HUNGER

by KNUT HAMSUN

Translated from the Norwegian by GEORGE EGERTON

_With an introduction by Edwin Bjorkman_

 Knut Hamsun

 Since the death of Ibsen and Strindberg, Hamsun is undoubtedly the foremost creative writer of the Scandinavian countries. Those approaching most nearly to his position are probably Selma Lagerlöf in Sweden and Henrik Pontoppidan in Denmark. Both these, however, seem to have less than he of that width of outlook, validity of interpretation and authority of tone that made the greater masters what they were. 

 His reputation is not confined to his own country or the two Scandinavian sister nations. It spread long ago over the rest of Europe, taking deepest roots in Russia, where several editions of his collected works have already appeared, and where he is spoken of as the equal of Tolstoy and Dostoyevski. The enthusiasm of this approval is a characteristic symptom that throws interesting light on Russia as well as on Hamsun. 

 Hearing of it, one might expect him to prove a man of the masses, full of keen social consciousness. Instead, he must be classed as an individualistic romanticist and a highly subjective aristocrat, whose foremost passion in life is violent, defiant deviation from everything average and ordinary. He fears and flouts the dominance of the many, and his heroes, who are nothing but slightly varied images of himself, are invariably marked by an originality of speech and action that brings them close to, if not across, the borderline of the eccentric. 

 In all the literature known to me, there is no writer who appears more ruthlessly and fearlessly himself, and the self thus presented to us is as paradoxical and rebellious as it is poetic and picturesque. Such a nature, one would think, must be the final blossoming of powerful hereditary tendencies, converging silently through numerous generations to its predestined climax. All we know is that Hamsun's forebears were sturdy Norwegian peasant folk, said only to be differentiated from their neighbours by certain artistic preoccupations that turned one or two of them into skilled craftsmen. More certain it is that what may or may not have been innate was favoured and fostered and exaggerated by physical environment and early social experiences. 

 Hamsun was born on Aug. 4, 1860, in one of the sunny valleys of central Norway. From there his parents moved when he was only four to settle in the far northern district of Lofoden--that land of extremes, where the year, and not the day, is evenly divided between darkness and light; where winter is a long dreamless sleep, and summer a passionate dream without sleep; where land and sea meet and intermingle so gigantically that man is all but crushed between the two--or else raised to titanic measures by the spectacle of their struggle. 

 The Northland, with its glaring lights and black shadows, its unearthly joys and abysmal despairs, is present and dominant in every line that Hamsun ever wrote. In that country his best tales and dramas are laid. By that country his heroes are stamped wherever they roam. Out of that country they draw their principal claims to probability. Only in that country do they seem quite at home. Today we know, however, that the pathological case represents nothing but an extension of perfectly normal tendencies. In the same way we know that the miraculous atmosphere of the Northland serves merely to develop and emphasize traits that lie slumbering in men and women everywhere. And on this basis the fantastic figures created by Hamsun relate themselves to ordinary humanity as the microscopic enlargement of a cross section to the living tissues. What we see is true in everything but proportion. 

 The artist and the vagabond seem equally to have been in the blood of Hamsun from the very start. Apprenticed to a shoemaker, he used his scant savings to arrange for the private printing of a long poem and a short novel produced at the age of eighteen, when he was still signing himself Knud Pedersen Hamsund. This done, he abruptly quit his apprenticeship and entered on that period of restless roving through trades and continents which lasted until his first real artistic achievement with "Hunger, " In 1888-90. It has often been noted that practically every one of Hamsun's heroes is of the same age as he was then, and that their creator takes particular pain to accentuate this fact. It is almost as if, during those days of feverish literary struggle, he had risen to heights where he saw things so clearly that no subsequent experience could add anything but occasional details. 

 Before he reached those heights, he had tried life as coal-heaver and school teacher, as road-mender and surveyor's attendant, as farm hand and streetcar conductor, as lecturer and free-lance journalist, as tourist and emigrant. Twice he visited this country during the middle eighties, working chiefly on the plains of North Dakota and in the streets of Chicago. Twice during that time he returned to his own country and passed through the experiences pictured in "Hunger, " before, at last, he found his own literary self and thus also a hearing from the world at large. While here, he failed utterly to establish any sympathetic contact between himself and the new world, and his first book after his return in 1888 was a volume of studies named "The Spiritual Life of Modern America, " which a prominent Norwegian critic once described as "a masterpiece of distorted criticism. " But I own a copy of this book, the fly-leaf of which bears the following inscription in the author's autograph:

 "A youthful work. It has ceased to represent my opinion of America. May 28, 1903. Knut Hamsun. "

 In its original form, "Hunger" was merely a sketch, and as such it appeared in 1888 in a Danish literary periodical, "New Earth. " It attracted immediate widespread attention to the author, both on account of its unusual theme and striking form. It was a new kind of realism that had nothing to do with photographic reproduction of details. It was a professedly psychological study that had about as much in common with the old-fashioned conceptions of man's mental activities as the delirious utterances of a fever patient. It was life, but presented in the Impressionistic temper of a Gauguin or Cezanne. On the appearance of the completed novel in 1890, Hamsun was greeted as one of the chief heralds of the neo-romantlc movement then spreading rapidly through the Scandinavian north and finding typical expressions not only in the works of theretofore unknown writers, but in the changed moods of masters like Ibsen and Bjornson and Strindberg. 

 It was followed two years later by "Mysteries, " which pretends to be a novel, but which may be better described as a delightfully irresponsible and defiantly subjective roaming through any highway or byway of life or letters that happened to take the author's fancy at the moment of writing. Some one has said of that book that in its abrupt swingings from laughter to tears, from irreverence to awe, from the ridiculous to the sublime, one finds the spirits of Dostoyevski and Mark Twain blended. 

 The novels "Editor Lynge" and "New Earth, " both published in 1893, were social studies of Christiania's Bohemia and chiefly characterized by their violent attacks on the men and women exercising the profession which Hamsun had just made his own. Then came "Pan" in 1894, and the real Hamsun, the Hamsun who ever since has moved logically and with increasing authority to "The Growth of the Soil, " stood finally revealed. It is a novel of the Northland, almost without a plot, and having its chief interest in a primitively spontaneous man's reactions to a nature so overwhelming that it makes mere purposeless existence seem a sufficient end in itself. One may well question whether Hamsun has ever surpassed the purely lyrical mood of that book, into which he poured the ecstatic dreams of the little boy from the south as, for the first time, he saw the forestclad northern mountains bathing their feet in the ocean and their crowns in the light of a never-setting sun. It is a wonderful paean to untamed nature and to the forces let loose by it within the soul of man. 

 Like most of the great writers over there, Hamsun has not confined himself to one poetic mood or form, but has tried all of them. From the line of novels culminating in "Pan, " he turned suddenly to the drama, and in 1895 appeared his first play, "At the Gates of the Kingdom. " It was the opening drama of a trilogy and was followed by "The Game of Life" in 1896 and "Sunset Glow" in 1898. The first play is laid in Christiania, the second in the Northland, and the third in Christiania again. The hero of all three is Ivar Kareno, a student and thinker who is first presented to us at the age of 29, then at 39, and finally at 50. His wife and several other characters accompany the central figure through the trilogy, of which the lesson seems to be that every one is a rebel at 30 and a renegade at 50. But when Kareno, the irreconcilable rebel of "At the Gates of the Kingdom, " the heaven-storming truth-seeker of "The Game of Life, " and the acclaimed radical leader in the first acts of "Sunset Glow, " surrenders at last to the powers that be in order to gain a safe and sheltered harbor for his declining years, then another man of 29 stands ready to denounce him and to take up the rebel cry of youth to which he has become a traitor. Hamsun's ironical humor and whimsical manner of expression do more than the plot itself to knit the plays into an organic unit, and several of the characters are delightfully drawn, particularly the two women who play the greatest part in Kareno's life: his wife Eline, and Teresita, who is one more of his many feminine embodiments of the passionate and changeable Northland nature. Any attempt to give a political tendency to the trilogy must be held wasted. Characteristically, Kareno is a sort of Nietzschean rebel against the victorious majority, and Hamsun's seemingly cynical conclusions stress man's capacity for action rather than the purposes toward which that capacity may be directed. 

 Of three subsequent plays, "Vendt the Monk, " (1903), "Queen Tamara" (1903) and "At the Mercy of Life" (1910), the first mentioned is by far the most remarkable. It is a verse drama in eight acts, centred about one of Hamsun's most typical vagabond heroes. The monk Vendt has much in common with Peer Gynt without being in any way an imitation or a duplicate. He is a dreamer in revolt against the world's alleged injustice, a rebel against the very powers that invisibly move the universe, and a passionate lover of life who in the end accepts it as a joyful battle and then dreams of the long peace to come. The vigor and charm of the verse proved a surprise to the critics when the play was published, as Hamsun until then had given no proof of any poetic gift in the narrower sense. 

 From 1897 to 1912 Hamsun produced a series of volumes that simply marked a further development of the tendencies shown in his first novels: "Siesta, " short stories, 1897; "Victoria" a novel with a charming love story that embodies the tenderest note in his production, 1898; "In Wonderland, " travelling sketches from the Caucasus, 1903; "Brushwood, " short stories, 1903; "The Wild Choir, " a collection of poems, 1904; "Dreamers, " a novel, 1904; "Struggling Life, " short stories and travelling sketches, 1905; "Beneath the Autumn Star" a novel, 1906; "Benoni, " and "Rosa, " two novels forming to some extent sequels to "Pan, " 1908; "A Wanderer Plays with Muted Strings, " a novel, 1909; and "The Last Joy, " a shapeless work, half novel and half mere uncoordinated reflections, 1912. 

 The later part of this output seemed to indicate a lack of development, a failure to open up new vistas, that caused many to fear that the principal contributions of Hamsun already lay behind him. Then appeared in 1913 a big novel, "Children of the Time, " which in many ways struck a new note, although led up to by "Rosa" and "Benoni. " The horizon is now wider, the picture broader. There is still a central figure, and still he possesses many of the old Hamsun traits, but he has crossed the meridian at last and become an observer rather than a fighter and doer. Nor is he the central figure to the same extent as Lieutenant Glahn in "Pan" or Kareno in the trilogy. The life pictured is the life of a certain spot of ground--Segelfoss manor, and later the town of Segelfoss--rather than that of one or two isolated individuals. One might almost say that Hamsun's vision has become social at last, were it not for his continued accentuation of the irreconcilable conflict between the individual and the group. 

 "Segelfoss Town" in 1915 and "The Growth of the Soil"--the title ought to be "The Earth's Increase"--in 1918 continue along the path Hamsun entered by "Children of the Time. " The scene is laid in his beloved Northland, but the old primitive life is going--going even in the outlying districts, where the pioneers are already breaking ground for new permanent settlements. Business of a modern type has arrived, and much of the quiet humor displayed in these the latest and maturest of Hamsun's works springs from the spectacle of its influence on the natives, whose hands used always to be in their pockets, and whose credulity in face of the improbable was only surpassed by their unwillingness to believe anything reasonable. Still the life he pictures is largely primitive, with nature as man's chief antagonist, and to us of the crowded cities it brings a charm of novelty rarely found in books today. With it goes an understanding of human nature which is no less deep-reaching because it is apt to find expression in whimsical or flagrantly paradoxical forms. 

 Hamsun has just celebrated his sixtieth birthday anniversary. He is as strong and active as ever, burying himself most of the time on his little estate in the heart of the country that has become to such a peculiar extent his own. There is every reason to expect from him works that may not only equal but surpass the best of his production so far. But even if such expectations should prove false, the body of his work already accomplished is such, both in quantity and quality, that he must perforce be placed in the very front rank of the world's living writers. To the English-speaking world he has so far been made known only through the casual publication at long intervals of a few of his books: "Hunger, " "Fictoria" and "Shallow Soil" (rendered in the list above as "New Earth"). There is now reason to believe that this negligence will be remedied, and that soon the best of Hamsun's work will be available in English. To the American and English publics it ought to prove a welcome tonic because of its very divergence from what they commonly feed on. And they may safely look to Hamsun as a thinker as well as a poet and laughing dreamer, provided they realize from the start that his thinking is suggestive rather than conclusive, and that he never meant it to be anything else. 

 EDWIN BJÖRKMAN. 

Part I

It was during the time I wandered about and starved in Christiania:Christiania, this singular city, from which no man departs withoutcarrying away the traces of his sojourn there. 

 * * * * *

I was lying awake in my attic and I heard a clock below strike six. It wasalready broad daylight, and people had begun to go up and down the stairs. By the door where the wall of the room was papered with old numbers of the_Morgenbladet_, I could distinguish clearly a notice from theDirector of Lighthouses, and a little to the left of that an inflatedadvertisement of Fabian Olsens' new-baked bread. 

The instant I opened my eyes I began, from sheer force of habit, to thinkif I had anything to rejoice over that day. I had been somewhat hard-uplately, and one after the other of my belongings had been taken to my"Uncle. " I had grown nervous and irritable. A few times I had kept my bedfor the day with vertigo. Now and then, when luck had favoured me, I hadmanaged to get five shillings for a feuilleton from some newspaper orother. 

It grew lighter and lighter, and I took to reading the advertisements nearthe door. I could even make out the grinning lean letters of "winding-sheets to be had at Miss Andersen's" on the right of it. That occupied mefor a long while. I heard the clock below strike eight as I got up and puton my clothes. 

I opened the window and looked out. From where I was standing I had a viewof a clothes, line and an open field. Farther away lay the ruins of aburnt-out smithy, which some labourers were busy clearing away. I leantwith my elbows resting on the window-frame and gazed into open space. Itpromised to be a clear day--autumn, that tender, cool time of the year, when all things change their colour, and die, had come to us. Theever-increasing noise in the streets lured me out. The bare room, thefloor of which rocked up and down with every step I took across it, seemedlike a gasping, sinister coffin. There was no proper fastening to thedoor, either, and no stove. I used to lie on my socks at night to dry thema little by the morning. The only thing I had to divert myself with was alittle red rocking-chair, in which I used to sit in the evenings and dozeand muse on all manner of things. When it blew hard, and the door belowstood open, all kinds of eerie sounds moaned up through the floor and fromout the walls, and the _Morgenbladet_ near the door was rent in strips aspan long. 

I stood up and searched through a bundle in the corner by the bed for abite for breakfast, but finding nothing, went back to the window. 

God knows, thought I, if looking for employment will ever again avail meaught. The frequent re pulses, half-promises, and curt noes, thecherished, deluded hopes, and fresh endeavours that always resulted innothing had done my courage to death. As a last resource, I had appliedfor a place as debt collector, but I was too late, and, besides, I couldnot have found the fifty shillings demanded as security. There was alwayssomething or another in my way. I had even offered to enlist in the FireBrigade. There we stood and waited in the vestibule, some half-hundredmen, thrusting our chests out to give an idea of strength and bravery, whilst an inspector walked up and down and scanned the applicants, felttheir arms, and put one question or another to them. Me, he passed by, merely shaking his head, saying I was rejected on account of my sight. Iapplied again without my glasses, stood there with knitted brows, and mademy eyes as sharp as needles, but the man passed me by again with a smile;he had recognized me. And, worse than all, I could no longer apply for asituation in the garb of a respectable man. 

How regularly and steadily things had gone downhill with me for a longtime, till, in the end, I was so curiously bared of every conceivablething. I had not even a comb left, not even a book to read, when thingsgrew all too sad with me. All through the summer, up in the churchyards orparks, where I used to sit and write my articles for the newspapers, I hadthought out column after column on the most miscellaneous subjects. Strange ideas, quaint fancies, conceits of my restless brain; in despair Ihad often chosen the most remote themes, that cost me long hours ofintense effort, and never were accepted. When one piece was finished I setto work at another. I was not often discouraged by the editors' "no. " Iused to tell myself constantly that some day I was bound to succeed; andreally occasionally when I was in luck's way, and made a hit withsomething, I could get five shillings for an afternoon's work. 

Once again I raised myself from the window, went over to thewashing-stand, and sprinkled some water on the shiny knees of my trousersto dull them a little and make them look a trifle newer. Having done this, I pocketed paper and pencil as usual and went out. I stole very quietlydown the stairs in order not to attract my landlady's attention (a fewdays had elapsed since my rent had fallen due, and I had no longeranything wherewith to raise it). 

It was nine o'clock. The roll of vehicles and hum of voices filled theair, a mighty morning-choir mingled with the footsteps of the pedestrians, and the crack of the hack-drivers' whips. The clamorous traffic everywhereexhilarated me at once, and I began to feel more and more contented. Nothing was farther from my intention than to merely take a morning walkin the open air. What had the air to do with my lungs? I was strong as agiant; could stop a dray with my shoulders. A sweet, unwonted mood, afeeling of lightsome happy-go-luckiness took possession of me. I fell toobserving the people I met and who passed me, to reading the placards onthe wall, noted even the impression of a glance thrown at me from apassing tram-car, let each bagatelle, each trifling incident that crossedor vanished from my path impress me. 

If one only had just a little to eat on such a lightsome day! The sense ofthe glad morning overwhelmed me; my satisfaction became ill-regulated, andfor no definite reason I began to hum joyfully. 

At a butcher's stall a woman stood speculating on sausage for dinner. As Ipassed her she looked up at me. She had but one tooth in the front of herhead. I had become so nervous and easily affected in the last few daysthat the woman's face made a loathsome impression upon me. The long yellowsnag looked like a little finger pointing out of her gum, and her gaze wasstill full of sausage as she turned it upon me. I immediately lost allappetite, and a feeling of nausea came over me. When I reached themarket-place I went to the fountain and drank a little. I looked up; thedial marked ten on Our Saviour's tower. 

I went on through the streets, listlessly, without troubling myself aboutanything at all, stopped aimlessly at a corner, turned off into a sidestreet without having any errand there. I simply let myself go, wanderedabout in the pleasant morning, swinging myself care-free to and froamongst other happy human beings. This air was clear and bright and mymind too was without a shadow. 

For quite ten minutes I had had an old lame man ahead of me. He carried abundle in one hand and exerted his whole body, using all his strength inhis endeavours to get along speedily. I could hear how he panted from theexertion, and it occurred to me that I might offer to bear his bundle forhim, but yet I made no effort to overtake him. Up in Graendsen I met HansPauli, who nodded and hurried past me. Why was he in such a hurry? I hadnot the slightest intention of asking him for a shilling, and, more thanthat, I intended at the very first opportunity to return him a blanketwhich I had borrowed from him some weeks before. 

Just wait until I could get my foot on the ladder, I would be beholden tono man, not even for a blanket. Perhaps even this very day I mightcommence an article on the "Crimes of Futurity, " "Freedom of Will, " orwhat not, at any rate, something worth reading, something for which Iwould at least get ten shillings. . . . And at the thought of this article Ifelt myself fired with a desire to set to work immediately and to drawfrom the contents of my overflowing brain. I would find a suitable placeto write in the park and not rest until I had completed my article. 

