, she
+was afraid and would have run away.
+
+But before she had time to move, the hostess's heavy hand had
+taken firm hold of her so that she could not escape.
+
+"If you can witness that such words have been uttered in my
+tavern, mistress," said the hostess, "then you were best not to
+run away. For you must go with me to those who have the power to
+seize the murderers and bring them to justice."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+SIR ARCHIE'S FLIGHT
+
+
+
+Elsalill came into the tavern wrapt in her long cloak and went
+straight to a table where Sir Archie sat drinking with his
+friends. A crowd of customers sat about the tables in the cellar,
+but Elsalill took no heed of all the wondering glances that
+followed her, as she went and sat down beside the man she loved.
+Her only thought was to be with Sir Archie in the few moments of
+freedom which were left to him.
+
+When Sir Archie saw Elsalill come and sit by him, he rose and
+moved with her to a table that stood far down the room, hidden by
+a pillar. She could see that he was displeased at her coming to
+meet him in a place where it was not the custom for young maids to
+show themselves.
+
+"I have no long message to bring you, Sir Archie," said Elsalill;
+"but I would have you know that I cannot go with you to your own
+country."
+
+When Sir Archie heard Elsalill speak thus he was in despair, since
+he feared that, if he lost Elsalill, the evil thoughts would again
+take possession of him.
+
+"Why will you not go with me, Elsalill?" he asked.
+
+Elsalill was as pale as death. Her thoughts were so confused that
+she scarce knew what answer she made him.
+
+"It is a perilous thing to follow a soldier of fortune," she said.
+"For none can tell whether such a man will keep his plighted
+troth."
+
+Before Sir Archie had time to answer, a sailor came into the
+tavern.
+
+He went up to Sir Archie and told him he was sent by the skipper
+of the great gallias which lay in the ice behind Klovero. The
+skipper prayed Sir Archie and all his men to make ready their
+goods and come aboard that evening. The storm had sprung up again
+and the sea was clearing far away to the westward. It might well
+be that before daybreak they would have open water and could sail
+for Scotland.
+
+"You hear what this man says?" said Sir Archie to Elsalill. "Will
+you come with me?"
+
+"No," said Elsalill, "I will not go with you."
+
+But in her heart she was very glad, for she thought: "Now belike
+it will turn out so that he may escape ere the watch can come and
+seize him."
+
+Sir Archie rose and went over to Sir Philip and Sir Reginald and
+spoke to them of the message. "Get you back to the inn before me,"
+he said, "and make all ready. I have a word or two yet to say to
+Elsalill."
+
+When Elsalill saw that Sir Archie was coming back to her, she
+waved her hands as though to prevent him. "Why do you come back,
+Sir Archie?" she said. "Why do you not hasten down to the sea as
+fast as your feet may carry you?"
+
+For such was her love for Sir Archie. She had indeed betrayed him
+for her dear foster sister's sake, but her most fervent wish was
+that he might escape.
+
+"No, first will I beg you once more to come with me," said Sir
+Archie.
+
+"But you know, Sir Archie, that I cannot come with you," said
+Elsalill.
+
+"Why can you not?" said Sir Archie. "You are a poor orphan, so
+forlorn and friendless that none will care what becomes of you.
+But if you come with me, I will make you a noble lady. I am a
+powerful man in my own country. You shall be clad in silk and
+gold, and you shall tread a measure at the King's court."
+
+Elsalill was shaking with alarm at his delaying while flight was
+still open to him. She could scarce calm herself to answer: "Go
+hence, Sir Archie! You must tarry no longer to importune me."
+"There is something I would say to you, Elsalill," said Sir
+Archie, and his voice became more tender as he spoke. "When first
+I saw you, my only thought was of tempting and beguiling you. In
+the beginning I promised you riches in jest, but since two nights
+ago I have meant honestly by you. And now it is my purpose and
+desire to make you my wife. You may trust in me, as I am a
+gentleman and a soldier."
+
+At that moment Elsalill heard the march of armed men in the square
+outside. "If I go with him now," she thought, "he may yet escape.
