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

reach; what might not happen to a person who had book-learning! You might become master of a workshop, a clerk, perhaps even a schoolmaster.

“Now do take care of the slate, and see that you don’t break it!” he said admonishingly. “And keep out of the way of the big boys until you can hold your own with them. But if any of them simply won’t let you alone, mind you manage to hit first! That takes the inclination out of most of them, especially if you hit hard; he who hits first hits twice, as the old proverb says. And then you must listen well, and keep in mind all that your teacher says; and if anyone tries to entice you into playing and larking behind his back, don’t do it. And remember that you’ve got a pocket-handkerchief, and don’t use your fingers, for that isn’t polite. If there’s no one to see you, you can save the handkerchief, of course, and then it’ll last all the longer. And take care of your nice jacket. And if the teacher’s lady invites you in to coffee, you mustn’t take more than one piece of cake, mind.”

Lasse’s hands trembled while he talked.

“She’s sure not to do that,” said Pelle, with a superior air.

“Well, well, now go, so that you don’t get there too late⁠—the very first day, too. And if there’s some tool or other wanting, you must say we’ll get it at once, for we aren’t altogether paupers!” And Lasse slapped his pocket; but it did not make much noise, and Pelle knew quite well that they had no money; they had got the slate and pencil on credit.

Lasse stood looking after the boy as long as he was in sight, and then went to his work of crushing oilcakes. He put them into a vessel to soak, and poured water on them, all the while talking softly to himself.

There was a knock at the outside stable-door, and Lasse went to open it. It was Brother Kalle.

“Good day, brother!” he said, with his cheerful smile. “Here comes his Majesty from the quarries!” He waddled in upon his bow legs, and the two exchanged hearty greetings. Lasse was delighted at the visit.

“What a pleasant time we had with you the other evening!” said Lasse, taking his brother by the hand.

“That’s a long time ago now. But you must look in again one evening soon. Grandmother looks upon both of you with a favorable eye!” Kalle’s eyes twinkled mischievously.

“How is she, poor body? Has she at all got over the hurt to her eye? Pelle came home the other day and told me that the children had been so unfortunate as to put a stick into her eye. It quite upset me. You had to have the doctor, too!”

“Well, it wasn’t quite like that,” said Kalle. “I had moved grandmother’s spinning-wheel myself one morning when I was putting her room to rights, and then I forgot to put it back in its place. Then when she was going to stoop down to pick up something from the floor, the spindle went into her eye; of course she’s used to have everything stand exactly in its place. So really the honor’s due to me.” He smiled all over his face.

Lasse shook his head sympathetically. “And she got over it fairly well?” he asked.

“No; it went altogether wrong, and she lost the sight of that eye.”

Lasse looked at him with disapproval.

Kalle caught himself up, apparently very much horrified. “Eh, what nonsense I’m talking! She lost the blindness of that eye, I ought to have said. Isn’t that all wrong, too? You put somebody’s eye out, and she begins to see! Upon my word, I think I’ll set up as an eye-doctor after this, for there’s not much difficulty in it.”

“What do you say? She’s begun to⁠—? Now you’re too merry! You oughtn’t to joke about everything.”

“Well, well, joking apart, as the prophet said when his wife scratched him⁠—she can really see with that eye now.”

Lasse looked suspiciously at him for a little while before he yielded. “Why, it’s quite a miracle!” he then said.

“Yes, that’s what the doctor said. The point of the spindle had acted as a kind of operation. But it might just as easily have taken the other direction. Yes, we had the doctor to her three times; it was no use being niggardly.” Kalle stood and tried to look important; he had stuck his thumbs into his waistcoat pockets.

“It cost a lot of money, I suppose?”

“That’s what I thought, too, and I wasn’t very happy when I asked the doctor how much it would be. Twenty-five krones, he said, and it didn’t sound anything more than when any of us ask for a piece of bread-and-dripping. ‘Will the doctor be so kind as to wait a few days so that I can get the cow properly sold?’ I asked. ‘What!’ he says, and glares at me over his spectacles. ‘You don’t mean to sell the cow so as to pay me? You mustn’t do that on any account; I’ll wait till times are better.’ ‘We come off easily, even if we get rid of the cow,’ I said. ‘How so?’ he asks, as we go out to the carriage⁠—it was the farmer of Kaase Farm that was driving for me. So I told him that Maria and I had been thinking of selling everything so that grandmother might go over and be operated. He said nothing to that, but climbed up into the carriage; but while I was standing like this, buttoning up his foot-bag, he seizes me by the collar and says: ‘Do you know, you little bowlegged creature!’ (Kalle imitated the doctor’s town speech), ‘You’re the best man I’ve ever met, and you don’t owe me a brass farthing! For that matter, it was you yourself that performed the operation.’ ‘Then I ought almost to have had the money,’ I said. Then he laughed and gave me a box