But the old cripple was still making the same sprawling movements ahead ofme up the street. The sight of this infirm creature constantly in front ofme, commenced to irritate me--his journey seemed endless; perhaps he hadmade up his mind to go to exactly the same place as I had, and I mustneeds have him before my eyes the whole way. In my irritation it seemed tome that he slackened his pace a little at every cross street, as ifwaiting to see which direction I intended to take, upon which he wouldagain swing his bundle in the air and peg away with all his might to keepahead of me. I follow and watch this tiresome creature and get more andmore exasperated with him, I am conscious that he has, little by little, destroyed my happy mood and dragged the pure, beautiful morning down tothe level of his own ugliness. He looks like a great sprawling reptilestriving with might and main to win a place in the world and reserve thefootpath for himself. When we reached the top of the hill I determined toput up with it no longer. I turned to a shop window and stopped in orderto give him an opportunity of getting ahead, but when, after a lapse ofsome minutes, I again walked on there was the man still in front of me--hetoo had stood stock still, --without stopping to reflect I made three orfour furious onward strides, caught him up, and slapped him on theshoulder. 

He stopped directly, and we both stared at one another fixedly. "Ahalfpenny for milk!" he whined, twisting his head askew. 

So that was how the wind blew. I felt in my pockets and said: "For milk, eh? Hum-m--money's scarce these times, and I don't really know how muchyou are in need of it. "

"I haven't eaten a morsel since yesterday in Drammen; I haven't got afarthing, nor have I got any work yet!"

"Are you an artisan?"

"Yes; a binder. "

"A what?"

"A shoe-binder; for that matter, I can make shoes too. "

"Ah, that alters the case, " said I, "you wait here for some, minutes and Ishall go and get a little money for you; just a few pence. "

I hurried as fast as I could down Pyle Street, where I knew of apawnbroker on a second-floor (one, besides, to whom I had never beenbefore). When I got inside the hall I hastily took off my waistcoat, rolled it up, and put it under my arm; after which I went upstairs andknocked at the office door. I bowed on entering, and threw the waistcoaton the counter. 

"One-and-six, " said the man. 

"Yes, yes, thanks, " I replied. "If it weren't that it was beginning to bea little tight for me, of course I wouldn't part with it. "

I got the money and the ticket, and went back. Considering all things, pawning that waistcoat was a capital notion. I would have money enoughover for a plentiful breakfast, and before evening my thesis on the"Crimes of Futurity" would be ready. I began to find existence morealluring; and I hurried back to the man to get rid of him. 

"There it is, " said I. "I am glad you applied to me first. "

The man took the money and scrutinized me closely. At what was he standingthere staring? I had a feeling that he particularly examined the knees ofmy trousers, and his shameless effrontery bored me. Did the scoundrelimagine that I really was as poor as I looked? Had I not as good as begunto write an article for half-a-sovereign? Besides, I had no fear whateverfor the future. I had many irons in the fire. What on earth business wasit of an utter stranger if I chose to stand him a drink on such a lovelyday? The man's look annoyed me, and I made up my mind to give him a gooddressing-down before I left him. I threw back my shoulders, and said:

"My good fellow, you have adopted a most unpleasant habit of staring at aman's knees when he gives you a shilling. "

He leant his head back against the wall and opened his mouth widely;something was working in that empty pate of his, and he evidently came tothe conclusion that I meant to best him in some way, for he handed me backthe money. I stamped on the pavement, and, swearing at him, told him tokeep it. Did he imagine I was going to all that trouble for nothing? Ifall came to all, perhaps I owed him this shilling; I had just recollectedan old debt; he was standing before an honest man, honourable to hisfinger-tips--in short, the money was his. Oh, no thanks were needed; ithad been a pleasure to me. Good-bye!

I went on. At last I was freed from this work-ridden plague, and I couldgo my way in peace. I turned down Pyle Street again, and stopped before agrocer's shop. The whole window was filled with eatables, and I decided togo in and get something to take with me. 

"A piece of cheese and a French roll, " I said, and threw my sixpence on tothe counter. 

"Bread and cheese for the whole of it?" asked the woman ironically, without looking up at me. 

"For the whole sixpence? Yes, " I answered, unruffled. 

I took them up, bade the fat old woman good-morning, with the utmostpoliteness, and sped, full tilt, up Castle Hill to the park. 

I found a bench to myself, and began to bite greedily into my provender. It did me good; it was a long time since I had had such a square meal, and, by degrees, I felt the same sated quiet steal over me that one feelsafter a good long cry. My courage rose mightily. I could no longer besatisfied with writing an article about anything so simple andstraight-ahead as the "Crimes of Futurity, " that any ass might arrive at, ay, simply deduct from history. I felt capable of a much greater effortthan that; I was in a fitting mood to overcome difficulties, and I decidedon a treatise, in three sections, on "Philosophical Cognition. " Thiswould, naturally, give me an opportunity of crushing pitiably some ofKant's sophistries . . . But, on taking out my writing materials to commencework, I discovered that I no longer owned a pencil: I had forgotten it inthe pawn-office. My pencil was lying in my waistcoat pocket. 

Good Lord! how everything seems to take a delight in thwarting me today! Iswore a few times, rose from the seat, and took a couple of turns up anddown the path. It was very quiet all around me; down near the Queen'sarbour two nursemaids were trundling their perambulators; otherwise, therewas not a creature anywhere in sight. I was in a thoroughly embitteredtemper; I paced up and down before my seat like a maniac. How strangelyawry things seemed to go! To think that an article in three sectionsshould be downright stranded by the simple fact of my not having apennyworth of pencil in my pocket. Supposing I were to return to PyleStreet and ask to get my pencil back? There would be still time to get agood piece finished before the promenading public commenced to fill theparks. So much, too, depended on this treatise on "PhilosophicalCognition"--mayhap many human beings' welfare, no one could say; and Itold myself it might be of the greatest possible help to many youngpeople. On second thoughts, I would not lay violent hands on Kant; I mighteasily avoid doing that; I would only need to make an almost imperceptiblegliding over when I came to query Time and Space; but I would not answerfor Renan, old Parson Renan. . . . 

At all events, an article of so-and-so many columns has to be completed. For the unpaid rent, and the landlady's inquiring look in the morning whenI met her on the stairs, tormented me the whole day; it rose up andconfronted me again and again, even in my pleasant hours, when I hadotherwise not a gloomy thought. 

I must put an end to it, so I left the park hurriedly to fetch my pencilfrom the pawnbroker's. 

As I arrived at the foot of the hill I overtook two ladies, whom I passed. As I did so, I brushed one of them accidentally on the arm. I looked up;she had a full, rather pale, face. But she blushes, and, becomes suddenlysurprisingly lovely. I know not why she blushes; maybe at some word shehears from a passer-by, maybe only at some lurking thought of her own. Orcan it be because I touched her arm? Her high, full bosom heaves violentlyseveral times, and she closes her hand tightly above the handle of herparasol. What has come to her?

I stopped, and let her pass ahead again. I could, for the moment, go nofurther; the whole thing struck me as being so singular. I was in atantalizing mood, annoyed with myself on account of the pencil incident, and in a high degree disturbed by all the food I had taken on a totallyempty stomach. Suddenly my thoughts, as if whimsically inspired, take asingular direction. I feel myself seized with an odd desire to make thislady afraid; to follow her, and annoy her in some way. I overtake heragain, pass her by, turn quickly round, and meet her face-to-face in orderto observe her well. I stand and gaze into her eyes, and hit, on the spurof the moment, on a name which I have never heard before--a name with agliding, nervous sound--Ylajali! When she is quite close to me I drawmyself up and say impressively:

"You are losing your book, madam!" I could hear my heart beat audibly as Isaid it. 

"My book?" she asks her companion, and she walks on. 

My devilment waxed apace, and I followed them. At the same time, I wasfully conscious that I was playing a mad prank without being able to stopmyself. My disordered condition ran away with me; I was inspired with thecraziest notions, which I followed blindly as they came to me. I couldn'thelp it, no matter how much I told myself that I was playing the fool. Imade the most idiotic grimaces behind the lady's back, and coughedfrantically as I passed her by. Walking on in this manner--very slowly, and always a few steps in advance--I felt her eyes on my back, andinvoluntarily put down my head with shame for having caused her annoyance. By degrees, a wonderful feeling stole over me of being far, far away inother places; I had a half-undefined sense that it was not I who was goingalong over the gravel hanging my head. 

A few minutes later, they reached Pascha's bookshop. I had already stoppedat the first window, and as they go by I step forward and repeat:

"You are losing your book, madam!"

"No; what book?" she asks affrightedly. "Can you make out what book it ishe is talking about?" and she comes to a stop. 

I hug myself with delight at her confusion; the irresolute perplexity inher eyes positively fascinates me. Her mind cannot grasp my short, passionate address. She has no book with her; not a single page of a book, and yet she fumbles in her pockets, looks down repeatedly at her hands, turns her head and scrutinizes the streets behind her, exerts hersensitive little brain to the utmost in trying to discover what book it isI am talking about. Her face changes colour, has now one, now anotherexpression, and she is breathing quite audibly--even the very buttons onher gown seem to stare at me, like a row of frightened eyes. 

"Don't bother about him!" says her companion, taking her by the arm. "Heis drunk; can't you see that the man is drunk?"

Strange as I was at this instant to myself, so absolutely a prey topeculiar invisible inner influences, nothing occurred around me without myobserving it. A large, brown dog sprang right across the street towardsthe shrubbery, and then down towards the Tivoli; he had on a very narrowcollar of German silver. Farther up the street a window opened on thesecond floor, and a servant-maid leant out of it, with her sleeves turnedup, and began to clean the panes on the outside. Nothing escaped mynotice; I was clear-headed and ready-witted. Everything rushed in upon mewith a gleaming distinctness, as if I were suddenly surrounded by a stronglight. The ladies before me had each a blue bird's wing in their hats, anda plaid silk ribbon round their necks. It struck me that they weresisters. 

They turned, stopped at Cisler's music-shop, and spoke together. I stoppedalso. Thereupon they both came back, went the same road as they had come, passed me again, and turned the corner of University Street and up towardsSt. Olav's place. I was all the time as close at their heels as I dared tobe. They turned round once, and sent me a half-fearful, half-questioninglook, and I saw no resentment nor any trace of a frown in it. 

This forbearance with my annoyance shamed me thoroughly and made me lowermy eyes. I would no longer be a trouble to them; out of sheer gratitude Iwould follow them with my gaze, not lose sight of them until they enteredsome place safely and disappeared. 

Outside No. 2, a large four-storeyed house, they turned again before goingin. I leant against a lamp-post near the fountain and listened for theirfootsteps on the stairs. They died away on the second floor. I advancedfrom the lamp-post and looked up at the house. Then something oddhappened. The curtains above were stirred, and a second after a windowopened, a head popped out, and two singular-looking eyes dwelt on me. "Ylajali!" I muttered, half-aloud, and I felt I grew red. 

Why does she not call for help, or push over one of these flower-pots andstrike me on the head, or send some one down to drive me away? We standand look into one another's eyes without moving; it lasts a minute. Thoughts dart between the window and the street, and not a word is spoken. She turns round, I feel a wrench in me, a delicate shock through mysenses; I see a shoulder that turns, a back that disappears across thefloor. That reluctant turning from the window, the accentuation in thatmovement of the shoulders was like a nod to me. My blood was sensible ofall the delicate, dainty greeting, and I felt all at once rarely glad. Then I wheeled round and went down the street. 

I dared not look back, and knew not if she had returned to the window. Themore I considered this question the more nervous and restless I became. Probably at this very moment she was standing watching closely all mymovements. It is by no means comfortable to know that you are beingwatched from behind your back. I pulled myself together as well as I couldand proceeded on my way; my legs began to jerk under me, my gait becameunsteady just because I purposely tried to make it look well. In order toappear at ease and indifferent, I flung my arms about, spat out, and threwmy head well back--all without avail, for I continually felt the pursuingeyes on my neck, and a cold shiver ran down my back. At length I escapeddown a side street, from which I took the road to Pyle Street to get mypencil. 

I had no difficulty in recovering it; the man brought me the waistcoathimself, and as he did so, begged me to search through all the pockets. Ifound also a couple of pawn-tickets which I pocketed as I thanked theobliging little man for his civility. I was more and more taken with him, and grew all of a sudden extremely anxious to make a favourable impressionon this person. I took a turn towards the door and then back again to thecounter as if I had forgotten something. It struck me that I owed him anexplanation, that I ought to elucidate matters a little. I began to hum inorder to attract his attention. Then, taking the pencil in my hand, I heldit up and said:

"It would never have entered my head to come such a long way for any andevery bit of pencil, but with this one it was quite a different matter;there Was another reason, a special reason. Insignificant as it looked, this stump of pencil had simply made me what I was in the world, so tosay, placed me in life. " I said no more. The man had come right over tothe counter. 

"Indeed!" said he, and he looked inquiringly at me. 

"It was with this pencil, " I continued, in cold blood, "that I wrote mydissertation on 'Philosophical Cognition, ' in three volumes. " Had he neverheard mention of it?

Well, he did seem to remember having heard the name, rather the title. 

"Yes, " said I, "that was by me, so it was. " So he must really not beastonished that I should be desirous of having the little bit of pencilback again. I valued it far too highly to lose it; why, it was almost asmuch to me as a little human creature. For the rest I was honestlygrateful to him for his civility, and I would bear him in mind for it. Yes, truly, I really would. A promise was a promise; that was the sort ofman I was, and he really deserved it. "Good-bye!" I walked to the doorwith the bearing of one who had it in his power to place a man in a highposition, say in the fire-office. The honest pawnbroker bowed twiceprofoundly to me as I withdrew. I turned again and repeated my good-bye. 

On the stairs I met a woman with a travelling-bag in her hand, whosqueezed diffidently against the wall to make room for me, and Ivoluntarily thrust my hand in my pocket for something to give her, andlooked foolish as I found nothing and passed on with my head down. I heardher knock at the office door; there was an alarm over it, and I recognizedthe jingling sound it gave when any one rapped on the door with hisknuckles. 

The sun stood in the south; it was about twelve. The whole town began toget on its legs as it approached the fashionable hour for promenading. Bowing and laughing folk walked up and down Carl Johann Street. I stuck myelbows closely to my sides, tried to make myself look small, and slippedunperceived past some acquaintances who had taken up their stand at thecorner of University Street to gaze at the passers-by. I wandered upCastle Hill and fell into a reverie. 

How gaily and lightly these people I met carried their radiant heads, andswung themselves through life as through a ball-room! There was no sorrowin a single look I met, no burden on any shoulder, perhaps not even aclouded thought, not a little hidden pain in any of the happy souls. AndI, walking in the very midst of these people, young and newly-fledged as Iwas, had already forgotten the very look of happiness. I hugged thesethoughts to myself as I went on, and found that a great injustice had beendone me. Why had the last months pressed so strangely hard on me? I failedto recognize my own happy temperament, and I met with the most singularannoyances from all quarters. I could not sit down on a bench by myself orset my foot any place without being assailed by insignificant accidents, miserable details, that forced their way into my imagination and scatteredmy powers to all the four winds. A dog that dashed by me, a yellow rose ina man's buttonhole, had the power to set my thoughts vibrating and occupyme for a length of time. 

 * * * * *

What was it that ailed me? Was the hand of the Lord turned against me? Butwhy just against me? Why, for that matter, not just as well against a manin South America? When I considered the matter over, it grew more and moreincomprehensible to me that I of all others should be selected as anexperiment for a Creator's whims. It was, to say the least of it, apeculiar mode of procedure to pass over a whole world of other humans inorder to reach me. Why not select just as well Bookseller Pascha, orHennechen the steam agent?

As I went my way I sifted this thing, and could not get quit of it. Ifound the most weighty arguments against the Creator's arbitrariness inletting me pay for all the others' sins. Even after I had found a seat andsat down, the query persisted in occupying me, and prevented me fromthinking of aught else. From the day in May when my ill-luck began I couldso clearly notice my gradually increasing debility; I had become, as itwere, too languid to control or lead myself whither I would go. A swarm oftiny noxious animals had bored a way into my inner man and hollowed meout. 

Supposing God Almighty simply intended to annihilate me? I got up andpaced backwards and forwards before the seat. 

My whole being was at this moment in the highest degree of torture, I hadpains in my arms, and could hardly bear to hold them in the usual way. Iexperienced also great discomfort from my last full meal; I was oversated, and walked backwards and forwards without looking up. The people who cameand went around me glided past me like faint gleams. At last my seat wastaken up by two men, who lit cigars and began to talk loudly together. Igot angry and was on the point of addressing them, but turned on my heeland went right to the other end of the Park, and found another seat. I satdown. 

 * * * * *

The thought of God began to occupy me. It seemed to me in the highestdegree indefensible of Him to interfere every time I sought for a place, and to upset the whole thing, while all the time I was but imploringenough for a daily meal. 

I had remarked so plainly that, whenever I had been hungry for any lengthof time, it was just as if my brains ran quite gently out of my head andleft me with a vacuum--my head grew light and far off, I no longer feltits weight on my shoulders, and I had a consciousness that my eyes staredfar too widely open when I looked at anything. 

I sat there on the seat and pondered over all this, and grew more and morebitter against God for His prolonged inflictions. If He meant to draw menearer to Him, and make me better by exhausting me and placing obstacleafter obstacle in my way, I could assure Him He made a slight mistake. And, almost crying with defiance, I looked up towards Heaven and told Himso mentally, once and for all. 

Fragments of the teachings of my childhood ran through my memory. Therhythmical sound of Biblical language sang in my ears, and I talked quitesoftly to myself, and held my head sneeringly askew. Wherefore should Isorrow for what I eat, for what I drink, or for what I may array thismiserable food for worms called my earthy body? Hath not my HeavenlyFather provided for me, even as for the sparrow on the housetop, and hathHe not in His graciousness pointed towards His lowly servitor? The Lordstuck His finger in the net of my nerves gently--yea, verily, in desultoryfashion--and brought slight disorder among the threads. And then the Lordwithdrew His finger, and there were fibres and delicate root-likefilaments adhering to the finger, and they were the nerve-threads of thefilaments. And there was a gaping hole after the finger, which was God'sfinger, and a wound in my brain in the track of His finger. But when Godhad touched me with His finger, He let me be, and touched me no more, andlet no evil befall me; but let me depart in peace, and let me depart withthe gaping hole. And no evil hath befallen me from the God who is the LordGod of all Eternity. 

The sound of music was borne up on the wind to me from the Students'Allée. It was therefore past two o'clock. I took out my writing materialsto try to write something, and at the same time my book of shaving-tickets[Footnote: Issued by the barbers at cheaper rates, as few men in Norwayshave themselves. ] fell out of my pocket. I opened it, and counted thetickets; there were six. "The Lord be praised, " I exclaimed involuntarily;"I can still get shaved for a couple of weeks, and look a little decent";and I immediately fell into a better frame of mind on account of thislittle property which still remained to me. I smoothed the leaves outcarefully, and put the book safely into my pocket. 

But write I could not. After a few lines nothing seemed to occur to me; mythought ran in other directions, and I could not pull myself togetherenough for any special exertion. 

Everything influenced and distracted me; everything I saw made a freshimpression on me. Flies and tiny mosquitoes stick fast to the paper anddisturb me. I blow at them to get rid of them--blow harder and harder; tono purpose, the little pests throw themselves on their backs, makethemselves heavy, and fight against me until their slender legs bend. Theyare not to be moved from the spot; they find something to hook on to, settheir heels against a comma or an unevenness in the paper, or standimmovably still until they themselves think fit to go their way. 