+If I refuse, I drive him to destruction. It is for my sake he
+tarries here so long that the watch will lay hands on him. But how
+can I go with the man who has murdered all my dear ones?"
+
+"Sir Archie," said Elsalill, and she hoped her words might startle
+him, "Do you not hear the tramp of armed men in the square?"
+
+"Oh, yes, I hear it," said Sir Archie; "there has been some
+alehouse brawl, I doubt not. Let it not fright you, Elsalill; it
+is but some fishermen that have come to clapper-claws over their
+cups."
+
+"Sir Archie," said Elsalill, "do you not hear them stand before
+the town hall?"
+
+Elsalill was trembling from head to foot, but Sir Archie took no
+note of it; he was quite calm.
+
+"Where else would you have them stand?" said Sir Archie. "They
+must bring the brawlers here to lay them by the heels in the watch
+house. Listen not to them, Elsalill, but to me, who ask you to
+follow me over the sea!"
+
+But Elsalill tried once more to put fear into Sir Archie. "Sir
+Archie," she said, do you not hear the watch coming down the steps
+to the cellar?"
+
+"Oh, yes, I hear them," said Sir Archie; "they will come here to
+empty a pot of ale, since their prisoners are safe under lock and
+key. Think not of them, Elsalill, but think how tomorrow you and I
+will be sailing the wide sea to my dear native land!"
+
+But Elsalill was pale as a corpse, and she shook so that she could
+scarce speak. "Sir Archie," she said, "do you not see them
+speaking with the hostess yonder at the bar? They are asking her
+whether any of those they seek is within."
+
+"I'll wager they are charging her to brew them a warm, strong
+drink this stormy night," said Sir Archie. "You need not quake and
+tremble so mightily, Elsalill. You can follow me without fear. I
+tell you that if my father would have me wed the noblest damsel in
+our land, I should now say her nay. Come with me over the sea in
+full security, Elsalill! Nothing awaits you there but joy and
+happiness."
+
+More and more of the pikemen had collected about the door, and
+Elsalill was now beside herself with terror. "I cannot look on
+while they come and seize him," she thought. She leaned toward Sir
+Archie and whispered to him: "Do you not hear, Sir Archie? They
+are asking the hostess whether any of Herr Arne's murderers is
+here within."
+
+Then Sir Archie threw a glance across the room and looked at the
+pikemen who were speaking with the hostess. But he did not rise
+and fly as Elsalill had expected: he bent down and looked deeply
+into her eyes. "Is it you, Elsalill, who have discovered and
+betrayed me?" he asked.
+
+"I have done it for my dear foster sister's sake, that she might
+have peace in her grave," said Elsalill. "God knows what it has
+cost me to do it. But now fly, Sir Archie! There is yet time. They
+have not yet barred all doors and lobbies."
+
+"You wolf's cub!" said Sir Archie. "When first I saw you on the
+quay I thought I ought to kill you."
+
+But Elsalill laid her hand on his arm. "Fly, Sir Archie! I cannot
+sit still and see them come and take you. If you will not fly
+without me, then in God's name I will go with you. But do not stay
+longer here for my sake, Sir Archie! I will do all you ask of me,
+if only you will save your life."
+
+But now Sir Archie was very angry, and he spoke scornfully to
+Elsalill. "Now, mistress, you shall never go in gold-embroidered
+shoes through lofty castle halls. Now you may stay in Marstrand
+all your days and gut herrings. Never shall you wed a man who has
+castle and lands, Elsalill. Your man shall be a poor fisherman and
+your dwelling a cabin on a cold rock."
+
+"Do you not hear them setting guards before all the doors to bar
+the way with their pikes?" asked Elsalill. "Why do you not hasten
+hence? Why do you not fly out upon the ice and hide yourself in a
+ship?"
+
+"I do not fly because I have a mind to sit and talk with
+Elsalill," said Sir Archie. "Are you thinking that now there is an
+end of all your joy, Elsalill? Are you thinking that now there is
+an end of my hope of atoning for my crime?"
