Pelle the Conqueror by Martin Andersen Nexø (great novels to read .TXT) 📕

Kalle’s that they must take little Maria back again. Anna ill-treats her. They are getting on well in other ways; now they want to buy a wagon and horses and set up as carriers.”

“Do they? Well, it’s easy for those to get on who haven’t any heart.” Lasse sighed.

“Look, father,” said Pelle suddenly, “there’s a theater here now, and I know all the players. I take them their boots, and they give me a ticket every evening. I’ve seen the whole thing.”

“But, of course, that’s all lies, eh?” Lasse had to pull up, in order to scrutinize Pelle’s face. “So you’ve been in a proper theater, eh? Well, those who live in the town have got the devil to thank for it if they are cleverer than a peasant. One can have everything here!”

“Will you go with me tonight? I can get the tickets.”

Lasse was uneasy. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to go; but the whole thing was so unaccustomed. However, it was arranged that he should sleep the night at Due’s, and in the evening they both went to the theater.

“Is it here?” asked Lasse, astounded. They had come to a great building like a barn, before which a number of people were standing. But it was fine inside. They sat right up at the top, at the back, where the seats were arranged like the side of a hill, and they had a view over the whole theater. Down below, right in front, sat some ladies who, so far as Lasse could see, were naked. “I suppose those are the performers?” he inquired.

Pelle laughed. “No, those are the grandest ladies in the town⁠—the doctor’s wife, the burgomaster’s lady, and the inspector’s wife, and suchlike.”

“What, they are so grand that they haven’t enough clothes to wear!” cried Lasse. “With us we call that poverty! But where are the players, then?”

“They are the other side of the curtain.”

“Then have they begun already?”

“No, you can see they haven’t⁠—the curtain has to go up first.”

There was a hole in the curtain, and a finger came through it, and began to turn from side to side, pointing at the spectators. Lasse laughed. “That’s devilish funny!” he cried, slapping his thighs, as the finger continued to point.

“It hasn’t begun yet,” said Pelle.

“Is that so?” This damped Lasse’s spirits a little.

But then the big crown-light began suddenly to run up through a hole in the ceiling; up in the loft some boys were kneeling round the hole, and as the light came up they blew out the lamps. Then the curtain went up, and there was a great brightly-lit hall, in which a number of pretty young girls were moving about, dressed in the most wonderful costumes⁠—and they were speaking! Lasse was quite astonished to find that he could understand what they said; the whole thing seemed so strange and foreign to him; it was like a peep into dreamland. But there was one maiden who sat there all alone at her spinning wheel, and she was the fairest of them all.

“That’s surely a fine lady?” asked Lasse.

But Pelle whispered that she was only a poor forest maiden, whom the lord of the castle had robbed, and now he wanted to force her to be his sweetheart. All the others were making a tremendous lot of her, combing her golden hair and kneeling before her; but she only looked unhappier than before. And sometimes her sadness was more than she could bear; then she opened her beautiful mouth and her wounded heart bled in song, which affected Lasse so that he had to fetch a long sighing breath.

Then a tall man with a huge red beard came stamping into the hall. Lasse saw that he was dressed like a man who has been keeping Carnival.

“That’s the one we made the fine boots for,” whispered Pelle: “the lord of the castle, who wants to seduce her.”

“An ugly devil he looks too!” said Lasse, and spat. “The master at Stone Farm is a child of God compared with him!” Pelle signed to him to be quiet.

The lord of the castle drove all the other women away, and then began to tramp stormily to and fro, eyeing the forest maiden and showing the whites of his eyes. “Well, have you at last decided?” he roared, and snorted like a mad bull. And suddenly he sprang at her as if to take her by force.

“Ha! Touch me not!” she cried, “or by the living God, I will plunge this dagger into my heart! You believe you can buy my innocence because I am poor, but the honor of the poor is not to be bought with gold!”

“That’s a true word!” said Lasse loudly.

But the lord of the castle gave a malicious laugh, and tugged at his red beard. He rolled his r’s dreadfully.

“Is my offer not enough for you? Come, stay this night with me and you shall receive a farm with ten head of cattle, so that tomorrow you can stand at the altar with your huntsman!”

“Hold your tongue, you whoremonger!” said Lasse angrily.

Those round about him tried to calm him; one or another nudged him in the ribs. “Well, can’t a man speak any longer?” Lasse turned crossly to Pelle. “I’m no clergyman, but if the girl doesn’t want to, let him leave her alone; at any rate he shan’t slake his lust publicly in the presence of hundreds of people with impunity! A swine like that!” Lasse was speaking loudly, and it seemed as though his words had had their effect on the lord of the castle. He stood there awhile staring in front of him, and then called a man, and bade him lead the maiden back to the forest.

Lasse breathed easily again as the curtain fell and the boys overhead by the hole in the ceiling relit the lamps and let them down again. “So far she’s got out of it all right,” he told Pelle, “but I don’t trust the lord⁠—he’s