These insects continued to busy me for a long time, and I crossed my legsto observe them at leisure. All at once a couple of high clarionet noteswaved up to me from the bandstand, and gave my thoughts a new impulse. 

Despondent at not being able to put my article together, I replaced thepaper in my pocket, and leant back in the seat. At this instant my head isso clear that I can follow the most delicate train of thought withouttiring. As I lie in this position, and let my eyes glide down my breastand along my legs, I notice the jerking movement my foot makes each timemy pulse beats. I half rise and look down at my feet, and I experience atthis moment a fantastic and singular feeling that I have never feltbefore--a delicate, wonderful shock through my nerves, as if sparks ofcold light quivered through them--it was as if catching sight of my shoesI had met with a kind old acquaintance, or got back a part of myself thathad been riven loose. A feeling of recognition trembles through my senses;the tears well up in my eyes, and I have a feeling as if my shoes are asoft, murmuring strain rising towards me. "Weakness!" I cried harshly tomyself, and I clenched my fists and I repeated "Weakness!" I laughed atmyself, for this ridiculous feeling, made fun of myself, with a perfectconsciousness of doing so, talked very severely and sensibly, and closedmy eyes very tightly to get rid of the tears. 

As if I had never seen my shoes before, I set myself to study their looks, their characteristics, and, when I stir my foot, their shape and theirworn uppers. I discover that their creases and white seams give themexpression--impart a physiognomy to them. Something of my own nature hadgone over into these shoes; they affected me, like a ghost of my otherI--a breathing portion of my very self. 

I sat and toyed with these fancies a long time, perhaps an entire hour. Alittle, old man came and took the other end of the seat; as he seatedhimself he panted after his walk, and muttered:

"Ay, ay, ay, ay, ay, ay, ay, ay, ay, ay; very true!"

As soon as I heard his voice, I felt as if a wind had swept through myhead. I let shoes be shoes, and it seemed to me that the distracted phaseof mind I had just experienced dated from a long-vanished period, maybe ayear or two back, and was about to be quietly effaced from my memory. Ibegan to observe the old fellow. 

Did this little man concern me in any way? Not in the least, not in thevery slightest degree! Only that he held a newspaper in his hand, an oldnumber (with the advertisement sheet on the outside), in which somethingor other seemed to be rolled up; my curiosity was aroused, and I could nottake my eyes away from this paper. The insane idea entered my head that itmight be a quite peculiar newspaper--unique of its kind. My curiosityincreased, and I began to move backwards and forwards on the seat. Itmight contain deeds, dangerous documents stolen from some archive orother; something floated before me about a secret treaty--a conspiracy. 

The man sat quietly, and pondered. Why did he not carry his newspaper asevery other person carries a paper, with its name out? What species ofcunning lurked under that? He did not seem either to like letting hispackage out of his hands, not for anything in the world; perhaps he didnot even dare trust it into his own pocket. I could stake my life therewas something at the bottom of that package--I considered a bit. Just thefact of finding it so impossible to penetrate this mysterious affairdistracted me with curiosity. I searched my pockets for something to offerthe man in order to enter into conversation with him, took hold of myshaving-book, but put it back again. Suddenly it entered my head to beutterly audacious; I slapped my empty breast-pocket, and said:

"May I offer you a cigarette?"

"Thank you!" The man did not smoke; he had to give it up to spare hiseyes; he was nearly blind. Thank you very much all the same. Was it longsince his eyes got bad? In that case, perhaps, he could not read either, not even a paper?

No, not even the newspaper, more's the pity. The man looked at me; hisweak eyes were each covered with a film which gave them a glassyappearance; his gaze grew bleary, and made a disgusting impression on me. 

"You are a stranger here?" he said. 

"Yes. " Could he not even read the name of the paper he held in his hand?

"Barely. " For that matter, he could hear directly that I was a stranger. There was something in my accent which told him. It did not need much; hecould hear so well. At night, when every one slept, he could hear peoplein the next room breathing. . . . 

"What I was going to say was, 'where do you live?'"

On the spur of the moment a lie stood, ready-made, in my head. I liedinvoluntarily, without any object, without any _arrière pensée_, andI answered--

"St. Olav's Place, No. 2. "

"Really?" He knew every stone in St. Olav's Place. There was a fountain, some lamp-posts, a few trees; he remembered all of it. "What number do youlive in?"

Desirous to put an end to this, I got up. But my notion about thenewspaper had driven me to my wit's end; I resolved to clear the thing up, at no matter what cost. 

"When you cannot read the paper, why--"

"In No. 2, I think you said, " continued the man, without noticing mydisturbance. "There was a time I knew every person in No. 2; what is yourlandlord's name?"

I quickly found a name to get rid of him; invented one on the spur of themoment, and blurted it out to stop my tormentor. 

"Happolati!" said I. 

"Happolati, ay!" nodded the man; and he never missed a syllable of thisdifficult name. 

I looked at him with amazement; there he sat, gravely, with a consideringair. Before I had well given utterance to the stupid name which jumpedinto my head the man had accommodated himself to it, and pretended to haveheard it before. 

In the meantime, he had laid his package on the seat, and I felt mycuriosity quiver through my nerves. I noticed there were a few greasespots on the paper. 

"Isn't he a sea-faring man, your landlord?" queried he, and there was nota trace of suppressed irony in his voice; "I seem to remember he was. "

"Sea-faring man? Excuse me, it must be the brother you know; this man isnamely J. A. Happolati, the agent. "

I thought this would finish him; but he willingly fell in with everythingI said. If I had found a name like Barrabas Rosebud it would not haveroused his suspicions. 

"He is an able man, I have heard?" he said, feeling his way. 

"Oh, a clever fellow!" answered I; "a thorough business head; agent forevery possible thing going. Cranberries from China; feathers and down fromRussia; hides, pulp, writing-ink--"

"He, he! the devil he is?" interrupted the old chap, highly excited. 

This began to get interesting. The situation ran away with me, and one lieafter another engendered in my head. I sat down again, forgot thenewspaper, and the remarkable documents, grew lively, and cut short theold fellow's talk. 

The little goblin's unsuspecting simplicity made me foolhardy; I wouldstuff him recklessly full of lies; rout him out o' field grandly, and stophis mouth from sheer amazement. 

Had he heard of the electric psalm-book that Happolati had invented?

"What? Elec--"

"With electric letters that could give light in the dark! a perfectlyextraordinary enterprise. A million crowns to be put in circulation;foundries and printing-presses at work, and shoals of regular mechanics tobe employed; I had heard as many as seven hundred men. "

"Ay, isn't it just what I say?" drawled out the man calmly. 

He said no more, he believed every word I related, and for all that, hewas not taken aback. This disappointed me a little; I had expected to seehim utterly bewildered by my inventions. 

I searched my brain for a couple of desperate lies, went the whole hog, hinted that Happolati had been Minister of State for nine years in Persia. "You perhaps have no conception of what it means to be Minister of Statein Persia?" I asked. It was more than king here, or about the same asSultan, if he knew what that meant, but Happolati had managed the wholething, and was never at a loss. And I related about his daughter Ylajali, a fairy, a princess, who had three hundred slaves, and who reclined on acouch of yellow roses. She was the loveliest creature I had ever seen; Ihad, may the Lord strike me, never seen her match for looks in my life!

"So--o; was she so lovely?" remarked the old fellow, with an absent air, as he gazed at the ground. 

"Lovely? She was beauteous, she was sinfully fascinating. Eyes like rawsilk, arms of amber! Just one glance from her was as seductive as a kiss;and when she called me, her voice darted like a wine-ray right into mysoul's phosphor. And why shouldn't she be so beautiful?" Did he imagineshe was a messenger or something in the fire brigade? She was simply aHeaven's wonder, I could just inform him, a fairy tale. 

"Yes, to be sure!" said he, not a little bewildered. His quiet bored me; Iwas excited by the sound of my own voice and spoke in utter seriousness;the stolen archives, treaties with some foreign power or other, no longeroccupied my thoughts; the little flat bundle of paper lay on the seatbetween us, and I had no longer the smallest desire to examine it or seewhat it contained. I was entirely absorbed in stories of my own whichfloated in singular visions across my mental eye. The blood flew to myhead, and I roared with laughter. 

At this moment the little man seemed about to go. He stretched himself, and in order not to break off too abruptly, added: "He is said to own muchproperty, this Happolati?"

How dared this bleary-eyed, disgusting old man toss about the rare name Ihad invented as if it were a common name stuck up over every huckster-shopin the town? He never stumbled over a letter or forgot a syllable. Thename had bitten fast in his brain and struck root on the instant. I gotannoyed; an inward exasperation surged up in me against this creature whomnothing had the power to disturb and nothing render suspicious. 

I therefore replied shortly, "I know nothing about that! I know absolutelynothing whatever about that! Let me inform you once for all that his nameis Johann Arendt Happolati, if you go by his own initials. "

"Johannn Arendt Happolati!" repeated the man, a little astonished at myvehemence; and with that he grew silent. 

"You should see his wife!" I said, beside myself. "A fatter creature . . . Eh? what? Perhaps you don't even believe she is really fat?"

Well, indeed he did not see his way to deny that such a man might perhapshave a rather stout wife. The old fellow answered quite gently and meeklyto each of my assertions, and sought for words as if he feared to offendand perhaps make me furious. 

"Hell and fire, man! Do you imagine that I am sitting here stuffing youchock-full of lies?" I roared furiously. "Perhaps you don't even believethat a man of the name of Happolati exists! I never saw your match forobstinacy and malice in any old man. What the devil ails you? Perhaps, too, into the bargain, you have been all this while thinking to yourself Iam a poverty-stricken fellow, sitting here in my Sunday-best without evena case full of cigarettes in my pocket. Let me tell you such treatment asyours is a thing I am not accustomed to, and I won't endure it, the Lordstrike me dead if I will--neither from you nor any one else, do you knowthat?"

The man had risen with his mouth agape; he stood tongue-tied and listenedto my outbreak until the end. Then he snatched his parcel from off theseat and went, ay, nearly ran, down the patch, with the short, totteringsteps of an old man. 

I leant back and looked at the retreating figure that seemed to shrink ateach step as it passed away. I do not know from where the impression came, but it appeared to me that I had never in my life seen a more vile backthan this one, and I did not regret that I had abused the creature beforehe left me. 

The day began to decline, the sun sank, it commenced to rustle lightly inthe trees around, and the nursemaids who sat in groups near the parallelbars made ready to wheel their perambulators home. I was calmed and ingood spirit. The excitement I had just laboured under quieted down littleby little, and I grew weaker, more languid, and began to feel drowsy. Neither did the quantity of bread I had eaten cause me any longer anyparticular distress. I leant against the back of the seat in the best ofhumours, closed my eyes, and got more and more sleepy. I dozed, and wasjust on the point of falling asleep, when a park-keeper put his hand on myshoulder and said:

"You must not sit here and go to sleep!"

"No?" I said, and sprang immediately up, my unfortunate position risingall at once vividly before my eyes. I must do something; find some way oranother out of it. To look for situations had been of no avail to me. Eventhe recommendations I showed had grown a little old, and were written bypeople all too little known to be of much use; besides that, constantrefusals all through the summer had somewhat disheartened me. At allevents, my rent was due, and I must raise the wind for that; the restwould have to wait a little. 

Quite involuntarily I had got paper and pencil into my hand again, and Isat and wrote mechanically the date, 1848, in each corner. If only now onesingle effervescing thought would grip me powerfully, and put words intomy mouth. Why, I had known hours when I could write a long piece, withoutthe least exertion, and turn it off capitally, too. 

I am sitting on the seat, and I write, scores of times, 1848. I write thisdate criss-cross, in all possible fashions, and wait until a workable ideashall occur to me. A swarm of loose thoughts flutter about in my head. Thefeeling of declining day makes me downcast, sentimental; autumn is here, and has already begun to hush everything into sleep and torpor. The fliesand insects have received their first warning. Up in the trees and down inthe fields the sounds of struggling life can be heard rustling, murmuring, restless; labouring not to perish. The down-trodden existence of the wholeinsect world is astir for yet a little while. They poke their yellow headsup from the turf, lift their legs, feel their way with long feelers andthen collapse suddenly, roll over, and turn their bellies in the air. 

Every growing thing has received its peculiar impress: the delicatelyblown breath of the first cold. The stubbles straggle wanly sunwards, andthe falling leaves rustle to the earth, with a sound as of errantsilkworms. 

It is the reign of Autumn, the height of the Carnival of Decay, the roseshave got inflammation in their blushes, an uncanny hectic tinge, throughtheir soft damask. 

I felt myself like a creeping thing on the verge of destruction, grippedby ruin in the midst of a whole world ready for lethargic sleep. I rose, oppressed by weird terrors, and took some furious strides down the path. "No!" I cried out, clutching both my hands; "there must be an end tothis, " and I reseated myself, grasped the pencil, and set seriously towork at an article. 

There was no possible use in giving way, with the unpaid rent staring mestraight in the face. 

Slowly, quite slowly, my thoughts collected. I paid attention to them, andwrote quietly and well; wrote a couple of pages as an introduction. Itwould serve as a beginning to anything. A description of travel, apolitical leader, just as I thought fit--it was a perfectly splendidcommencement for something or anything. So I took to seeking for someparticular subject to handle, a person or a thing, that I might grapplewith, and I could find nothing. Along with this fruitless exertion, disorder began to hold its sway again in my thoughts. I felt how my brainpositively snapped and my head emptied, until it sat at last, light, buoyant, and void on my shoulders. I was conscious of the gaping vacuum inmy skull with every fibre of my being. I seemed to myself to be hollowedout from top and toe. 

In my pain I cried: "Lord, my God and Father!" and repeated this cry manytimes at a stretch, without adding one word more. 

The wind soughed through the trees; a storm was brewing. I sat a whilelonger, and gazed at my paper, lost in thought, then folded it up and putit slowly into my pocket. It got chilly; and I no longer owned awaistcoat. I buttoned my coat right up to my throat and thrust my hands inmy pockets; thereupon I rose and went on. 

If I had only succeeded this time, just this once. Twice my landlady hadasked me with her eyes for payment, and I was obliged to hang my head andslink past her with a shamefaced air. I could not do it again: the verynext time I met those eyes I would give warning and account for myselfhonestly. Well, any way, things could not last long at this rate. 

On coming to the exit of the park I saw the old chap I had put to flight. The mysterious new paper parcel lay opened on the seat next him, filledwith different sorts of victuals, of which he ate as he sat. I immediatelywanted to go over and ask pardon for my conduct, but the sight of foodrepelled me. The decrepit fingers looked like ten claws as they clutchedloathsomely at the greasy bread and butter; I felt qualmish, and passed bywithout addressing him. He did not recognize me; his eyes stared at me, dry as horn, and his face did not move a muscle. 

And so I went on my way. 

As customary, I halted before every newspaper placard I came to, to readthe announcements of situations vacant, and was lucky enough to find onethat I might try for. 

A grocer in Groenlandsleret wanted a man every week for a couple of hours'book-keeping; remuneration according to agreement. I noted my man'saddress, and prayed to God in silence for this place. I would demand lessthan any one else for my work; sixpence was ample, or perhaps fivepence. That would not matter in the least. 

On going home, a slip of paper from my landlady lay on my table, in whichshe begged me to pay my rent in advance, or else move as soon as I could. I must not be offended, it was absolutely a necessary request. FriendlilyMrs. Gundersen. 

I wrote an application to Christy the grocer, No. 13 Groenlandsleret, putit in an envelope, and took it to the pillar at the corner. Then Ireturned to my room and sat down in the rocking-chair to think, whilst thedarkness grew closer and closer. Sitting up late began to be difficultnow. 

I woke very early in the morning. It was still quite dark as I opened myeyes, and it was not till long after that I heard five strokes of theclock down-stairs. I turned round to doze again, but sleep had down. Igrew more and more wakeful, and lay and thought of a thousand things. 

Suddenly a few good sentences fitted for a sketch or story strike me, delicate linguistic hits of which I have never before found the equal. Ilie and repeat these words over to myself, and find that they are capital. Little by little others come and fit themselves to the preceding ones. Igrow keenly wakeful. I get up and snatch paper and pencil from the tablebehind my bed. It was as if a vein had burst in me; one word followsanother, and they fit themselves together harmoniously with tellingeffect. Scene piles on scene, actions and speeches bubble up in my brain, and a wonderful sense of pleasure empowers me. I write as one possessed, and fill page after page, without a moment's pause. 

Thoughts come so swiftly to me and continue to flow so richly that I missa number of telling bits, that I cannot set down quickly enough, althoughI work with all my might. They continue to invade me; I am full of mysubject, and every word I write is inspired. 

This strange period lasts--lasts such a blessedly long time before itcomes to an end. I have fifteen--twenty written pages lying on my kneesbefore me, when at last I cease and lay my pencil aside, So sure as thereis any worth in these pages, so sure am I saved. I jump out of bed anddress myself, It grows lighter. I can half distinguish the lighthousedirector's announcement down near the door, and near the window it isalready so light that I could, in case of necessity, see to write. I setto work immediately to make a fair copy of what I have written. 

An intense, peculiar exhalation of light and colour emanates from thesefantasies of mine. I start with surprise as I note one good thing afteranother, and tell myself that this is the best thing I have ever read. Myhead swims with a sense of satisfaction; delight inflates me; I growgrandiose. 

I weigh my writing in my hand, and value it, at a loose guess, for fiveshillings on the spot. 

It could never enter any one's head to chaffer about five shillings; onthe contrary, getting it for half-a-sovereign might be considereddirt-cheap, considering the quality of the thing. 

I had no intention of turning off such special work gratis. As far as Iwas aware, one did not pick up stories of that kind on the wayside, and Idecided on half-a-sovereign. 

The room brightened and brightened. I threw a glance towards the door, andcould distinguish without particular trouble the skeleton-like letters ofMiss Andersen's winding-sheet advertisement to the right of it. It wasalso a good while since the clock has struck seven. 

I rose and came to a standstill in the middle of the floor. Everythingwell considered, Mrs. Gundersen's warning came rather opportunely. Thiswas, properly speaking, no fit room for me: there were only common enoughgreen curtains at the windows, and neither were there any pegs too many onthe wall. The poor little rocking-chair over in the corner was in realitya mere attempt at a rocking-chair; with the smallest sense of humour, onemight easily split one's sides with laughter at it. It was far too low fora grown man, and besides that, one needed, so to speak, the aid of aboot-jack to get out of it. To cut it short, the room was not adopted forthe pursuit of things intellectual, and I did not intend to keep it anylonger. On no account would I keep it. I had held my peace, and enduredand lived far too long in such a den. 

Buoyed up by hope and satisfaction, constantly occupied with my remarkablesketch, which I drew forth every moment from my pocket and re-read, Idetermined to set seriously to work with my flitting. I took out mybundle, a red handkerchief that contained a few clean collars and somecrumpled newspapers, in which I had occasionally carried home bread. Irolled my blanket up and pocketed my reserve white writing-paper. Then Iransacked every corner to assure myself that I had left nothing behind, and as I could not find anything, went over to the window and looked out. 