+
+"Sir Archie," whispered Elsalill, rising from her seat in her
+terror; "now the men are all posted. Now they will catch and seize
+you. Make haste and fly! I shall come out to your ship, Sir
+Archie, if only you will fly."
+
+"You need not be so frightened, Elsalill," said Sir Archie. "We
+have some time left to talk together. These fellows have no
+stomach to set upon me here, where I can defend myself. They mean
+to take me in the narrow stair. They think to spit me on their
+long pikes. And that is what you have always wished me, Elsalill."
+
+But the more her terror gained on Elsalill, the calmer became Sir
+Archie. She never ceased praying him to fly, but he laughed at
+her.
+
+"You need not be so sure, mistress, that these fellows can take
+me. I have come through greater dangers than this. I'll warrant I
+was harder put to it some months since in Sweden. Some slanderers
+had told King John that his Scots guard was disloyal to him. And
+the King believed them. He threw the three commanders into dungeon
+and sent their men out of his realm, and had them guarded till
+they had passed the border."
+
+"Fly, Sir Archie, fly!" begged Elsalill.
+
+"You need not be troubled for me, Elsalill," said Sir Archie with
+a hard laugh. "This evening I am myself again, my old humour is
+come back. I see no more the young maid that haunted me, and I
+shall hold my own, never fear. I will tell you of those three who
+lay in King John's dungeon. They stole out of the tower one night,
+when their guards were drowsy with liquor, and ran their ways. And
+then they fled to the border. But so long as they were in the
+Swedish king's land they durst not betray themselves. They had no
+choice, Elsalill, but to make themselves rough coats of skin and
+give out that they were journeymen tanners travelling the country
+in search of work."
+
+Now Elsalill began to mark how changed Sir Archie was toward her.
+And she knew he hated her, since he had found out that she had
+betrayed him.
+
+"Speak not so, Sir Archie!" said Elsalill.
+
+"Why should you play me false, just when I trusted you most?" said
+Sir Archie. "Now I am again the man I was. Now none shall find me
+merciful. And now you'll see, Fortune will favour me, as she has
+done hitherto. Were we not in bad case, I and my comrades, when at
+last we had walked through all Sweden and come down to the coast
+here? We had no money to buy us honourable clothes. We had no
+money to pay for our shipping to Scotland. We knew no remedy but
+to break into Solberga parsonage."
+
+"Speak no more of that!" said Elsalill.
+
+"Yes, now you must hear all, Elsalill," said Sir Archie. "There is
+one thing you know not, and it is that when first we came into the
+house we went to Herr Arne, roused him, and told him he must give
+us money. If he gave it freely, we would not harm him. But Herr
+Arne resisted us with force, and so we had to strike him down. And
+when we had dispatched him, we had to make an end of all his
+household."
+
+Elsalill interrupted Sir Archie no more, but her heart felt cold
+and empty. She shuddered as she looked upon Sir Archie, for as he
+spoke a cruel and bloodthirsty look came over him. "What was I
+about to do?" she thought. "Have I been mad and loved the man who
+murdered all my dear ones? God forgive my sin!"
+
+"When we thought all were dead," said Sir Archie, "we dragged the
+heavy money chest out of the house. Then we set fire about it,
+that men might think Herr had been burnt alive."
+
+"I have loved a wolf of the woods," said Elsalill to herself. "And
+him I have tried to save from justice!"
+
+"But we drove down to the ice and fled to sea," Sir Archie went
+on. "We had no fear so long as we saw the flames mounting to the
+sky, but when we saw them die down we took alarm. We knew then
+that neighbours had come and put out the fire, and that we should
+be pursued. So we drove back toward land, for we had seen the
+outlet of a stream where the ice was thin. We lifted the chest
+from the sledge and drove forward till the ice broke under the
+horse's hoofs. Then we let it drown and sprang off to one side. If
+you were aught but a little maid, Elsalill, you would see that
+this was bravely done. We acquitted ourselves like men."
+
+Elsalill kept still; she felt a sharp pain tearing at her heart.
+But Sir Archie hated her and delighted to torment her. "Then we
+took our belts and fastened them to the chest and began to draw
+it. But as the chest left tracks in the ice, we went ashore and
+gathered twigs of spruce and laid them under the chest. Then we
+took off our boots and went over the ice without leaving a trace
+behind us."