The morning was gloomy and wet; there was no one about at the burnt-outsmithy, and the clothesline down in the yard stretched tightly from wallto wall shrunken by the wet. It was all familiar to me, so I stepped backfrom the window, took the blanket under my arm, and made a low bow to thelighthouse director's announcement, bowed again to Miss Andersen'swinding-sheet advertisement, and opened the door. Suddenly the thought ofmy land-lady struck me; she really ought to be informed of my leaving, sothat she could see she had had an honest soul to deal with. 

I wanted also to thank her in writing for the few days' overtime in whichI occupied the room. The certainty that I was now saved for some time tocome increased so strongly in me that I even promised her five shillings. I would call in some day when passing by. 

Besides that, I wanted to prove to her what an upright sort of person herroof had sheltered. 

I left the note behind me on the table. 

Once again I stopped at the door and turned round; the buoyant feeling ofhaving risen once again to the surface charmed me, and made me feelgrateful towards God and all creation, and I knelt down at the bedside andthanked God aloud for His great goodness to me that morning. 

I knew it; ah! I knew that the rapture of inspiration I had just felt andnoted down was a miraculous heaven-brew in my spirit in answer to myyesterday's cry for aid. 

"It was God! It was God!" I cried to myself, and I wept for enthusiasmover my own words; now and then I had to stop and listen if any one was onthe stairs. At last I rose up and prepared to go. I stole noiselessly downeach flight and reached the door unseen. 

The streets were glistening from the rain which had fallen in the earlymorning. The sky hung damp and heavy over the town, and there was no glintof sunlight visible. I wondered what the day would bring forth? I went asusual in the direction of the Town Hall, and saw that it was half-pasteight. I had yet a few hours to walk about; there was no use in going tothe newspaper office before ten, perhaps eleven. I must lounge about solong, and think, in the meantime, over some expedient to raise breakfast. For that matter, I had no fear of going to bed hungry that day; thosetimes were over, God be praised! That was a thing of the past, an evildream. Henceforth, Excelsior!

But, in the meanwhile, the green blanket was a trouble to me. Neithercould I well make myself conspicuous by carrying such a thing about rightunder people's eyes. What would any one think of me? And as I went on Itried to think of a place where I could have it kept till later on. Itoccurred to me that I might go into Semb's and get it wrapped up in paper;not only would it look better, but I need no longer be ashamed of carryingit, I entered the shop, and stated my errand to one of the shop boys. 

He looked first at the blanket, then at me. It struck me that he shruggedhis shoulders to himself a little contemptuously as he took it; thisannoyed me. 

"Young man, " I cried, "do be a little careful! There are two costly glassvases in that; the parcel has to go to Smyrna. "

This had a famous effect. The fellow apologized with every movement hemade for not having guessed that there was something out of the common inthis blanket. When he had finished packing it up I thanked him with theair of a man who had sent precious goods to Smyrna before now. He held thedoor open for me, and bowed twice as I left. 

I began to wander about amongst the people in the market place, kept fromchoice near the woman who had potted plants for sale. The heavy crimsonroses--the leaves of which glowed blood-like and moist in the dampmorning--made me envious, and tempted me sinfully to snatch one, and Iinquired the price of them merely as an excuse to approach as near to themas possible. 

If I had any money over I would buy one, no matter how things went;indeed, I might well save a little now and then out of my way of living tobalance things again. 

It was ten o'clock, and I went up to the newspaper office. "Scissors" isrunning through a lot of old papers. The editor has not come yet. On beingasked my business, I delivered my weighty manuscript, lead him to supposethat it is something of more than uncommon importance, and impress uponhis memory gravely that he is to give it into we editor's own hands assoon as he arrives. 

I would myself call later on in the day for an answer. 

"All right, " replied "Scissors, " and busied himself again with his papers. 

It seemed to me that he treated the matter somewhat too coolly; but I saidnothing, only nodded rather carelessly to him, and left. 

I had now time on hand! If it would only clear up! It was perfectlywretched weather, without either wind or freshness. Ladies carried theirumbrellas, to be on the safe side, and the woollen caps of the men lookedlimp and depressing. 

I took another turn across the market and looked at the vegetables androses. I feel a hand on my shoulder and turn round--"Missy" bids me goodmorning! "Good-morning!" I say in return, a little questioningly. I nevercared particularly for "Missy. "

He looks inquisitively at the large brand-new parcel under my arm, andasks:

"What have you got there?"

"Oh, I have been down to Semb and got some cloth for a suit, " I reply, ina careless tone. "I didn't think I could rub on any longer; there's such athing as treating oneself too shabbily. "

He looks at me with an amazed start. 

"By the way, how are you getting on?" He asks it slowly. 

"Oh, beyond all expectation!"

"Then you have got something to do now?"

"Something to do?" I answer and seem surprised. "Rather! Why, I ambook-keeper at Christensen's--a wholesale house. "

"Oh, indeed!" he remarks and draws back a little. 

"Well, God knows I am the first to be pleased at your success. If only youdon't let people beg the money from you that you earn. Good-day!"

A second after he wheels round and comes back and, pointing with his caneto my parcel, says:

"I would recommend my tailor to you for the suit of clothes. You won'tfind a better tailor than Isaksen--just say I sent you, that's all!"

This was really rather more than I could swallow. What did he want to pokehis nose in my affairs for? Was it any concern of his which tailor Iemployed? The sight of this empty-headed dandified "masher" embittered me, and I reminded him rather brutally of ten shilling he had borrowed fromme. But before he could reply I regretted that I had asked for it. I gotashamed and avoided meeting his eyes, and, as a lady came by just then, Istepped hastily aside to let her pass, and seized the opportunity toproceed on my way. 

What should I do with myself whilst I waited? I could not visit a cafewith empty pockets, and I knew of no acquaintance that I could call on atthis time of day. I wended my way instinctively up town, killed a gooddeal of time between the marketplace and the Graendsen, read the_Aftenpost, _ which was newly posted up on the board outside theoffice, took a turn down Carl Johann, wheeled round and went straight onto Our Saviour's Cemetery, where I found a quiet seat on the slope nearthe Mortuary Chapel. 

I sat there in complete quietness, dozed in the damp air, mused, half-slept and shivered. 

And time passed. Now, was it certain that the story really was a littlemasterpiece of inspired art? God knows if it might not have its faultshere and there. All things well weighed, it was not certain that it wouldbe accepted; no, simply not even accepted. It was perhaps mediocre enoughin its way, perhaps downright worthless. What security had I that it wasnot already at this moment lying in the waste-paper basket?. . . Myconfidence was shaken. I sprang up and stormed out of the graveyard. 

Down in Akersgaden I peeped into a shop window, and saw that it was only alittle past noon. There was no use in looking up the editor before four. The fate of my story filled me with gloomy forebodings; the more I thoughtabout it the more absurd it seemed to me that I could have writtenanything useable with such suddenness, half-asleep, with my brain full offever and dreams. Of course I had deceived myself and been happy allthrough the long morning for nothing!. . . Of course!. . . I rushed withhurried strides up Ullavold-sveien, past St. Han's Hill, until I came tothe open fields; on through the narrow quaint lanes in Sagene, past wasteplots and small tilled fields, and found myself at last on a country road, the end of which I could not see. 

Here I halted and decided to turn. 

I was warm from the walk, and returned slowly and very downcast. I met twohay-carts. The drivers were lying flat upon the top of their loads, andsang. Both were bare-headed, and both had round, care-free faces. I passedthem and thought to myself that they were sure to accost me, sure to flingsome taunt or other at me, play me some trick; and as I got near enough, one of them called out and asked what I had under my arm?

"A blanket!"

"What o'clock is it?" he asked then. 

"I don't know rightly; about three, I think!"Whereupon they both laughed and drove on. I felt at the same moment thelash of a whip curl round one of my ears, and my hat was jerked off. Theycouldn't let me pass without playing me a trick. I raised my hand to myhead more or less confusedly, picked my hat out of the ditch, andcontinued on my way. Down at St. Han's Hill I met a man who told me it waspast four. Past four! already past four! I mended my pace, nearly ran downto the town, turned off towards the news office. Perhaps the editor hadbeen there hours ago, and had left the office by now. I ran, jostledagainst folk, stumbled, knocked against cars, left everybody behind me, competed with the very horses, struggled like a madman to arrive there intime. I wrenched through the door, took the stairs in four bounds, andknocked. 

No answer. 

"He has left, he has left, " I think. I try the door which is open, knockonce again, and enter. The editor is sitting at his table, his facetowards the window, pen in hand, about to write. When he hears mybreathless greeting he turns half round, steals a quick look at me, shakeshis head, and says:

"Oh, I haven't found time to read your sketch yet. "

I am so delighted, because in that case he has not rejected it, that Ianswer:

"Oh, pray, sir, don't mention it. I quite understand--there is no hurry;in a few days, perhaps--"

"Yes, I shall see; besides, I have your address. "

I forgot to inform him that I no longer had an address, and the interviewis over. I bow myself out, and leave. Hope flames up again in me; as yet, nothing is lost--on the contrary, I might, for that matter, yet win all. And my brain began to spin a romance about a great council in Heaven, inwhich it had just been resolved that I should win--ay, triumphantly winten shillings for a story. 

If I only had some place in which to take refuge for the night! I considerwhere I can stow myself away, and am so absorbed in this query that I cometo a standstill in the middle of the street. I forget where I am, and poselike a solitary beacon on a rock in mid-sea, whilst the tides rush androar about it. 

A newspaper boy offers me _The Viking_. 

"It's real good value, sir!"

I look up and start; I am outside Semb's shop again. I quickly turn to theright-about, holding the parcel in front of me, and hurry down Kirkegaden, ashamed and afraid that any one might have seen me from the window. I passby Ingebret's and the theatre, turn round by the box-office, and gotowards the sea, near the fortress. I find a seat once more, and begin toconsider afresh. 

Where in the world shall I find a shelter for the night?

Was there a hole to be found where I could creep in and hide myself tillmorning? My pride forbade my returning to my lodging--besides, it couldnever really occur to me to go back on my word; I rejected this thoughtwith great scorn, and I smiled superciliously as I thought of the littlered rocking-chair. By some association of ideas, I find myself suddenlytransported to a large, double room I once occupied in Haegdehaugen. Icould see a tray on the table, filled with great slices ofbread-and-butter. The vision changed; it was transformed into beef--aseductive piece of beef--a snow-white napkin, bread in plenty, a silverfork. The door opened; enter my landlady, offering me more tea. . . . 

Visions; senseless dreams! I tell myself that were I to get food now myhead would become dizzy once more, fever would fill my brain, and I wouldhave to fight again against many mad fancies. I could not stomach food, myinclination did not lie that way; that was peculiar to me--an idiosyncrasyof mine. 

Maybe as night drew on a way could be found to procure shelter. There wasno hurry; at the worst, I could seek a place out in the woods. I had theentire environs of the city at my disposal; as yet, there was no degree ofcold worth speaking of in the weather. 

And outside there the sea rocked in drowsy rest; ships and clumsy, broad-nosed prams ploughed graves in its bluish surface, and scatteredrays to the right and left, and glided on, whilst the smoke rolled up indowny masses from the chimney-stacks, and the stroke of the engine pistonspierced the clammy air with a dull sound. There was no sun and no wind;the trees behind me were almost wet, and the seat upon which I sat wascold and damp. 

Time went. I settled down to doze, waxed tired, and a little shiver randown my back. A while after I felt that my eyelids began to droop, and Ilet them droop. . . . 

When I awoke it was dark all around me. I started up, bewildered andfreezing. I seized my parcel and commenced to walk. I went faster andfaster in order to get warm, slapped my arms, chafed my legs--which by nowI could hardly feel under me--and thus reached the watch-house of the firebrigade. It was nine o'clock; I had been asleep for several hours. 

Whatever shall I do with myself? I must go to some place. I stand thereand stare up at the watch-house, and query if it would not be possible tosucceed in getting into one of the passages if I were to watch for amoment when the watchman's back was turned. I ascend the steps, andprepare to open a conversation with the man. He lifts his ax in salute, and waits for what I may have to say. The uplifted ax, with its edgeturned against me, darts like a cold slash through my nerves. I stand dumbwith terror before this armed man, and draw involuntarily back. I saynothing, only glide farther and farther away from him. To save appearancesI draw my hand over my forehead, as if I had forgotten something or other, and slink away. When I reached the pavement I felt as much saved as if Ihad just escaped a great peril, and I hurried away. 

Cold and famished, more and more miserable in spirit, I flew up CarlJohann. I began to swear out aloud, troubling myself not a whit as towhether any one heard me or not. Arrived at Parliament House, just nearthe first trees, I suddenly, by some association of ideas, bethoughtmyself of a young artist I knew, a stripling I had once saved from anassault in the Tivoli, and upon whom I had called later on. I snap myfingers gleefully, and wend my way to Tordenskjiolds Street, find thedoor, on which is fastened a card with C. Zacharias Bartel on it, andknock. 

He came out himself, and smelt so fearfully of ale and tobacco that it washorrible. 

"Good-evening!" I say. 

"Good-evening! is that you? Now, why the deuce do you come so late? Itdoesn't look at all its best by lamplight. I have added a hayrick to itsince, and have made a few other alterations. You must see it by daylight;there is no use our trying to see it now!"

"Let me have a look at it now, all the same, " said I; though, for thatmatter, I did not in the least remember what picture he was talking about. 

"Absolutely impossible, " he replied; "the whole thing will look yellow;and, besides, there's another thing"--and he came towards me, whispering:"I have a little girl inside this evening, so it's clearly impracticable. "

"Oh, in that case, of course there's no question about it. "

I drew back, said good-night, and went away. 

So there was no way out of it but to seek some place out in the woods. Ifonly the fields were not so damp. I patted my blanket, and felt more andmore at home at the thought of sleeping out. I had worried myself so longtrying to find a shelter in town that I was wearied and bored with thewhole affair. It would be a positive pleasure to get to rest, to resignmyself; so I loaf down the street without thought in my head. At a placein Haegdehaugen I halted outside a provision shop where some food wasdisplayed in the window. A cat lay there and slept beside a round Frenchroll. There was a basin of lard and several basins of meal in thebackground. I stood a while and gazed at these eatables; but as I had nomoney wherewith to buy, I turned quickly away and continued my tramp. Iwent very slowly, passed by Majorstuen, went on, always on--it seemed tome for hours, --and came at length at Bogstad's wood. 

I turned off the road here, and sat down to rest. Then I began to lookabout for a place to suit me, to gather together heather and juniperleaves, and make up a bed on a little declivity where it was a bit dry. Iopened the parcel and took out the blanket; I was tired and exhausted withthe long walk, and lay down at once. I turned and twisted many timesbefore I could get settled. My ear pained me a little--it was slightlyswollen from the whip-lash--and I could not lie on it. I pulled off myshoes and put them under my head, with the paper from Semb on top. 

And the great spirit of darkness spread a shroud over me . . . Everythingwas silent--everything. But up in the heights soughed the everlastingsong, the voice of the air, the distant, toneless humming which is neversilent. I listened so long to this ceaseless faint murmur that it began tobewilder me; it was surely a symphony from the rolling spheres above. Stars that intone a song. . . . 

"I am damned if it is, though, " I exclaimed;and I laughed aloud to collect my wits. "They'renight-owls hooting in Canaan!"

I rose again, pulled on my shoes, and wanderedabout in the gloom, only to lay down once more. I fought and wrestled with anger and fear untilnearly dawn, then fell asleep at last. 

 * * * * *

It was broad daylight when I opened my eyes, and I had a feeling that itwas going on towards noon. 

I pulled on my shoes, packed up the blanket again, and set out for town. There was no sun to be seen today either; I shivered like a dog, my feetwere benumbed, and water commenced to run from my eyes, as if they couldnot bear the daylight. 

It was three o'clock. Hunger began to assail me downright in earnest. Iwas faint, and now and again I had to retch furtively. I swung round bythe Dampkökken, [Footnote: Steam cooking-kitchen and famous cheapeating-house] read the bill of fare, and shrugged my shoulders in a way toattract attention, as if corned beef or salt port was not meet food forme. After that I went towards the railway station. 

A singular sense of confusion suddenly darted through my head. I stumbledon, determined not to heed it; but I grew worse and worse, and was forcedat last to sit down on a step. My whole being underwent a change, as ifsomething had slid aside in my inner self, or as if a curtain or tissue ofmy brain was rent in two. 

I was not unconscious; I felt that my ear was gathering a little, and, asan acquaintance passed by, I recognized him at once and got up and bowed. 

What sore of fresh, painful perception was this that was being added tothe rest? Was it a consequence of sleeping in the sodden fields, or did itarise from my not having had any breakfast yet? Looking the whole thingsquarely in the face, there was no meaning in living on in this manner, byChrist's holy pains, there wasn't. I failed to see either how I had mademyself deserving of this special persecution; and it suddenly entered myhead that I might just as well turn rogue at once and go to my "Uncle's"with the blanket. I could pawn it for a shilling, and get three fullmeals, and so keep myself going until I thought of something else. 'Tistrue I would have to swindle Hans Pauli. I was already on my way to thepawn-shop, but stopped outside the door, shook my head irresolutely, thenturned back. The farther away I got the more gladsome, ay, delighted Ibecame, that I had conquered this strong temptation. The consciousnessthat I was yet pure and honourable rose to my head, filled me with asplendid sense of having principle, character, of being a shining whitebeacon in a muddy, human sea amidst floating wreck. 

Pawn another man's property for the sake of a meal, eat and drink one'sself to perdition, brand one's soul with the first little scar, set thefirst black mark against one's honour, call one's self a blackguard toone's own face, and needs must cast one's eyes down before one's self?Never! never! It could never have been my serious intention--it had reallynever seriously taken hold of me; in fact, I could not be answerable forevery loose, fleeting, desultory thought, particularly with such aheadache as I had, and nearly killed carrying a blanket, too, thatbelonged to another fellow. 

There would surely be some way or another of getting help when the righttime came! Now, there was the grocer in Groenlandsleret. Had I importunedhim every hour in the day since I sent in my application? Had I rung thebell early and late, and been turned away? Why, I had not even appliedpersonally to him or sought an answer! It did not follow, surely, that itmust needs be an absolutely vain attempt. 

Maybe I had luck with me this time. Luck often took such a devious course, and I started for Groenlandsleret. 

The last spasm that had darted through my head had exhausted me a little, and I walked very slowly and thought over what I would say to him. 

Perhaps he was a good soul; if the whim seized him he might pay me for mywork a shilling in advance, even without my asking for it. People of thatsort had sometimes the most capital ideas. 

I stole into a doorway and blackened the knees of my trousers with spittleto try and make them look a little respectable, left the parcel behind mein a dark corner at the back of a chest, and entered the little shop. 

A man is standing pasting together bags made of old newspaper. 

"I would like to see Mr. Christie, " I said. 

"That's me!" replied the man. 

"Indeed!" Well, my name was so-and-so. I had taken the liberty of sendinghim an application, I did not know if it had been of any use. 

He repeated my name a couple of times and commenced to laugh. 