+
+Sir Archie paused to throw a scornful glance at Elsalill.
+
+"Although we had prospered in all this, we were yet in bad case.
+Wherever we went our bloodstained clothes would betray us and we
+should be seized. But now listen, Elsalill, so that you may tell
+all those who would be at the pains to give us chase, that they
+may understand we are not of a sort to be lightly taken! Listen to
+this: As we came over the ice toward Marstrand here, we met our
+comrades and countrymen, who had been banished by King John from
+his land. They had not been able to leave Marstrand because of the
+ice, and they helped us in our need, so that we got clothes. Since
+then we have gone about here in Marstrand and been in no danger.
+And no danger would threaten us now, if you had not been faithless
+and played me false."
+
+Elsalill sat still. This was too great a grief for her. She could
+scarce feel her heart beating.
+
+But Sir Archie sprang up and cried: "And no ill shall befall us
+tonight either. Of that you shall be witness, Elsalill!"
+
+In an instant he seized Elsalill in both his arms and raised her
+off her feet. And with Elsalill before him as a shield Sir Archie
+ran through the tavern to the doorway. And the men who were posted
+to guard the door levelled their long pikes at him, but they durst
+not use them for fear of hurting Elsalill.
+
+When Sir Archie reached the narrow stair and the lobby, he held
+Elsalill before him in the same way. And she protected him better
+than the strongest armour, for the pikemen who were drawn up there
+could make no use of their weapons. Thus he came a good way up the
+steps, and Elsalill could feel the free air of heaven blowing
+about her.
+
+But Elsalill's love for Sir Archie was changed to the most deadly
+hatred, and her only thought was that he was a villain and a
+murderer. And when she saw that her body shielded him, so that he
+was likely to escape, she stretched out her hand and took hold of
+one of the watchmen's pikes and aimed it at her heart. "Now I will
+serve my foster sister, so that her mission shall be fulfilled at
+last," thought Elsalill. And at the next step Sir Archie took up
+the stairs, the pike entered Elsalill's heart.
+
+But then Sir Archie was already at the top of the stairway. And
+the pikemen fell back when they saw that one of them had hurt the
+maid. And he ran past them. When Sir Archie came out into the
+market-place he heard a Scottish war cry from one of the lanes: "A
+rescue! A rescue! For Scotland! For Scotland!"
+
+It was Sir Philip and Sir Reginald, who had mustered the Scots and
+now came to relieve him.
+
+And Sir Archie ran toward them and cried in a loud voice: "Hither
+to me! For Scotland! For Scotland!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+OVER THE ICE
+
+As Sir Archie walked out over the ice he still held Elsalill on
+his arm.
+
+Sir Philip and Sir Reginald walked beside him. They tried to tell
+him how they had discovered the trap laid for them and how they
+had succeeded in getting the heavy treasure chest away to the
+gallias and in collecting their countrymen; but Sir Archie paid no
+heed to their words. He seemed to be conversing with her he
+carried on his arm.
+
+"Who is that you carry there?" asked Sir Reginald.
+
+"It is Elsalill," answered Sir Archie. "I shall take her with me
+to Scotland. I will not leave her behind. Here she would never be
+aught but a poor fish wench."
+
+"No, that is like enough," said Sir Reginald.
+
+"Here none would give her clothes but of the coarsest wool," said
+Sir Archie, "and a narrow bed of hard planks to sleep on. But I
+shall spread her couch with the softest cushions, and her resting-
+place shall be made of marble. I shall wrap her in the costliest
+furs, and on her feet she shall wear jewelled shoes."
+
+"You intend her great honour," said Sir Reginald.
+
+"I cannot let her stay behind here," said Sir Archie, "for who
+among them would be mindful of such a poor creature? She would be
+forgotten by all ere many months were past. None would visit her
+abode, none would relieve her loneliness. But when once I reach
+home, I shall rear a stately dwelling for her. There shall her
+name stand graven in the hard stone, that none may forget it.