"Well now, you shall see, " he said, taking my letter out of hisbreast-pocket, "if you will just be good enough to see how you deal withdates, sir. You dated your letter 1848, " and the man roared with laughter. 

"Yes, that was rather a mistake, " I said, abashed--a distraction, a wantof thought; I admitted it. 

"You see I must have a man who, as a matter of fact, makes no mistakes infigures, " said he. "I regret it, your handwriting is clear, and I likeyour letter, too, but--"

I waited a while; this could not possibly be the man's final say. Hebusied himself again with the bags. 

"Yes, it was a pity, " I said; "really an awful pity, but of course itwould not occur again; and, after all, surely this little error could nothave rendered me quite unfit to keep books?"

"No, I didn't say that, " he answered, "but in the meantime it had so muchweight with me that I decided at once upon another man. "

"So the place is filled?"

"Yes. "

"A--h, well, then there's nothing more to be said about it!"

"No! I'm sorry, but--"

"Good-evening!" said I. 

Fury welled up in me, blazing with brutal strength. I fetched my parcelfrom the entry, set my teeth together, jostled against the peaceful folkon the footpath, and never once asked their pardon. 

As one man stopped and set me to rights rather sharply for my behaviour, Iturned round and screamed a single meaningless word in his ear, clenchedmy fist right under his nose, and stumbled on, hardened by a blind ragethat I could not control. 

He called a policeman, and I desired nothing better than to have onebetween my hands just for one moment. I slackened my pace intentionally inorder to give him an opportunity of overtaking me; but he did not come. Was there now any reason whatever that absolutely every one of one's mostearnest and most persevering efforts should fail? Why, too, had I written1828? In what way did that infernal date concern me? Here I was goingabout starving, so that my entrails wriggle together in me like worms, andit was, as far as I knew, not decreed in the book of fate that anything inthe shape of food would turn up later on in the day. 

I was becoming mentally and physically more and more prostrate; I wasletting myself down each day to less and less honest actions, so that Ilied on each day without blushing, cheated poor people out of their rent, struggled with the meanest thoughts of making away with other men'sblankets--all without remorse or prick of conscience. 

Foul places began to gather in my inner being, black spores which spreadmore and more. And up in Heaven God Almighty sat and kept a watchful eyeon me, and took heed that _my_ destruction proceeded in accordancewith all the rules of art, uniformly and gradually, without a break in themeasure. 

But in the abysses of hell the angriest devils bristled with range becauseit lasted such a long time until I committed a mortal sin, an unpardonableoffence for which God in His justice must cast me--down. . . . 

I quickened my pace, hurried faster and faster, turned suddenly to theleft and found myself, excited and angry, in a light ornate doorway. I didnot pause, not for one second, but the whole peculiar ornamentation of theentrance struck on my perception in a flash; every detail of thedecoration and the tiling of the floor stood clear on my mental vision asI sprang up the stairs. I rang violently on the second floor. Why should Istop exactly on the second floor? And why just seize hold of this bellwhich was some little way from the stairs?

A young lady in a grey gown with black trimming came out and opened thedoor. She looked for a moment in astonishment at me, then shook her headand said:

"No, we have not got anything today, " and she made a feint to close thedoor. 

What induced me to thrust myself in this creature's way? She took mewithout further ado for a beggar. 

I got cool and collected at once. I raised my hat, made a respectful bow, and, as if I had not caught her words, said, with the utmost politeness:

"I hope you will excuse me, madam, for ringing so hard, the bell was newto me. Is it not here that an invalid gentleman lives who has advertisedfor a man to wheel him about in a chair?"

She stood awhile and digested this mendacious invention and seemed to beirresolute in her summing up of my person. 

"No!" she said at length; "no, there is no invalid gentleman living here. "

"Not really? An elderly gentleman--two hours a day--sixpence an hour?"

"No!"

"Ah! in that case, I again ask pardon, " said I. "It is perhaps on thefirst floor. I only wanted, in any case, to recommend a man I know, inwhom I am interested; my name is Wedel-Jarlsberg, " [Footnote: The lastfamily bearing title of nobility in Norway. ] and I bowed again and drewback. The young lady blushed crimson, and in her embarrassment could notstir from the spot, but stood and stared after me as I descended thestairs. 

My calm had returned to me, and my head was clear. The lady's saying thatshe had nothing for me today had acted upon me like an icy shower. So ithad gone so far with me that any one might point at me, and say tohimself, "There goes a beggar--one of those people who get their foodhanded out to them at folk's back-doors!"

I halted outside an eating-house in Möller Street, and sniffed the freshsmell of meat roasting inside; my hand was already upon the door-handle, and I was on the point of entering without any fixed purpose, when Ibethought myself in time, and left the spot. On reaching the market, andseeking for a place to rest for a little, I found all the benchesoccupied, and I sought in vain all round outside the church for a quietseat, where I could sit down. 

Naturally, I told myself, gloomily--naturally, naturally; and I commencedto walk again. I took a turn round the fountain at the corner of thebazaar, and swallowed a mouthful of water. On again, dragging one footafter the other; stopped for a long time before each shop window; halted, and watched every vehicle that drove by. I felt a scorching heat in myhead, and something pulsated strangely in my temples. The water I haddrunk disagreed with me fearfully, and I retched, stopping here and thereto escape being noticed in the open street. In this manner I came up toOur Saviour's Cemetery. 

I sat down here, with my elbows on my knees and my head in my hands. Inthis cramped position I was more at ease, and I no longer felt the littlegnawing in my chest. 

A stone-cutter lay on his stomach on a large slab of granite, at the sideof me, and cut inscriptions. He had blue spectacles on, and reminded me ofan acquaintance of mine, whom I had almost forgotten. 

If I could only knock all shame on the head and apply to him. Tell him thetruth right out, that things were getting awfully tight with me now; ay, that I found it hard enough to keep alive. I could give him myshaving-tickets. 

Zounds! my shaving-tickets; tickets for nearly a shilling. I searchnervously for this precious treasure. As I do not find them quicklyenough, I spring to my feet and search, in a sweat of fear. I discoverthem at last in the bottom of my breast-pocket, together with otherpapers--some clean, some written on--of no value. 

I count these six tickets over many times, backwards and forwards; I hadnot much use for them; it might pass for a whim--a notion of mine--that Ino longer cared to get shaved. 

I was saved to the extent of sixpence--a white sixpence of Kongsbergsilver. The bank closed at six; I could watch for my man outside theOpland Café between seven and eight. 

I sat, and was for a long time pleased with this thought. Time went. Thewind blew lustily through the chestnut trees around me, and the daydeclined. 

After all, was it not rather petty to come slinking up with sixshaving-tickets to a young gentleman holding a good position in a bank?Perhaps, he had already a book, maybe two, quite full of spick and spantickets, a contrast to the crumpled ones I held. 

Who could tell? I felt in all my pockets for anything else I could let gowith them, but found nothing. If I could only offer him my tie? I couldwell do without it if I buttoned my coat tightly up, which, by the way, Iwas already obliged to do, as I had no waistcoat. I untied it--it was alarge overlapping bow which hid half my chest, --brushed it carefully, andfolded it up in a piece of clean white writing-paper, together with thetickets. Then I left the churchyard and took the road leading to theOpland. 

It was seven by the Town Hall clock. I walked up and down hard by thecafé, kept close to the iron railings, and kept a sharp watch on all whowent in and came out of the door. At last, about eight o'clock, I saw theyoung fellow, fresh, elegantly dressed, coming up the hill and across tothe cafe door. My heart fluttered like a little bird in my breast as Icaught sight of him, and I blurted out, without even a greeting:

"Sixpence, old friend!" I said, putting on cheek; "here is the worth ofit, " and I thrust the little packet into his hand. 

"Haven't got it, " he exclaimed. "God knows if I have!" and he turned hispurse inside out right before my eyes. "I was out last night and gottotally cleared out! You must believe me, I literally haven't got it. "

"No, no, my dear fellow; I suppose it is so, " I answered, and I took hisword for it. There was, indeed, no reason why he should lie about such atrifling matter. It struck me, too, that his blue eyes were moist whilsthe ransacked his pockets and found nothing. I drew back. "Excuse me, " Isaid; "it was only just that I was a bit hard up. " I was already a piecedown the street, when he called after me about the little packet. "Keepit! keep it, " I answered; "you are welcome to it. There are only a fewtrifles in it--a bagatelle; about all I own in the world, " and I became sotouched at my own words, they sounded so pathetic in the twilight, that Ifell a-weeping. . . . 

The wind freshened, the clouds chased madly across the heavens, and itgrew cooler and cooler as it got darker. I walked, and cried as I walked, down the whole street; felt more and more commiseration with myself, andrepeated, time after time, a few words, an ejaculation, which called forthfresh tears whenever they were on the point of ceasing: "Lord God, I feelso wretched! Lord God, I feel so wretched!"

An hour passed; passed with such strange slowness, such weariness. I spenta long time in Market Street; sat on steps, stole into doorways, and whenany one approached, stood and stared absently into the shops where peoplebustled about with wares or money. At last I found myself a shelteredplace, behind a deal hoarding, between the church and the bazaar. 

No; I couldn't go out into the woods again this evening. Things must taketheir course. I had not strength enough to go, and it was such an endlessway there. I would kill the night as best I could, and remain where I was;if it got all too cold, well, I could walk round the church. I would notin any case worry myself any more about that, and I leant back and dozed. 

The noise around me diminished; the shops closed. The steps of thepedestrians sounded more and more rarely, and in all the windows about thelights went out. I opened my eyes, and became aware of a figure standingin front of me. The flash of shining buttons told me it was a policeman, though I could not see the man's face. 

"Good-night, " he said. 

"Good-night, " I answered and got afraid. 

"Where do you live?" he queried. 

I name, from habit, and without thought, my old address, the little attic. 

He stood for a while. 

"Have I done anything wrong?" I asked anxiously. 

"No, not at all!" he replied; "but you had perhaps better be getting homenow; it's cold lying here. "

"Ay, that's true; I feel it is a little chilly. " I said good-night, andinstinctively took the road to my old abode. If I only set about itcarefully, I might be able to get upstairs without being heard; there wereeight steps in all, and only the two top ones creaked under my tread. Downat the door I took off my shoes, and ascended. It was quiet everywhere. Icould hear the slow tick-tack of a clock, and a child crying a little. After that I heard nothing. I found my door, lifted the latch as I wasaccustomed to do, entered the room, and shut the door noiselessly afterme. 

Everything was as I had left it. The curtains were pulled aside from thewindows, and the bed stood empty. I caught a glimpse of a note lying onthe table; perhaps it was my note to the landlady--she might never havebeen up here since I went away. 

I fumbled with my hands over the white spot, and felt, to my astonishment, that it was a letter. I take it over to the window, examine as well as itis possible in the dark the badly-written letters of the address, and makeout at least my own name. Ah, I thought, an answer from my landlady, forbidding me to enter the room again if I were for sneaking back. 

Slowly, quite slowly I left the room, carrying my shoes in one hand, theletter in the other, and the blanket under my arm. I draw myself up, setmy teeth as I tread on the creaking steps, get happily down the stairs, and stand once more at the door. I put on my shoes, take my time with thelaces, sit a while quietly after I'm ready, and stare vacantly before me, holding the letter in my hand. Then I get up and go. 

The flickering ray of a gas lamp gleams up thestreet. I make straight for the light, lean my parcelagainst the lamp-post and open the letter. Allthis with the utmost deliberation. A stream oflight, as it were, darts through my breast, and I hearthat I give a little cry--a meaningless sound ofjoy. The letter was from the editor. My storywas accepted--had been set in type immediately, straight off! A few slight alterations. . . . Acouple of errors in writing amended. . . . Workedout with talent . . . Be printed tomorrow . . . Half-a-sovereign. 

I laughed and cried, took to jumping and running down the street, stopped, slapped my thighs, swore loudly and solemnly into space at nothing inparticular. And time went. 

All through the night until the bright dawn I "jodled" about the streetsand repeated--"Worked out with talent--therefore a little masterpiece--astroke of genius--and half-a-sovereign. "

Part II

A few weeks later I was out one evening. Once more I had sat out in achurchyard and worked at an article for one of the newspapers. But whilstI was struggling with it eight o'clock struck, and darkness closed in, andtime for shutting the gates. 

I was hungry--very hungry. The ten shillings had, worse luck, lasted alltoo short. It was now two, ay, nearly three days since I had eatenanything, and I felt somewhat faint; holding the pencil even had taxed mea little. I had half a penknife and a bunch of keys in my pocket, but nota farthing. 

When the churchyard gate shut I meant to have gone straight home, but, from an instinctive dread of my room--a vacant tinker's workshop, whereall was dark and barren, and which, in fact, I had got permission tooccupy for the present--I stumbled on, passed, not caring where I went, the Town Hall, right to the sea, and over to a scat near the railwaybridge. 

At this moment not a sad thought troubled me. I forgot my distress, andfelt calmed by the view of the sea, which lay peaceful and lovely in themurkiness. For old habit's sake I would please myself by reading throughthe bit I had just written, and which seemed to my suffering head the bestthing I had ever done. 

I took my manuscript out of my pocket to try and decipher it, held itclose up to my eyes, and ran through it, one line after the other. At lastI got tired, and put the papers back in my pocket. Everything was still. The sea stretched away in pearly blueness, and little birds flittednoiselessly by me from place to place. 

A policeman patrols in the distance; otherwise there is not a soulvisible, and the whole harbour is hushed in quiet. 

I count my belongings once more--half a penknife, a bunch of keys, but nota farthing. Suddenly I dive into my pocket and take the papers out again. It was a mechanical movement, an unconscious nervous twitch. I selected awhite unwritten page, and--God knows where I got the notion from--but Imade a cornet, closed it carefully, so that it looked as if it were filledwith something, and threw it far out on to the pavement. The breeze blewit onward a little, and then it lay still. 

By this time hunger had begun to assail me in earnest. I sat and looked atthe white paper cornet, which seemed as if it might be bursting withshining silver pieces, and incited myself to believe that it really didcontain something. I sat and coaxed myself quite audibly to guess the sum;if I guessed aright, it was to be mine. 

I imagined the tiny, pretty penny bits at the bottom and the thick flutedshillings on top--a whole paper cornet full of money! I sat and gazed atit with wide opened eyes, and urged myself to go and steal it. 

Then I hear the constable cough. What puts it into my head to do the same?I rise up from the seat and repeat the cough three times so that he mayhear it. Won't he jump at the corner when he comes. I sat and laughed atthis trick, rubbed my hands with glee, and swore with rollickingrecklessness. What a disappointment he will get, the dog! Wouldn't thispiece of villainy make him inclined to sink into hell's hottest pool oftorment! I was drunk with starvation; my hunger had made me tipsy. 

A few minutes later the policeman comes by, clinking his iron heels on thepavement, peering on all sides. He takes his time; he has the whole nightbefore him; he does not notice the paper bag--not till he comes quiteclose to it. Then he stops and stares at it. It looks so white and so fullas it lies there; perhaps a little sum--what? A little sum of silvermoney?. . . And he picks it up. Hum . . . It is light--very light; maybe anexpensive feather; some hat trimming. . . . He opened it carefully with hisbig hands, and looked in. I laughed, laughed, slapped my thighs, andlaughed, like a maniac. And not a sound issued from my throat; my laughterwas hushed and feverish to the intensity of tears. 

Clink, clink again over the paving-stones, and the policeman took a turntowards the landing-stage. I sat there, with tears in my eyes, andhiccoughed for breath, quite beside myself with feverish merriment. Icommenced to talk aloud to myself all about the cornet, imitated the poorpoliceman's movements, peeped into my hollow hand, and repeated over andover again to myself, "He coughed as he threw it away--he coughed as hethrew it away. " I added new words to these, gave them additional point, changed the whole sentence, and made it catching and piquant. He coughedonce--Kheu heu!

I exhausted myself in weaving variations on these words, and the eveningwas far advanced before my mirth ceased. Then a drowsy quiet overcame me;a pleasant languor which I did not attempt to resist. The darkness hadintensified, and a slight breeze furrowed the pearl-blue sea. The ships, the masts of which I could see outlined against the sky, looked with theirblack hulls like voiceless monsters that bristled and lay in wait for me. I had no pain--my hunger had taken the edge off it. In its stead I feltpleasantly empty, untouched by everything around me, and glad not to benoticed by any one. I put my feet up on the seat and leant back. Thus Icould best appreciate the well-being of perfect isolation. There was not acloud on my mind, not a feeling of discomfort, and so far as my thoughtreached, I had not a whim, not a desire unsatisfied. I lay with open eyes, in a state of utter absence of mind. I felt myself charmed away. Moreover, not a sound disturbed me. Soft darkness had hidden the whole world from mysight, and buried me in ideal rest. Only the lonely, crooning voice ofsilence strikes in monotones on my ear, and the dark monsters out therewill draw me to them when night comes, and they will bear me far acrossthe sea, through strange lands where no man dwells, and they will bear meto Princess Ylajali's palace, where an undreamt-of grandeur awaits me, greater than that of any other man. And she herself will be sitting in adazzling hall where all is amethyst, on a throne of yellow roses, and willstretch out her hands to me when I alight; will smile and call as Iapproach and kneel: "Welcome, welcome, knight, to me and my land! I havewaited twenty summers for you, and called for you on all bright nights. And when you sorrowed I have wept here, and when you slept I have breathedsweet dreams in you!". . . And the fair one clasps my hand and, holding it, leads me through long corridors where great crowds of people cry, "Hurrah!" through bright gardens where three hundred tender maidens laughand play; and through another hall where all is of emerald; and here thesun shines. 

In the corridors and galleries choirs of musicians march by, and rills ofperfume are wafted towards me. 

I clasp her hand in mine; I feel the wild witchery of enchantment shiverthrough my blood, and I fold my arms around her, and she whispers, "Nothere; come yet farther!" and we enter a crimson room, where all is ofruby, a foaming glory, in which I faint. 

Then I feel her arms encircle me; her breath fans my face with a whispered"Welcome, loved one! Kiss me . . . More . . . More. . . . "

I see from my seat stars shooting before my eyes, and my thoughts areswept away in a hurricane of light. . . . 

I had fallen asleep where I lay, and was awakened by the policeman. ThereI sat, recalled mercilessly to life and misery. My first feeling was ofstupid amazement at finding myself in the open air; but this was quicklyreplaced by a bitter despondency, I was near crying with sorrow at beingstill alive. It had rained whilst I slept, and my clothes were soakedthrough and through, and I felt a damp cold in my limbs. 

The darkness was denser; it was with difficulty that I could distinguishthe policeman's face in front of me. 

"So, that's right, " he said; "get up now. "

I got up at once; if he had commanded me to lie down again I would haveobeyed too. I was fearfully dejected, and utterly without strength; addedto that, I was almost instantly aware of the pangs of hunger again. 

"Hold on there!" the policeman shouted after me; "why, you're walking offwithout your hat, you Juggins! So--h there; now, go on. "

"I indeed thought there was something--something I had forgotten, " Istammered, absently. "Thanks, good-night!" and I stumbled away. 

If one only had a little bread to eat; one of those delicious little brownloaves that one could bite into as one walked along the street; and as Iwent on I thought over the particular sort of brown bread that would be sounspeakably good to munch. I was bitterly hungry; wished myself dead andburied; I got maudlin, and wept. 

There never was any end to my misery. Suddenly I stopped in the street, stamped on the pavement, and cursed loudly. What was it he called me? A"Juggins"? I would just show him what calling me a "Juggins" means. Iturned round and ran back. I felt red-hot with anger. Down the street Istumbled, and fell, but I paid no heed to it, jumped up again, and ran on. But by the time I reached the railway station I had become so tired that Idid not feel able to proceed all the way to the landing-stage; besides, myanger had cooled down with the run. At length I pulled up and drew breath. Was it not, after all, a matter of perfect indifference to me what such apoliceman said? Yes; but one couldn't stand everything. Right enough, Iinterrupted myself; but he knew no better. And I found this argumentsatisfactory. I repeated twice to myself, "He knew no better"; and withthat I returned again. 

"Good Lord!" thought I, wrathfully, "what things you do take into yourhead: running about like a madman through the soaking wet streets on darknights. " My hunger was now tormenting me excruciatingly, and gave me norest. Again and again I swallowed saliva to try and satisfy myself alittle; I fancied it helped. 

I had been pinched, too, for food for ever so many weeks before this lastperiod set in, and my strength had diminished considerably of late. When Ihad been lucky enough to raise five shillings by some manoeuvre or anotherthey only lasted any time with difficulty; not long enough for me to berestored to health before a new hunger period set in and reduced me again. My back and shoulders caused me the worst trouble. I could stop the littlegnawing I had in my chest by coughing hard, or bending well forward as Iwalked, but I had no remedy for back and shoulders. Whatever was thereason that things would not brighten up for me? Was I not just as muchentitled to live as any one else? for example, as Bookseller Pascha orSteam Agent Hennechen? Had I not two shoulders like a giant, and twostrong hands to work with? and had I not, in sooth, even applied for aplace as wood-chopper in Möllergaden in order to earn my daily bread? WasI lazy? Had I not applied for situations, attended lectures, writtenarticles, and worked day and night like a man possessed? Had I not livedlike a miser, eaten bread and milk when I had plenty, bread alone when Ihad little, and starved when I had nothing? Did I live in an hotel? Had Ia suite of rooms on the first floor? Why, I am living in a loft over atinker's workshop, a loft already forsaken by God and man last winter, because the snow blew in. So I could not understand the whole thing; not abit of it. 

I slouched on, and dwelt upon all this, and there was not as much as aspark of bitterness or malice or envy in my mind. 

I halted at a paint-shop and gazed into the window. I tried to read thelabels on a couple of the tins, but it was too dark. Vexed with myselfover this new whim, and excited--almost angry at not being able to makeout what these tins held, --I rapped twice sharply on the window and wenton. 

Up the street I saw a policeman. I quickened my pace, went close up tohim, and said, without the slightest provocation, "It is ten o'clock. "

"No, it's two, " he answered, amazed. 

"No, it's ten, " I persisted; "it is ten o'clock!" and, groaning withanger, I stepped yet a pace or two nearer, clenched my fist, and said, "Listen, do you know what, it's ten o'clock!"

He stood and considered a while, summed up my appearance, stared aghast atme, and at last said, quite gently, "In any case, it's about time ye weregetting home. Would ye like me to go with ye a bit?"

I was completely disarmed by this man's unexpected friendliness. I feltthat tears sprang to my eyes, and I hastened to reply:

"No, thank you! I have only been out a little too late in a café. Thankyou very much all the same!"

He saluted with his hand to his helmet as I turned away. His friendlinesshad overwhelmed me, and I cried weakly, because I had not even a littlecoin to give him. 

I halted, and looked after him as he went slowly on his way. I struck myforehead, and, in measure, as he disappeared from my sight, I cried moreviolently. 

I railed at myself for my poverty, called myself abusive names, inventedfurious designations--rich, rough nuggets--in a vein of abuse with which Ioverwhelmed myself. I kept on at this until I was nearly home. On comingto the door I discovered I had dropped my keys. 

"Oh, of course, " I muttered to myself, "why shouldn't I lose my keys? HereI am, living in a yard where there is a stable underneath and a tinker'sworkshop up above. The door is locked at night, and no one, no one canopen it; therefore, why should I not lose my keys?

"I am as wet as a dog--a little hungry--ah, just ever such a littlehungry, and slightly, ay, absurdly tired about my knees; therefore, whyshould I not lose them?

"Why, for that matter, had not the whole house flitted out to Aker by thetime I came home and wished to enter it?" . . . And I laughed to myself, hardened by hunger and exhaustion. 

I could hear the horses stamp in the stables, and I could see my windowabove, but I could not open the door, and I could not get in. 

It had begun to rain again, and I felt the water soak through to myshoulders. At the Town Hall I was seized by a bright idea. I would ask thepoliceman to open the door. I applied at once to a constable, andearnestly begged him to accompany me and let me in, if he could. 

Yes, if he could, yes! But he couldn't; he had no key. The police keyswere not there; they were kept in the Detective Department. 

What was I to do then?

Well, I could go to an hotel and get a bed!

But I really couldn't go to an hotel and get a bed; I had not money, I hadbeen out--in a café . . . He knew. . . . 

We stood a while on the Town Hall steps. He considered and examined mypersonal appearance. The rain fell in torrents outside. 

"Well then, you must go to the guard-house and report yourself ashomeless!" said he. 

Homeless? I hadn't thought of that. Yes, by Jove, that was a capital idea;and I thanked the constable on the spot for the suggestion. Could I simplygo in and say I was homeless?

"Just that. ". . . 

 * * * * *

"Your name?" inquired the guard. 

"Tangen--Andreas Tangen!"

I don't know why I lied; my thoughts fluttered about disconnectedly andinspired me with many singular whims, more than I knew what to do with. Ihit upon this out-of-the-way name on the spur of the moment, and blurtedit out without any calculation. I lied without any occasion for doing so. 

"Occupation?"

This was driving me into a corner with a vengeance. Occupation! what wasmy occupation? I thought first of turning myself into a tinker--but Idared not; firstly, I had given myself a name that was not common to everyand any tinker--besides, I wore _pince-nez_. It suddenly entered myhead to be foolhardy. I took a step forward and said firmly, almostsolemnly:

"A journalist. "

The guard gave a start before he wrote it down, whilst I stood asimportant as a homeless Cabinet Minister before the barrier. It roused nosuspicions. The guard understood quite well why I hesitated a littlebefore answering. What did it look like to see a journalist in the nightguard-house without a roof over his head?

"On what paper, Herr Tangen?"

"_Morgenbladet_!" said I. "I have been out a little too late thisevening, more's the shame!"

"Oh, we won't mention that, " he interrupted, with a smile; "when youngpeople are out . . . We understand!"

Turning to a policeman, he said, as he rose and bowed politely to me, "Show this gentleman up to the reserved section. Good-night!"

I felt ice run down my back at my own boldness, and I clenched my hands tosteady myself a bit. If I only hadn't dragged in the _Morgenbladet_. I knew Friele could show his teeth when he liked, and I was reminded ofthat by the grinding of the key turning in the lock. 

"The gas will burn for ten minutes, " remarked the policeman at the door. 

"And then does it go out?"

"Then it goes out!"

I sat on the bed and listened to the turning of the key. The bright cellhad a friendly air; I felt comfortably and well sheltered; and listenedwith pleasure to the rain outside--I couldn't wish myself anything betterthan such a cosy cell. My contentment increased. Sitting on the bed, hatin hand, and with eyes fastened on the gas jet over in the wall, I gavemyself up to thinking over the minutes of my first interview with thepolice. This was the first time, and how hadn't I fooled them?"Journalist!--Tangen! if you please! and then _Morgenbladet_!" Didn'tI appeal straight to his heart with _Morgenbladet_? "We won't mentionthat! Eh? Sat in state in the Stiftsgaarden till two o'clock; forgotdoor-key and a pocket-book with a thousand kroner at home. Show thisgentleman up to the reserved section!". . . 

All at once out goes the gas with a strange suddenness, withoutdiminishing or flickering. 

I sit in the deepest darkness; I cannot see my hand, nor the whitewalls--nothing. There was nothing for it but to go to bed, and Iundressed. 

But I was not tired from want of sleep, and it would not come to me. I laya while gazing into the darkness, this dense mass of gloom that had nobottom--my thoughts could not fathom it. 

It seemed beyond all measure dense to me, and I felt its presence oppressme. I closed my eyes, commenced to sing under my breath, and tossed to andfro, in order to distract myself, but to no purpose. The darkness hadtaken possession of my thoughts and left me not a moment in peace. Supposing I were myself to be absorbed in darkness; made one with it?

I raise myself up in bed and fling out my arms. My nervous condition hasgot the upper hand of me, and nothing availed, no matter how much I triedto work against it. There I sat, a prey to the most singular fantasies, listening to myself crooning lullabies, sweating with the exertion ofstriving to hush myself to rest. I peered into the gloom, and I never inall the days of my life felt such darkness. There was no doubt that Ifound myself here, in face of a peculiar kind of darkness; a desperateelement to which no one had hitherto paid attention. The most ludicrousthoughts busied me, and everything made me afraid. 

A little hole in the wall at the head of my bed occupies me greatly--anail hole. I find the marks in the wall--I feel it, blow into it, and tryto guess its depth. That was no innocent hole--not at all. It was adownright intricate and mysterious hole, which I must guard against!Possessed by the thought of this hole, entirely beside myself withcuriosity and fear, I get out of bed and seize hold of my penknife inorder to gauge its depth, and convince myself that it does not reach rightinto the next wall. 

I lay down once more to try and fall asleep, but in reality to wrestleagain with the darkness. The rain had ceased outside, and I could not heara sound. I continued for a long time to listen for footsteps in thestreet, and got no peace until I heard a pedestrian go by--to judge fromthe sound, a constable. Suddenly I snap my fingers many times and laugh:"That was the very deuce! Ha--ha!" I imagined I had discovered a new word. I rise up in bed and say, "It is not in the language; I have discoveredit. 'Kuboa. ' It has letters as a word has. By the benign God, man, youhave discovered a word!. . . 'Kuboa' . . . A word of profound import. "

I sit with open eyes, amazed at my own find, and laugh for joy. Then Ibegin to whisper; some one might spy on me, and I intended to keep mydiscovery a secret. I entered into the joyous frenzy of hunger. I wasempty and free from pain, and I gave free rein to my thoughts. 

In all calmness I revolve things in my mind. With the most singular jerksin my chain of ideas I seek to explain the meaning of my new word. Therewas no occasion for it to mean either God or the Tivoli; [Footnote:Theatre of Varieties, etc. , and Garden in Christiania. ] and who said thatit was to signify cattle show? I clench my hands fiercely, and repeat onceagain, "Who said that it was to signify cattle show?" No; on secondthoughts, it was not absolutely necessary that it should mean padlock, orsunrise. It was not difficult to find a meaning for such a word as this. Iwould wait and see. In the meantime I could sleep on it. 

I lie there on the stretcher-bed and laugh slily, but say nothing; givevent to no opinion one way or the other. Some minutes pass over, and I waxnervous; this new word torments me unceasingly, returns again and again, takes up my thoughts, and makes me serious. I had fully formed an opinionas to what it should not signify, but had come to no conclusion as to whatit should signify. "That is quite a matter of detail, " I said aloud tomyself, and I clutched my arm and reiterated: "That is quite a matter ofdetail. " The word was found, God be praised! and that was the principalthing. But ideas worry me without end and hinder me from falling asleep. Nothing seemed good enough to me for this unusually rare word. At length Isit up in bed again, grasp my head in both hands, and say, "No! it is justthis, it is impossible to let it signify emigration or tobacco factory. Ifit could have meant anything like that I would have decided upon it longsince and taken the consequences. " No; in reality the word is fitted tosignify something psychical, a feeling, a state. Could I not apprehend it?and I reflect profoundly in order to find something psychical. Then itseems to me that some one is interposing, interrupting my confab. I answerangrily, "Beg pardon! Your match in idiocy is not to be found; no, sir!Knitting cotton? Ah! go to hell!" Well, really I had to laugh. Might I askwhy should I be forced to let it signify knitting cotton, when I had aspecial dislike to its signifying knitting cotton? I had discovered theword myself, so, for that matter, I was perfectly within my right inletting it signify whatsoever I pleased. As far as I was aware, I had notyet expressed an opinion as to. . . . 

But my brain got more and more confused. At last I sprang out of bed tolook for the water-tap. I was not thirsty, but my head was in a fever, andI felt an instinctive longing for water. When I had drunk some I got intobed again, and determined with all my might to settle to sleep. I closedmy eyes and forced myself to keep quiet. I lay thus for some minuteswithout making a movement, sweated and felt my blood jerk violentlythrough my veins. No, it was really too delicious the way he thought tofind money in the paper cornet! He only coughed once, too! I wonder if heis pacing up and down there yet! Sitting on my bench? the pearly bluesea . . . The ships. . . . 

I opened my eyes; how could I keep them shut when I could not sleep? Thesame darkness brooded over me; the same unfathomable black eternity whichmy thoughts strove against and could not understand. I made the mostdespairing efforts to find a word black enough to characterize thisdarkness; a word so horribly black that it would darken my lips if I namedit. Lord! how dark it was! and I am carried back in thought to the sea andthe dark monsters that lay in wait for me. They would draw me to them, andclutch me tightly and bear me away by land and sea, through dark realmsthat no soul has seen. I feel myself on board, drawn through waters, hovering in clouds, sinking--sinking. 

I give a hoarse cry of terror, clutch the bed tightly--I had made such aperilous journey, whizzing down through space like a bolt. Oh, did I notfeel that I was saved as I struck my hands against the wooden frame! "Thisis the way one dies!" said I to myself. "Now you will die!" and I lay fora while and thought over that I was to die. 

Then I start up in bed and ask severely, "If I found the word, am I notabsolutely within my right to decide myself what it is to signify?". . . Icould hear myself that I was raving. I could hear it now whilst I wastalking. My madness was a delirium of weakness and prostration, but I wasnot out of my senses. All at once the thought darted through my brain thatI was insane. Seized with terror, I spring out of bed again, I stagger tothe door, which I try to open, fling myself against it a couple of timesto burst it, strike my head against the wall, bewail loudly, bite myfingers, cry and curse. . . . 

All was quiet; only my own voice echoed from the walls. I had fallen tothe floor, incapable of stumbling about the cell any longer. 

Lying there I catch a glimpse, high up, straight before my eyes, of agreyish square in the wall, a suggestion of white, a presage--it must beof daylight. I felt it must be daylight, felt it through every pore in mybody. Oh, did I not draw a breath of delighted relief! I flung myself flaton the floor and cried for very joy over this blessed glimpse of light, sobbed for very gratitude, blew a kiss to the window, and conducted myselflike a maniac. And at this moment I was perfectly conscious of what I wasdoing. All my dejection had vanished; all despair and pain had ceased, andI had at this moment, at least as far as my thought reached, not a wishunfilled. I sat up on the floor, folded my hands, and waited patiently forthe dawn. 

What a night this had been!

That they had not heard any noise! I thought with astonishment. But then Iwas in the reserved section, high above all the prisoners. A homelessCabinet Minister, if I might say so. 

Still in the best of humours, with eyes turned towards the lighter, everlighter square in the wall, I amused myself acting Cabinet Minister;called myself Von Tangen, and clothed my speech in a dress of red-tape. Myfancies had not ceased, but I was far less nervous. If I only had not beenthoughtless enough to leave my pocket-book at home! Might I not have thehonour of assisting his Right Honourable the Prime Minister to bed? And inall seriousness, and with much ceremony I went over to the stretcher andlay down. 

By this it was so light that I could distinguish in some degree theoutlines of the cell and, little by little, the heavy handle of the door. This diverted me; the monotonous darkness so irritating in itsimpenetrability that it prevented me from seeing myself was broken; myblood flowed more quietly; I soon felt my eyes close. 

I was aroused by a couple of knocks on my door. I jumped up in all haste, and clad myself hurriedly; my clothes were still wet through from lastnight. 

"You'll report yourself downstairs to the officer on duty, " said theconstable. 

Were there more formalities to be gone through, then? I thought with fear. 

Below I entered a large room, where thirty or forty people sat, allhomeless. They were called up one by one by the registering clerk, and oneby one they received a ticket for breakfast. The officer on duty repeatedconstantly to the policeman at his side, "Did he get a ticket? Don'tforget to give them tickets; they look as if they wanted a meal!"

And I stood and looked at these tickets, and wished I had one. 

"Andreas Tangen--journalist. "

I advanced and bowed. 

"But, my dear fellow, how did you come here?"

I explained the whole state of the case, repeated the same story as lastnight, lied without winking, lied with frankness--had been out ratherlate, worse luck . . . Café . . . Lost door-key. . . . 

"Yes, " he said, and he smiled; "that's the way! Did you sleep well then?"

I answered, "Like a Cabinet Minister--like a Cabinet Minister!"

"I am glad to hear it, " he said, and he stood up. "Good-morning. "

And I went!

A ticket! a ticket for me too! I have not eaten for more than three longdays and nights. A loaf! But no one offered me a ticket, and I dared notdemand one. It would have roused suspicion at once. They would begin topoke their noses into my private affairs, and discover who I really was;they might arrest me for false pretences; and so, with elevated head, thecarriage of a millionaire, and hands thrust under my coat-tails, I strideout of the guard-house. 

The sun shone warmly, early as it was. It was ten o'clock, and the trafficin Young's Market was in full swing. Which way should I take? I slapped mypockets and felt for my manuscript. At eleven I would try and see theeditor. I stand a while on the balustrade, and watch the bustle under me. Meanwhile, my clothes commenced to steam. Hunger put in its appearanceafresh, gnawed at my breast, clutched me, and gave small, sharp stabs thatcaused me pain. 

Had I not a friend--an acquaintance whom I could apply to? I ransack mymemory to find a man good for a penny piece, and fail to find him. 

Well, it was a lovely day, anyway! Sunlight bright and warm surrounded me. The sky stretched away like a beautiful sea over the Lier mountains. 

Without knowing it, I was on my way home. I hungered sorely. I found achip of wood in the street to chew--that helped a bit. To think that Ihadn't thought of that sooner! The door was open; the stable-boy bade megood-morning as usual. 

"Fine weather, " said he. 

"Yes, " I replied. That was all I found to say. Could I ask for the loan ofa shilling? He would be sure to lend it willingly if he could; besidesthat, I had written a letter for him once. 

He stood and turned something over in his mind before he ventured onsaying it. 

"Fine weather! Ahem! I ought to pay my landlady today; you wouldn't be sokind as to lend me five shillings, would you? Only for a few days, sir. You did me a service once before, so you did. "

"No; I really can't do it, Jens Olaj, " I answered. "Not now--perhaps lateron, maybe in the afternoon, " and I staggered up the stairs to my room. 

I flung myself on my bed, and laughed. How confoundedly lucky it was thathe had forestalled me; my self-respect was saved. Five shillings! Godbless you, man, you might just as well have asked me for five shares inthe Dampkökken, or an estate out in Aker. 