+There I myself shall come to her every day, and all shall be so
+splendidly devised that folk from far away shall come to visit
+her. There shall be lamps and candles burning night and day, and
+the sound of music and song shall make it seem a perpetual
+festival."
+
+The gale blew violently in their faces as they walked over the
+ice. It tore Elsalill's cloak loose and made it flutter like a
+banner.
+
+"Will you help me to carry Elsalill a moment," said Sir Archie,
+"while I wind her cloak about her?"
+
+Sir Reginald took Elsalill in his arms, but as he did so he was so
+terrified that he let her slip between his hands on to the ice. "I
+knew not that Elsalill was dead," he said.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+THE ROAR OF THE WAVES
+
+All night the skipper of the great gallias walked back and forth
+on his lofty poop. It was dark, and the gale howled around him,
+lashing him with sleet and rain. But the ice still lay firm and
+fast about the vessel, so that the skipper might just as well have
+slept quietly in his berth.
+
+But he stayed up the whole night. Time after time he put his hand
+to his ear and listened.
+
+It was not easy to say what he was listening for. He had all his
+crew on board, as well as all the passengers he was to carry over
+to Scotland. Every one of them lay below decks fast asleep, and
+there was no sound of talk to which the skipper might be
+listening.
+
+As the storm came sweeping over the icebound gallias it threw
+itself upon the vessel, as though from old habit it would drive
+her through the water. And as the ship still stood fast the wind
+took hold of her again and again. It rattled all the little
+icicles that hung from her ropes and tackles, it made her timbers
+creak and groan. Her masts were strained and gave loud cracks, as
+though they would go by the board.
+
+It was no quiet night. There was a muffled rustling in the air, as
+the snow came whizzing past; there was a patter and splash as the
+rain came pelting down.
+
+And in the ice one crack after another opened with a noise like
+thunder, as though ships of war had been at sea exchanging heavy
+salvoes.
+
+But to none of this was the skipper listening.
+
+He stayed up the whole night, until a gray dawn spread over the
+sky; but still he did not hear the sound he was waiting for.
+
+At last a singing, monotonous murmur was borne upon the night air,
+a rocking, caressing sound as of distant music.
+
+Then the skipper hurried across the rowers' thwarts amidships to
+the lofty forecastle where his crew slept. "Turn out," he called
+to them, "and take your oars and boat-hooks! The time is almost
+come when we shall be free. I hear the roar of open water. I hear
+the song of the free waves."
+
+The men left sleeping and came out at once. They posted themselves
+along the ship's sides, while the day slowly dawned.
+
+When at last it was light enough for them to see what changes the
+night had brought, they found that all the creeks and channels
+were open far out to sea, but in the bay where they were frozen in
+not a fissure could be seen in the ice, which lay firm and
+unbroken.
+
+And in the channel which led out of this bay the ice had piled
+itself up into a high wall. The waves in their free play outside
+continually cast up floating ice upon it.
+
+In the sound between the skerries there was a swarm of sails. All
+the fishing-boats which had lain icebound off Marstrand were now
+streaming out. The sea ran high and blocks of ice still floated
+among the waves, but the fishermen seemed to think they had no
+time to wait for safe and calm water, and they had set sail. They
+stood in the bows of their boats and kept a sharp lookout. Small
+blocks of ice they fended off with an oar, but when the big ones
+came they put the helm over and bore away. On the high poop of the
+gallias the skipper stood and watched them. He could see that they
+had their troubles, but he saw too that one boat after another
+wriggled through and came out into the open sea.
+
+And when the skipper saw the sails gliding over the blue water, he
+felt his disappointment so bitterly that tears came into his eyes.
+
+But his ship lay still, and before him the wall of ice was piling
+up higher and higher.
+
+The sea outside bore not only ships and boats, but sometimes small
+white icebergs came floating past. They were big ice-floes that
+had been thrown one upon another and were now sailing southward.
+They shone like silver in the morning sun, and now and then they
+showed as pink as though they had been strewed with roses.