And the thought of these five shillings made melaugh louder and louder. Wasn't I a devil of afellow, eh? Five shillings! My mirth increased, and I gave way to it. Ugh! what a shocking smellof cooking there was here--a downright disgustinglystrong smell of chops for dinner, phew! andI flung open the window to let out this beastly smell. "Waiter, a plate of beef!" Turning to the table--this miserable table that I was forced to supportwith my knees when I wrote--I bowed profoundly, and said:

"May I ask will you take a glass of wine? No? I am Tangen--Tangen, theCabinet Minister. I--more's the pity--I was out a little late . . . Thedoor-key. " Once more my thoughts ran without rein in intricate paths. Iwas continually conscious that I talked at random, and yet I gaveutterance to no word without hearing and understanding it. I said tomyself, "Now you are talking at random again, " and yet I could not helpmyself. It was as if one were lying awake, and yet talking in one's sleep. 

My head was light, without pain and without pressure, and my mood wasunshadowed. It sailed away with me, and I made no effort. 

"Come in! Yes, only come right in! As you see everything is ofruby--Ylajali, Ylajali! that swelling crimson silken divan! Ah, howpassionately she breathes. Kiss me--loved one--more--more! Your arms arelike pale amber, your mouth blushes. . . . Waiter I asked for a plate ofbeef!"

The sun gleamed in through the window, and I could hear the horses belowchewing oats. I sat and mumbled over my chip gaily, glad at heart as achild. 

I kept all the time feeling for my manuscript. It wasn't really in mythoughts, but instinct told me it was there--'twas in my blood to rememberit, and I took it out. 

It had got wet, and I spread it out in the sun to dry; then I took towandering up and down the room. How depressing everything looked! Smallscraps of tin shavings were trodden into the floor; there was not a chairto sit upon, not even a nail in the bare walls. Everything had beenbrought to my "Uncle's, " and consumed. A few sheets of paper lying on thetable, covered with thick dust, were my sole possession; the old greenblanket on the bed was lent to me by Hans Pauli some months ago. . . . HansPauli! I snap my fingers. Hans Pauli Pettersen shall help me! He wouldcertainly be very angry that I had not appealed to him at once. I put onmy hat in haste, gather up the manuscript, thrust it into my pocket, andhurry downstairs. 

"Listen, Jens Olaj!" I called into the stable, "I am nearly certain I canhelp you in the afternoon. "

Arrived at the Town Hall I saw that it was past eleven, and I determinedon going to the editor at once. I stopped outside the office door to seeif my sheets were paged rightly, smoothed them carefully out, put themback in my pocket, and knocked. My heart beat audibly as I entered. 

"Scissors" is there as usual. I inquire timorously for the editor. Noanswer. The man sits and probes for minor items of news amongst theprovincial papers. 

I repeat my question, and advance a little farther. 

"The editor has not come yet!" said "Scissors" at length, without lookingup. 

How soon would he come?

"Couldn't say--couldn't say at all!"

How long would the office be open?

To this I received no answer, so I was forced to leave. "Scissors" had notonce looked up at me during all this scene; he had heard my voice, andrecognized me by it. You are in such bad odour here, thought I, that hedoesn't even take the trouble to answer you. I wonder if that is an orderof the editor's. I had, 'tis true enough, right from the day my celebratedstory was accepted for ten shillings, overwhelmed him with work, rushed tohis door nearly every day with unsuitable things that he was obliged toperuse only to return them to me. Perhaps he wished to put an end tothis--take stringent measures. . . . I took the road to Homandsbyen. 

Hans Paul! Pettersen was a peasant-farmer's son, a student, living in theattic of a five-storeyed house; therefore, Hans Pauli Pettersen was a poorman. But if he had a shilling he wouldn't stint it. I would get it just assure as if I already held it in my hand. And I rejoiced the whole time, asI went, over the shilling, and felt confident I would get it. 

When I got to the street door it was closed and I had to ring. 

"I want to see Student Pettersen, " I said, and was about to step inside. "I know his room. "

"Student Pettersen, " repeats the girl. "Was it he who had the attic?" Hehad moved. 

Well, she didn't know the address; but he had asked his letters to be sentto Hermansen in Tolbod-gaden, and she mentioned the number. 

I go, full of trust and hope, all the way to Tolbod-gaden to ask HansPauli's address; being my last chance, I must turn it to account. On theway I came to a newly-built house, where a couple of joiners stood planingoutside. I picked up a few satiny shavings from the heap, stuck one in mymouth, and the other in my pocket for by-and-by, and continued my journey. 

I groaned with hunger. I had seen a marvellously large penny loaf at abaker's--the largest I could possibly get for the price. 

"I come to find out Student Pettersen's address!"

"Bernt Akers Street, No. 10, in the attic. " Was I going out there? Well, would I perhaps be kind enough to take out a couple of letters that hadcome for him?

I trudge up town again, along the same road, pass by the joiners--who aresitting with their cans between their knees, eating their good warm dinnerfrom the Dampkökken--pass the bakers, where the loaf is still in itsplace, and at length reach Bernt Akers Street, half dead with fatigue. Thedoor is open, and I mount all the weary stairs to the attic. I take theletters out of my pocket in order to put Hans Pauli into a good humour onthe moment of my entrance. 

He would be certain not to refuse to give me a helping hand when Iexplained how things were with me; no, certainly not; Hans Pauli had sucha big heart--I had always said that of him. . . . I discovered his cardfastened to the door--"H. P. Pettersen, Theological Student, 'gone home. '"

I sat down without more ado--sat down on the bare floor, dulled withfatigue, fairly beaten with exhaustion. I mechanically mutter, a couple oftimes, "Gone home--gone home!" then I keep perfectly quiet. There was nota tear in my eyes; I had not a thought, not a feeling of any kind. I satand stared, with wide-open eyes, at the letters, without coming to anyconclusion. Ten minutes went over--perhaps twenty or more. I sat stolidlyon the one spot, and did not move a finger. This numb feeling ofdrowsiness was almost like a brief slumber. I hear some one come up thestairs. 

"It was Student Pettersen, I . . . I have two letters for him. "

"He has gone home, " replies the woman; "but he will return after theholidays. I could take the letters if you like!"

"Yes, thanks! that was all right, " said I. "He could get them then when hecame back; they might contain matters of importance. Good-morning. "

When I got outside, I came to a standstill and said loudly in the openstreet, as I clenched my hands: "I will tell you one thing, my good LordGod, you are a bungler!" and I nod furiously, with set teeth, up to theclouds; "I will be hanged if you are not a bungler. "

Then I took a few strides, and stopped again. Suddenly, changing myattitude, I fold my hands, hold my head to one side, and ask, with anunctuous, sanctimonious tone of voice: "Hast thou appealed also to him, mychild?" It did not sound right!

With a large H, I say, with an H as big as a cathedral! once again, "Hastthou invoked Him, my child?" and I incline my head, and I make my voicewhine, and answer, No!

That didn't sound right either. 

You can't play the hypocrite, you idiot! Yes, you should say, I haveinvoked God my Father! and you must set your words to the most piteoustune you have ever heard in your life. So--o! Once again! Come, that wasbetter! But you must sigh like a horse down with the colic. So--o! that'sright. Thus I go, drilling myself in hypocrisy; stamp impatiently in thestreet when I fail to succeed; rail at myself for being such a blockhead, whilst the astonished passers-by turn round and stare at me. 

I chewed uninterruptedly at my shaving, and proceeded, as steadily as Icould, along the street. Before I realized it, I was at the railwaysquare. The dock on Our Saviour's pointed to half-past one. I stood for abit and considered. A faint sweat forced itself out on my face, andtrickled down my eyelids. Accompany me down to the bridge, said I tomyself--that is to say, if you have spare time!--and I made a bow tomyself, and turned towards the railway bridge near the wharf. 

The ships lay there, and the sea rocked in the sunshine. There was bustleand movement everywhere, shrieking steam-whistles, quay porters with caseson their shoulders, lively "shanties" coming from the prams. An old woman, a vendor of cakes, sits near me, and bends her brown nose down over herwares. The little table before her is sinfully full of nice things, and Iturn away with distaste. She is filling the whole quay with her smell ofcakes--phew! up with the windows!

I accosted a gentleman sitting at my side, and represented forcibly to himthe nuisance of having cake-sellers here, cake-sellers there. . . . Eh? Yes;but he must really admit that. . . . But the good man smelt a rat, and didnot give me time to finish speaking, for he got up and left. I rose, too, and followed him, firmly determined to convince him of his mistake. 

"If it was only out of consideration for sanitary conditions, " said I; andI slapped him on the shoulders. 

"Excuse me, I am a stranger here, and know nothing of the sanitaryconditions, " he replied, and stared at me with positive fear. 

Oh, that alters the case! if he was a stranger. . . . Could I not render hima service in any way? show him about? Really not? because it would be apleasure to me, and it would cost him nothing. . . . 

But the man wanted absolutely to get rid of me, and he sheered off, in allhaste, to the other side of the street. 

I returned to the bench and sat down. I was fearfully disturbed, and thebig street organ that had begun to grind a tune a little farther away mademe still worse--a regular metallic music, a fragment of Weber, to which alittle girl is singing a mournful strain. The flute-like sorrowfulness ofthe organ thrills through my blood; my nerves vibrate in responsive echo. A moment later, and I fall back on the seat, whimpering and crooning intime to it. 

Oh, what strange freaks one's thoughts are guilty of when one is starving. I feel myself lifted up by these notes, dissolved in tones, and I floatout, I feel so clearly. How I float out, soaring high above the mountains, dancing through zones of light!. . . 

"A halfpenny, " whines the little organ-girl, reaching forth her little tinplate; "only a halfpenny. "

"Yes, " I said, unthinkingly, and I sprang to my feet and ransacked all mypockets. But the child thinks I only want to make fun of her, and she goesaway at once without saying a word. 

This dumb forbearance was too much for me. If she had abused me, it wouldhave been more endurable. I was stung with pain, and recalled her. 

"I don't possess a farthing; but I will remember you later on, maybetomorrow. What is your name? Yes, that is a pretty name; I won't forgetit. Till tomorrow, then. . . . "

But I understood quite well that she did not believe me, although shenever said one word; and I cried with despair because this little streetwench would not believe in me. 

Once again I called her back, tore open my coat, and was about to give hermy waistcoat. "I will make up to you for it, " said I; "wait only amoment" . . . And lo! I had no waistcoat. 

What in the world made me look for it? Weeks had gone by since it was inmy possession. What was the matter with me, anyway? The astonished childwaited no longer, but withdrew fearsomely, and I was compelled to let hergo. People throng round me, laugh aloud; a policeman thrusts his waythrough to me, and wants to know what is the row. 

"Nothing!" I reply, "nothing at all; I only wanted to give the little girlover there my waistcoat . . . For her father . . . You needn't stand there andlaugh at that . . . I have only to go home and put on another. "

"No disturbance in the street, " says the constable; "so, march, " and hegives me a shove on. 

"Is them your papers?" he calls after me. 

"Yes, by Jove! my newspaper leader; many important papers! However could Ibe so careless?" I snatch up my manuscript, convince myself that it islying in order and go, without stopping a second or looking about me, towards the editor's office. 

It was now four by the clock of Our Saviour's Church. The office is shut. I stead noiselessly down the stairs, frightened as a thief, and standirresolutely outside the door. What should I do now? I lean up against thewall, stare down at the stones, and consider. A pin is lying glistening atmy feet; I stoop and pick it up. Supposing I were to cut the buttons offmy coat, how much could I get for them? Perhaps it would be no use, thoughbuttons are buttons; but yet, I look and examine them, and find them asgood as new--that was a lucky idea all the same; I could cut them offwith my penknife and take them to the pawn-office. The hope of being ableto sell these five buttons cheered me immediately, and I cried, "See, see;it will all come right!" My delight got the upper hand of me, and I atonce set to cut off the buttons one by one. Whilst thus occupied, Iheld the following hushed soliloquy:

Yes, you see one has become a little impoverished; a momentaryembarrassment . . . Worn out, do you say? You must not make slips when youspeak? I would like to see the person who wears out less buttons than Ido, I can tell you! I always go with my coat open; it is a habit of mine, an idiosyncrasy. . . . No, no; of course, if you _won't_, well! But Imust have a penny for them, at least. . . . No indeed! who said you wereobliged to do it? You can hold your tongue, and leave me in peace. . . . Yes, well, you can fetch a policeman, can't you? I'll wait here whilst you areout looking for him, and I won't steal anything from you. Well, good-day!Good-day! My name, by the way, is Tangen; have been out a little late. 

Some one comes up the stairs. I am recalled at once to reality. Irecognize "Scissors, " and put the buttons carefully into my pocket. Heattempts to pass; doesn't even acknowledge my nod; is suddenly intentlybusied with his nails. I stop him, and inquire for the editor. 

"Not in, do you hear. "

"You lie, " I said, and, with a cheek that fairly amazed myself, Icontinued, "I must have a word with him; it is a necessaryerrand--communications from the Stiftsgaarden. [Footnote: Dwelling of thecivil governor of a Stift or diocese. ]

"Well, can't you tell me what it is, then?"

"Tell you?" and I looked "Scissors" up and down. This had the desiredeffect. He accompanied me at once, and opened the door. My heart was in mymouth now; I set my teeth, to try and revive my courage, knocked, andentered the editor's private office. 

"Good-day! Is it you?" he asked kindly; "sit down. "

If he had shown me the door it would have been almost as acceptable. Ifelt as if I were on the point of crying and said:

"I beg you will excuse. . . . "

"Pray, sit down, " he repeated. And I sat down, and explained that I againhad an article which I was extremely anxious to get into his paper. I hadtaken such pains with it; it had cost me much effort. 

"I will read it, " said he, and he took it. "Everything you write iscertain to cost you effort, but you are far too impetuous; if you couldonly be a little more sober. There's too much fever. In the meantime, Iwill read it, " and he turned to the table again. 

There I sat. Dared I ask for a shilling? explain to him why there wasalways fever? He would be sure to aid me; it was not the first time. 

I stood up. Hum! But the last time I was with him he had complained aboutmoney, and had sent a messenger out to scrape some together for me. Maybeit might be the same case now. No; it should not occur! Could I not seethen that he was sitting at work?

Was there otherwise anything? he inquired. 

"No, " I answered, and I compelled my voice to sound steady. "About howsoon shall I call in again?"

"Oh, any time you are passing--in a couple of days or so. "

I could not get my request over my lips. This man's friendliness seemed tome beyond bounds, and I ought to know how to appreciate it. Rather die ofhunger! I went. Not even when I was outside the door, and felt once morethe pangs of hunger, did I repent having left the office without havingasked for that shilling. I took the other shaving out of my pocket andstuck it into my mouth. It helped. Why hadn't I done so before? "You oughtto be ashamed of yourself, " I said aloud. "Could it really have enteredyour head to ask the man for a shilling and put him to inconvenienceagain?" and I got downright angry with myself for the effrontery of whichI had almost been guilty. "That is, by God! the shabbiest thing I everheard, " said I, "to rush at a man and nearly tear the eyes out of his headjust because you happen to need a shilling, you miserable dog! So--o, march! quicker! quicker! you big thumping lout; I'll teach you. " Icommenced to run to punish myself, left one street after the other behindme at a bound, goaded myself on with suppressed cries, and shrieked dumblyand furiously at myself whenever I was about to halt. Thus I arrived along way up Pyle Street, when at last I stood still, almost ready to crywith vexation at not being able to run any farther. I was trembling overmy whole body, and I flung myself down on a step. "No; stop!" I said, and, in order to torture myself rightly, I arose again, and forced myself tokeep standing. I jeered at myself and hugged myself with pleasure at thespectacle of my own exhaustion. At length, after the lapse of a fewmoments, I gave myself, with a nod, permission to be seated, though, eventhen, I chose the most uncomfortable place on the steps. 

Lord! how delicious it was to rest! I dried the sweat off my face, anddrew great refreshing breaths. How had I not run! But I was not sorry; Ihad richly deserved it. Why did I want to ask for that shilling? Now Icould see the consequences, and I began to talk mildly to myself, dealingout admonitions as a mother might have done. I grew more and more moved, and tired and weak as I was, I fell a-crying. A quiet, heart-felt cry; aninner sobbing without a tear. 

I sat for the space of a quarter of an hour, or more, in the same place. People came and went, and no one molested me. Little children played aboutaround me, and a little bird sang on a tree on the other side of thestreet. 

A policeman came towards me. "Why do you sit here?" said he. 

"Why do I sit here?" I replied; "for pleasure. "

"I have been watching you for the last half-hour. You've sat here nowhalf-an-hour. "

"About that, " I replied; "anything more?"

I got up in a temper and walked on. Arrived at the market-place, I stoppedand gazed down the street. For pleasure. Now, was that an answer to give?For weariness, you should have replied, and made your voice whining. Youare a booby; you will never learn to dissemble. From exhaustion, and youshould have gasped like a horse. 

When I got to the fire look-out, I halted afresh, seized by a new idea. Isnapped my fingers, burst into a loud laugh that confounded thepassers-by, and said: "Now you shall just go to Levion the parson. Youshall, as sure as death--ay, just for a try. What have you got to lose byit? and it is such glorious weather!"

I entered Pascha's book-shop, found Pastor Levion's address in thedirectory, and started for it. 

Now for it! said I. Play no pranks. Conscience, did you say? No rubbish, if you please. You are too poor to support a conscience. You are hungry;you have come on important business--the first thing needful. But youshall hold your head askew, and set your words to a sing-song. You won't!What? Well then, I won't go a step farther. Do you hear that? Indeed, youare in a sorely tempted condition, fighting with the powers of darknessand great voiceless monsters at night, so that it is a horror to think of;you hunger and thirst for wine and milk, and don't get them. It has goneso far with you. Here you stand and haven't as much as a halfpenny tobless yourself with. But you believe in grace, the Lord be praised; youhaven't yet lost your faith; and then you must clasp your hands together, and look a very Satan of a fellow for believing in grace. As far as Mammonwas concerned, why, you hated Mammon with all its pomps in any form. Nowit's quite another thing with a psalm-book--a souvenir to the extent of afew shillings. . . . I stopped at the pastor's door, and read, "Office hours, 12 to 4. "

Mind, no fudge, I said; now we'll go ahead in earnest! So hang your head alittle more, and I rang at the private entrance. 

"I want to see the pastor, " said I to the maid; but it was not possiblefor me to get in God's name yet awhile. 

"He has gone out. "

Gone out, gone out! That destroyed my whole plan; scattered all I intendedto say to the four winds. What had I gained then by the long walk? There Istood. 

"Was it anything particular?" questioned the maid. 

"Not at all, " I replied, "not at all. " It was only just that it was suchglorious God's weather that I thought I would come out and make a call. 

There I stood, and there she stood. I purposely thrust out my chest toattract her attention to the pin that held my coat together. I imploredher with a look to see what I had come for, but the poor creature didn'tunderstand it at all. 

Lovely God's weather. Was not the mistress at home either?

Yes; but she had gout, and lay on a sofa without being able to moveherself. . . . Perhaps I would leave a message or something?