+
+But high up among the whistling of the wind loud cries were heard,
+now like singing voices, now like pealing trumpets. There was a
+sound of jubilation in these cries, swelling the heart of him who
+heard them. They came from a long flight of swans on their way
+from the south.
+
+But when the skipper saw the icebergs moving southward and the
+swans flying to the north such longing seized him that he wrung
+his hands. "Woe's me, that I must lie here!" he said. "Will the
+ice never break up in this bay? I may lie waiting here many days
+yet."
+
+Just as he said this, he saw a man come driving on the ice. He
+came out of a narrow channel on the Marstrand side, and he drove
+as calmly on the ice as if he did not know the waves had begun
+once more to carry ships and boats.
+
+As he drove under the stern of the gallias he hailed the skipper:
+"Ho, you there, frozen in the ice, do you lack food aboard? Will
+you buy my salt herring or dried ling or smoked eel?"
+
+The skipper did not trouble to answer him. He only shook his fist
+at him and swore.
+
+Then the fish hawker stepped off his load. He took a bunch of hay
+from the sledge and laid it in front of his horse. Then he climbed
+up on the deck of the gallias. When he faced the skipper he said
+to him very earnestly:
+
+"Today I have not come to sell fish. But I know that you are a
+God-fearing man. Therefore I have come to ask your help to find a
+maiden whom the Scotsmen brought out to your ship with them
+yester-night."
+
+"I know naught of their bringing any maiden with them," said the
+skipper. "I have heard no woman's voice aboard the ship tonight."
+
+"I am Torarin the fish hawker," said the other; "maybe you have
+heard of me? It was I who supped with Herr Arne at Solberga
+parsonage the same night he was murdered. Since then I have had
+Herr Arne's foster daughter under my roof, but last night she was
+stolen away by his murderers, and they have surely brought her
+with them to your vessel."
+
+"Are Herr Arne's murderers aboard my vessel?" asked the skipper in
+dismay.
+
+"You see that I am a poor and feeble man," said Torarin. "I have a
+palsied arm, and therefore I am fearful of taking upon myself any
+bold and hazardous thing. I have known these many days who were
+Herr Arne's murderers, but I have not dared to bring them to
+justice. And because I have held my peace they have made their
+escape and have found occasion to carry the maiden with them. But
+now I have said to myself that I will have no more of my
+conscience in this matter. At least I will try to save the little
+maid."
+
+"If Herr Arne's murderers are on board my ship, why does not the
+watch come out and arrest them?"
+
+"I have begged and prayed them all this night and morning," said
+Torarin, "but the watch durst not come out. They say there are a
+hundred men-at-arms on board, and with them they durst not
+contend. Then I thought, in God's name I must come out here alone
+and beg you help me to find the maiden, for I know you to be a
+God-fearing man."
+
+But the skipper paid no heed to his question of the maiden; his
+mind was full of the other matter. "What makes you sure that the
+murderers are on board?" he said.
+
+Torarin pointed to a great oaken chest which stood between the
+rowers' thwarts. "I have seen that chest too often in Herr Arne's
+house to be mistaken," he said. "In it is Herr Arne's money, and
+where his money is, there you will find his murderers."
+
+"That chest belongs to Sir Archie and his two friends, Sir
+Reginald and Sir Philip," said the skipper.
+
+"Ay," said Torarin, looking at him fixedly; "that is so. It
+belongs to Sir Archie and Sir Philip and Sir Reginald."
+
+The skipper stood silent awhile and looked this way and that.
+"When think you the ice will break up in this bay?" he said to
+Torarin.
+
+"There is something strange in it this year," said Torarin. "In
+this bay we have always seen the ice break up early, for there is
+a strong current. But as it shapes now you must have a care that
+you be not thrust against the land when the ice begins to move."
+
+"I think of naught else," said the skipper.
+
+Again he stood silent for a while and turned his face toward the
+sea. The morning sun shone high in the sky, and the waves
+reflected its radiance. The liberated vessels scudded this way and
+that, and the sea birds came flying from the south with joyous
+cries. The fish lay near the surface and glittered in the sun as
+they leapt high out of the water, wanton after their long
+imprisonment under the ice. The gulls, which had been circling out
+beyond the edge of the ice, came in great flocks toward land to
+fish in their old waters.
+
+The skipper could not endure this sight. "Shall I be counted the
+friend of murderers and evildoers?" he said. "Can I close my eyes
+and refuse to see why God keeps the gates of the sea barred
+against my vessel? Shall I be destroyed for the sake of the
+unrighteous who have taken refuge with me?"
+
+And the skipper went forward and said to his men: "Now I know why
+we have been held back while all other ships have put to sea. It
+is because we have murderers and evildoers on board."
+
+Then the skipper went to the Scottish men-at-arms, who still lay
+asleep in the ship's hold. "Listen," he said to them; "keep you
+quiet yet awhile, no matter what cries or tumult you may hear on
+board. We must follow God's commandment and not suffer evildoers
+amongst us. If you obey me I promise to bring you the chest which
+holds Herr Arne's money, and you shall share it among you."
+
+But to Torarin the skipper said: "Go down to your sledge and cast
+your fish out on the ice. You shall have other freight anon."
+
+Then the skipper and his men broke into the cabin where Sir Archie
+and his friends slept. And they threw themselves upon them to bind
+them while they still lay asleep.
+
+And when the three Scotsmen tried to defend themselves, they smote
+them hard with their axes and handspikes, and the skipper said to
+them: "You are murderers and evildoers. How could you think to
+escape punishment? Know you not that it is for your sake God keeps
+all the gates of the sea closed?"
+
+Then the three men cried aloud to their comrades, bidding them
+come and help them.
+
+"You need not call to them," said the skipper. "They will not
+come. They have gotten Herr Arne's hoard to share amongst them,
+and are even now measuring out silver coin in their hats. For the
+sake of this money the evil deed was done, and this money has now
+brought retribution upon you."
+
+And before Torarin had finished unloading the fish from his
+sledge, the skipper and his men came down on to the ice. They
+brought with them three men securely bound. They were grievously
+hurt and fainting from their wounds.
+
+"God has not called on me in vain," said the skipper. "As soon as
+His will was clear to me, I hearkened to it."
+
+They laid the prisoners on the sledge, and Torarin drove with them
+by creeks and narrow sounds where the ice still lay firm, until he
+came to Marstrand.
+
+Now late in the afternoon the skipper stood on the lofty poop of
+his vessel and looked out to seaward. Nothing was changed around
+the vessel, and the wall of ice towered ever higher before her.
+
+Then the skipper saw a long procession of people coming out to his
+ship. All the women of Marstrand were there, both young and old.
+They all wore mourning weeds, and they brought with them a group
+of boys who carried a bier.
+
+When they were come to the gallias, they said to the skipper: "We
+are come to fetch a young maiden who is dead. Those murderers have
+confessed that she gave her life to hinder their escape, and now
+we, all the women of Marstrand, are come to bring her to our town
+with all the honour that is her due."
+
+Then Elsalill was found and brought down to the ice and borne in
+to Marstrand; and all the women in the place wept over the young
+maid, who had loved an evildoer and given her life to destroy him
+she loved. But even as the line of women advanced, the wind and
+waves broke in behind them and tore up the ice over which they had
+but lately passed; and when they came to Marstrand with Elsalill,
+all the gates of the sea stood open.
+
+THE END
+
+
+FOREWORD
+
+
+
+
+The Treasure is an opposite fairy tale, presenting Prince Charming
+as he really is: an orphan girl is cleaning fish and foreseeing
+her life of poverty; a man well-dressed in seductive splendor woos
+her and offers her ... forever after. There is only one catch: she
+must betray her sister.
+
+Although Selma Lagerlof won the Nobel Prize for literature in
+1909, her name is known in this country--if at all--as author of a
+children's book only. All her other works, including novels and
+feminist essays, have been unavailable in English for almost fifty
+years.
+
+In 1911, she made a speech entitled "Home and State" to the
+International Woman Suffrage Alliance Congress. She argued, first,
+that the Home was the creation of woman and the place where the
+values of women were nourished and protected. The Home was a
+community where "punishment is not for the sake of revenge, but
+for training and education," where "there is a use for all
+talents, but [she] who is without can make [her] self as much
+loved as the cleverest." It was the "storehouse for the songs and
+legends of our fore-fathers," and, she said, "there is nothing
+more mobile, more merciful amongst the creations of [humankind]."
+Although not all homes are good, good and happy homes do sometimes
+exist. Men by themselves, on the other hand, were responsible for
+creating the State which "continually gives cause for discontent
+and bitterness." There has never been a State which could satisfy
+all its members, which did not ask to be reformed from its very
+foundations. Yet it is through the State that humankind will reach
+its highest hopes. Her conclusion: women must add their special
+virtues, what she calls "God's spirit," to the "law and order"
+goals of men.
+
+Selma Lagerlof's own home was a community of family and servants,
+within which she experienced profound affections--for the
+nursemaid who carried her as a crippled child upon her back, for
+the old housekeeper, her younger sister, her grandmother who told
+the children stories every afternoon. She never married; she spent
+her entire life within communities of women, and her career could
+be described as the author being handed up to greatness by a
+procession of women who gave encouragement, advice, editorial
+help, criticism, contacts, companionship. She called Frederika
+Bremer the first feminist and "last old Mamsell" of Sweden,
+meaning that Frederika Bremer's life's work had banished the "old
+maid" from the realm of pitiful figures. Selma Lagerlof was
+herself proof of her statement.
+
+In The Treasure, written midway between her farewell to Frederika
+Bremer and her plea for woman suffrage, the men are interested in
+money, murder, and revenge. They miss the evil apparent even to
+their dogs. When the old mistress (and who should know better that
+the home is threatened?) warns that knives are being sharpened two
+miles away, her lord refuses to believe that she could hear what
+he cannot. The fishpeddler's dog has instinct enough to balk and
+howl, sensing death; the fishpeddler's wife and the woman tavern-
+keeper respond to the supernatural however little they understand;
+the men turn their backs on understanding even when they are being
+implored.
+
+But the thrust of the story deals with the maiden Elsalill's
+painful struggle to choose between her dearest sister, who has had
+to wander so long on earth "she has worn her feet to bleeding" and
+can find grave's rest only if her murderer is apprehended; and Sir
+Archie, the murderer himself, whom Elsalill loves with all her
+heart.
+
+Sir Archie is a subtle Prince Charming; he understands innocence
+and tempts Elsalill mightily: "You are a poor orphan, so forlorn
+and friendless that none will care what becomes of you. But if you
+come with me, I will make you a noble lady. I am a powerful man in
+my own country. You shall be clad in silk and gold, and you shall
+tread a measure at the King's court."
+
+Even after Elsalill knows that her love is the murderer of her
+sister, she still hopes to escape the action this knowledge
+demands: she tries to persuade herself that because he wants to
+make up to Elsalill for the evil he did to her sister, she should
+give him a chance to save his soul. She thinks that her sister
+does not know he will atone for his sin and become a good man; her
+sister could not wish her unhappiness; how can she ask that
+Elsalill betray the man she loves?
+
+But she hears her sister weep and she sees her sister's blood on
+the snow, and she turns him in quickly, hoping that will be
+enough. It isn't. Her choice requires that she give her life.
+
+At the book's end Sir Archie, still clinging to his belief in
+money-power, still trying to use her saintliness to save his own
+soul, says he will erect a grand monument to her memory. He
+believes that if he leaves her body in Marstand she will have only
+a pauper's grave and be soon forgotten. An exactly opposite event
+occurs. A long procession walks out across the ice toward the
+ship; all the women of Marstand, young and old, are coming to
+retrieve Elsalill's body and carry her back "with all the honor
+that is her due."
+
+The Treasure is a fable, a fairytale, an allegory of sisterhood
+itself. There is good reason that this book has been out of print
+for two generations. Daughters, Inc. is proud to retrieve Selma
+Lagerlof and publish her in English once again--with all the honor
+that is her due.
+
+June Arnold Plainfield, Vermont 1973
+
+
+
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE TREASURE ***
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