No, not at all; I only just took walks like this now and again, just forexercise; it was so wholesome after dinner. . . . I set out on the roadback--what would gossiping longer lead to? Besides, I commenced to feeldizzy. There was no mistake about it; I was about to break down inearnest. Office hours from 12 to 4. I had knocked at the door an hour toolate. The time of grace was over. I sat down on one of the benches nearthe church in the market. Lord! how black things began to look for me now!I did not cry; I was too utterly tired, worn to the last degree. I satthere without trying to arrive at any conclusion, sad, motionless, andstarving. My chest was much inflamed; it smarted most strangely andsorely--nor would chewing shavings help me much longer. My jaws were tiredof that barren work, and I let them rest. I simply gave up. A brownorange-peel, too, I had found in the street, and which I had at oncecommenced to chew, had given me nausea. I was ill--the veins swelled upbluely on my wrists. What was it I had really sought after? Run about thewhole live-long day for a shilling, that would but keep life in me for afew hours longer. Considering all, was it not a matter of indifference ifthe inevitable took place one day earlier or one day later? If I hadconducted myself like an ordinary being I should have gone home long ago, and laid myself down to rest, and given in. My mind was clear for amoment. Now I was to die. It was in the time of the fall, and all thingswere hushed to sleep. I had tried every means, exhausted every resource ofwhich I knew. I fondled this thought sentimentally, and each time I stillhoped for a possible succour I whispered repudiatingly: "You fool, youhave already begun to die. "

I ought to write a couple of letters, make all ready--prepare myself. Iwould wash myself carefully and tidy my bed nicely. I would lay my headupon the sheets of white paper, the cleanest things I had left, and thegreen blanket. I . . . The green blanket! Like a shot I was wide awake. Theblood mounted to my head, and I got violent palpitation of the heart. Iarise from the seat, and start to walk. Life stirs again in all my fibres, and time after time I repeat disconnectedly, "The green blanket--the greenblanket. " I go faster and faster, as if it is a case of fetchingsomething, and stand after a little time in my tinker's workshop. Withoutpausing a moment, or wavering in my resolution, I go over to the bed, androll up Hans Pauli's blanket. It was a strange thing if this bright ideaof mine couldn't save me. I rose infinitely superior to the stupidscruples which sprang up in me--half inward cries about a certain stain onmy honour. I bade good-bye to the whole of them. I was no hero--novirtuous idiot. I had my senses left. 

So I took the blanket under my arm and went to No. 5 Stener's Street. Iknocked, and entered the big, strange room for the first time. The bell onthe door above my head gave a lot of violent jerks. A man enters from aside room, chewing, his mouth is full of food, and stands behind thecounter. 

"Eh, lend me sixpence on my eye-glasses?" said I. "I shall release them ina couple of days, without fail--eh?"

"No! they're steel, aren't they?"

"Yes. "

"No; can't do it. "

"Ah, no, I suppose you can't. Well, it was really at best only a joke. Well, I have a blanket with me for which, properly speaking, I have nolonger any use, and it struck me that you might take it off my hands. "

"I have--more's the pity--a whole store full of bed-clothes, " he replied;and when I had opened it he just cast one glance over it and said, "No, excuse me, but I haven't any use for that either. "

"I wanted to show you the worse side first, " said I; "it's much better onthe other side. "

"Ay, ay; it's no good. I won't own it; and you wouldn't raise a penny onit anywhere. "

"No, it's clear it isn't worth anything, " I said; "but I thought it mightgo with another old blanket at an auction. "

"Well, no; it's no use. "

"Three pence?" said I. 

"No; I won't have it at all, man! I wouldn't have it in the house!" I tookit under my arm and went home. 

I acted as if nothing had passed, spread it over the bed again, smoothedit well out, as was my custom, and tried to wipe away every trace of mylate action. I could not possibly have been in my right mind at the momentwhen I came to the conclusion to commit this rascally trick. The more Ithought over it the more unreasonable it seemed to me. It must have beenan attack of weakness; some relaxation in my inner self that had surprisedme when off my guard. Neither had I fallen straight into the trap. I hadhalf felt that I was going the wrong road, and I expressly offered myglasses first, and I rejoiced greatly that I had not had the opportunityof carrying into effect this fault which would have sullied the last hoursI had to live. 

I wandered out into the city again. I let myself sink upon one of theseats by Our Saviour's Church; dozed with my head on my breast, apatheticafter my last excitement, sick and famished with hunger. And time went by. 

I should have to sit out this hour, too. It was a little lighter outsidethan in the house, and it seemed to me that my chest did not pain quite sobadly out in the open air. I should get home, too, soon enough--and Idozed, and thought, and suffered fearfully. 

I had found a little pebble; I wiped it clean on my coat sleeve and put itinto my mouth so that I might have something to mumble. Otherwise I didnot stir, and didn't even wink an eyelid. People came and went; the noiseof cars, the tramp of hoofs, and chatter of tongues filled the air. Imight try with the buttons. Of course there would be no use in trying; andbesides, I was now in a rather bad way; but when I came to consider thematter closely, I would be obliged, as it were, to pass in the directionof my "Uncle's" as I went home. At last I got up, dragging myself slowlyto my feet, and reeled down the streets. It began to burn over myeyebrows--fever was setting in, and I hurried as fast as I could. Oncemore I passed the baker's shop where the little loaf lay. "Well, we muststop here!" I said, with affected decision. But supposing I were to go inand beg for a bit of bread? Surely that was a fleeting thought, a flash;it could never really have occurred to me seriously. "Fie!" I whispered tomyself, and shook my head, and held on my way. In Rebslager a pair oflovers stood in a doorway and talked together softly; a little farther upa girl popped her head out of a window. I walked so slowly andthoughtfully, that I looked as if I might be deep in meditation on nothingin particular, and the wench came out into the street. "How is the worldtreating you, old fellow? Eh, what, are you ill? Nay, the Lord preserveus, what a face!" and she drew away frightened. I pulled up at once:What's amiss with my face? Had I really begun to die? I felt over mycheeks with my hand; thin--naturally, I was thin--my cheeks were like twohollowed bowls; but Lord . . . I reeled along again, but again came to astandstill; I must be quite inconceivably thin. Who knows but that my eyeswere sinking right into my head? How did I look in reality? It was thevery deuce that one must let oneself turn into a living deformity forsheer hunger's sake. Once more I was seized by fury, a last flaring up, afinal spasm. "Preserve me, what a face. Eh?" Here I was, with a head thatcouldn't be matched in the whole country, with a pair of fists that, bythe Lord, could grind a navvy into finest dust, and yet I went andhungered myself into a deformity, right in the town of Christiania. Wasthere any rhyme or reason in that? I had sat in saddle, toiled day andnight like a carrier's horse. 

I had read my eyes out of their sockets, had starved the brains out of myhead, and what the devil had I gained by it? Even a street hussy prayedGod to deliver her from the sight of me. Well, now, there should be a stopto it. Do you understand that? Stop it shall, or the devil take a worsehold of me. 

With steadily increasing fury, grinding my teeth under the consciousnessof my impotence, with tears and oaths I raged on, without looking at thepeople who passed me by. I commenced once more to martyr myself, ran myforehead against lamp-posts on purpose, dug my nails deep into my palms, bit my tongue with frenzy when it didn't articulate clearly, and laughedinsanely each time it hurt much. 

Yes; but what shall I do? I asked myself at last, and I stamped many timeson the pavement and repeated, What shall I do? A gentleman just going byremarks, with a smile, "You ought to go and ask to be locked up. " I lookedafter him. One of our well-known lady's doctors, nicknamed "The Duke. " Noteven he understood my real condition--a man I knew; whose hand I hadshaken. I grew quiet. Locked up? Yes, I was mad; he was right. I feltmadness in my blood; felt its darting pain through my brain. So that wasto be the end of me! Yes, yes; and I resume my wearisome, painful walk. There was the haven in which I was to find rest. 

Suddenly I stop again. But not locked up! I say, not that; and I grewalmost hoarse with fear. I implored grace for myself; begged to the windand weather not to be locked up. I should have to be brought to theguard-house again, imprisoned in a dark cell which had not a spark oflight in it. Not that! There must be other channels yet open that I hadnot tried, and I would try them. I would be so earnestly painstaking;would take good time for it, and go indefatigably round from house tohouse. For example, there was Cisler the music-seller; I hadn't been tohim at all. Some remedy would turn up!. . . . Thus I stumbled on, and talkeduntil I brought myself to weep with emotion. Cisler! Was that perchance ahint from on high? His name had struck me for no reason, and he lived sofar away; but I would look him up all the same, go slowly, and restbetween times. I knew the place well; I had been there often, when timeswere good had bought much music from him. Should I ask him for sixpence?Perhaps that might make him feel uncomfortable. I would ask him for ashilling. I went into the shop, and asked for the chief. They showed meinto his office; there he sat--handsome, well-dressed in the lateststyle--running down some accounts. I stammered through an excuse, and setforth my errand. Compelled by need to apply to him . . . It should not bevery long till I could pay it back . . . When I got paid for my newspaperarticle. . . . He would confer such a great benefit on me. . . . Even as I wasspeaking he turned about to his desk, and resumed his work. When I hadfinished, he glanced sideways at me, shook his handsome head, and said, "No"; simply "no"--no explanation--not another word. 

My knees trembled fearfully, and I supported myself against the littlepolished barrier. I must try once more. Why should just his name haveoccurred to me as I stood far away from there in "It won't be I that willdo that, " he observed; adding, "and let me tell you, at the same time, I've had about enough of this. "

I tore myself out, sick with hunger, and boiling with shame. I had turnedmyself into a dog for the sake of a miserable bone, and I had not got it. Nay, now there must be an end of this! It had really gone all too far withme. I had held myself up for many years, stood erect through so many hardhours, and now, all at once, I had sunk to the lowest form of begging. This one day had coarsened my whole mind, bespattered my soul withshamelessness. I had not been too abashed to stand and whine in thepettiest huckster's shop, and what had it availed me?

But was I not then without the veriest atom of bread to put inside mymouth? I had succeeded in rendering myself a thing loathsome to myself. Yes, yes; but it must come to an end. Presently they would lock the outerdoor at home? I must hurry unless I wished to lie in the guard-houseagain. 

This gave me strength. Lie in that cell again I would not. With body bentforward, and my hands pressed hard against my left ribs to deaden thestings a little, I struggled on, keeping my eyes fastened upon thepaving-stones that I might not be forced to bow to possible acquaintances, and hastened to the fire look-out. God be praised! it was only seveno'clock by the dial on Our Saviour's; I had three hours yet before thedoor would be locked. What a fright I had been in!

Well, there was not a stone left unturned. I had done all I could. Tothink that I really could not succeed once in a whole day! If I told it noone could believe it; if I were to write it down they would say I hadinvented it. Not in a single place! Well, well, there is no help for it. Before all, don't go and get pathetic again. Bah! how disgusting! I canassure you, it makes me have a loathing for you. If all hope is over, whythere is an end of it. Couldn't I, for that matter, steal a handful ofoats in the stable? A streak of light--a ray--yet I knew the stable wasshut. 

I took my ease, and crept home at a slow snail's pace. I felt thirsty, luckily for the first time through the whole day, and I went and soughtabout for a place where I could get a drink. I was a long distance awayfrom the bazaar, and I would not ask at a private house. Perhaps, though, I could wait till I got home; it would take a quarter of an hour. It wasnot at all so certain that I could keep down a draught of water, either;my stomach no longer suffered in any way--I even felt nausea at thespittle I swallowed. But the buttons! I had not tried the buttons at allyet. There I stood, stock-still, and commenced to smile. Maybe there was aremedy, in spite of all! I wasn't totally doomed. I should certainly get apenny for them; tomorrow I might raise another some place or other, andThursday I might be paid for my newspaper article. I should just see itwould come out all right. To think that I could really go and forget thebuttons. I took them out of my pocket, and inspected them as I walked onagain. My eyes grew dazed with joy. I did not see the street; I simplywent on. Didn't I know exactly the big pawn-shop--my refuge in the darkevenings, with my blood-sucking friend? One by one my possessions hadvanished there--my little things from home--my last book. I liked to gothere on auction days, to look on, and rejoice each time my books seemedlikely to fall into good hands. Magelsen, the actor, had my watch; I wasalmost proud of that. A diary, in which I had written my first smallpoetical attempt, had been bought by an acquaintance, and my topcoat hadfound a haven with a photographer, to be used in the studio. So there wasno cause to grumble about any of them. I held my buttons ready in my hand;"Uncle" is sitting at his desk, writing. "I am not in a hurry, " I say, afraid of disturbing him, and making him impatient at my application. Myvoice sounded so curiously hollow I hardly recognized it again, and myheart beat like a sledge-hammer. 

He came smilingly over to me, as was his wont, laid both his hands flat onthe counter, and looked at my face without saying anything. Yes, I hadbrought something of which I would ask him if he could make any use;something which is only in my way at home, assure you of it--are quite anannoyance--some buttons. Well, what then? what was there about thebuttons? and he thrusts his eyes down close to my hand. Couldn't he giveme a couple of halfpence for them?--whatever he thought himself--quiteaccording to his own judgment. "For the buttons?"--and "Uncle" staresastonishedly at me--"for these buttons?" Only for a cigar or whatever heliked himself; I was just passing, and thought I would look in. 

Upon this, the old pawnbroker burst out laughing, and returned to his deskwithout saying a word. There I stood; I had not hoped for much, yet, allthe same, I had thought of a possibility of being helped. This laughterwas my death-warrant. It couldn't, I suppose, be of any use trying with myeyeglasses either? Of course, I would let my glasses go in with them; thatwas a matter of course, said I, and I took them off. Only a penny, or ifhe wished, a halfpenny. 

"You know quite well I can't lend you anything on your glasses, " said"Uncle"; I told you that once before. "

"But I want a stamp, " I said, dully. "I can't even send off the letters Ihave written; a penny or a halfpenny stamp, just as you will. "

"Oh, God help you, go your way!" he replied, and motioned me off with hishands. 

Yes, yes; well, it must be so, I said to myself. Mechanically, I put on myglasses again, took the buttons in my hand, and, turning away, bade himgood-night, and closed the door after me as usual. Well, now, there wasnothing more to be done! To think he would not take them at any price, Imuttered. They are almost new buttons; I can't understand it. 

Whilst I stood, lost in thought, a man passed by and entered the office. He had given me a little shove in his hurry. We both made excuses, and Iturned round and looked after him. 

"What! is that you?" he said, suddenly, when half-way up the steps. Hecame back, and I recognized him. "God bless me, man, what on earth do youlook like? What were you doing in there?"

"Oh, I had business. You are going in too, I see. "

"Yes; what were you in with?"

My knees trembled; I supported myself against the wall, and stretched outmy hand with the buttons in it. 

"What the deuce!" he cried. "No; this is really going too far. "

"Good-night!" said I, and was about to go; I felt the tears choking mybreast. 

"No; wait a minute, " he said. 

What was I to wait for? Was he not himself on the road to my "Uncle, "bringing, perhaps, his engagement ring--had been hungry, perhaps, forseveral days--owed his landlady?

"Yes, " I replied; "if you will be out soon. . . . "

"Of course, " he broke in, seizing hold of my arm; "but I may as well tellyou I don't believe you. You are such an idiot, that it's better you comein along with me. "

I understood what he meant, suddenly felt a little spark of pride, andanswered:

"I can't; I promised to be in Bernt Akers Street at half-past seven, and. . . . "

"Half-past seven, quite so; but it's eight now. Here I am, standing withthe watch in my hand that I'm going to pawn. So, in with you, you hungrysinner! I'll get you five shillings anyhow, " and he pushed me in. 

Part III

A week passed in glory and gladness. 

I had got over the worst this time, too. I had had food every day, and mycourage rose, and I thrust one iron after the other into the fire. 

I was working at three or four articles, that plundered my poor brain ofevery spark, every thought that rose in it; and yet I fancied that I wrotewith more facility than before. 

The last article with which I had raced about so much, and upon which Ihad built such hopes, had already been returned to me by the editor; and, angry and wounded as I was, I had destroyed it immediately, without evenre-reading it again. In future, I would try another paper in order to openup more fields for my work. 

Supposing that writing were to fail, and the worst were to come to theworst, I still had the ships to take to. The _Nun_ lay alongside thewharf, ready to sail, and I might, perhaps, work my way out to Archangel, or wherever else she might be bound; there was no lack of openings on manysides. The last crisis had dealt rather roughly with me. My hair fell outin masses, and I was much troubled with headaches, particularly in themorning, and my nervousness died a hard death. I sat and wrote during theday with my hands bound up in rags, simply because I could not endure thetouch of my own breath upon them. If Jens Olaj banged the stable doorunderneath me, or if a dog came into the yard and commenced to bark, itthrilled through my very marrow like icy stabs piercing me from everyside. I was pretty well played out. 

Day after day I strove at my work, begrudging myself the short time ittook to swallow my food before I sat down again to write. At this timeboth the bed and the little rickety table were strewn over with notes andwritten pages, upon which I worked turn about, added any new ideas whichmight have occurred to me during the day, erased, or quickened here andthere the dull points by a word of colour--fagged and toiled at sentenceafter sentence, with the greatest of pains. One afternoon, one of myarticles being at length finished, I thrust it, contented and happy, intomy pocket, and betook myself to the "commandor. " It was high time I madesome arrangement towards getting a little money again; I had only a fewpence left. 

The "commandor" requested me to sit down for a moment; he would bedisengaged immediately, and he continued writing. 

I looked about the little office--busts, prints, cuttings, and an enormouspaper-basket, that looked as if it might swallow a man, bones and all. Ifelt sad at heart at the sight of this monstrous chasm, this dragon'smouth, that always stood open, always ready to receive rejected work, newly crushed hopes. 

"What day of the month is it?" queried the "commandor" from the table. 

"The 28th, " I reply, pleased that I can be of service to him, "the 28th, "and he continues writing. At last he encloses a couple of letters in theirenvelopes, tosses some papers into the basket, and lays down his pen. Thenhe swings round on his chair, and looks at me. Observing that I am stillstanding near the door, he makes a half-serious, half-playful motion withhis hand, and points to a chair. 

I turn aside, so that he may not see that I have no waistcoat on, when Iopen my coat to take the manuscript out of my pocket. 

"It is only a little character sketch of Correggio, " I say; "but perhapsit is, worse luck, not written in such a way that. . . . "

He takes the papers out of my hand, and commences to go through them. Hisface is turned towards me. 

And so it is thus he looks at close quarters, this man, whose name I hadalready heard in my earliest youth, and whose paper had exercised thegreatest influence upon me as the years advanced? His hair is curly, andhis beautiful brown eyes are a little restless. He has a habit of tweakinghis nose now and then. No Scotch minister could look milder than thistruculent writer, whose pen always left bleeding scars wherever itattacked. A peculiar feeling of awe and admiration comes over me in thepresence of this man. The tears are on the point of coming to my eyes, andI advanced a step to tell him how heartily I appreciated him, for all hehad taught me, and to beg him not to hurt me; I was only a poor bunglingwretch, who had had a sorry enough time of it as it was. . . . 

He looked up, and placed my manuscript slowly together, whilst he sat andconsidered. To make it easier for him to give me a refusal, I stretch outmy hand a little, and say:

"Ah, well, of course, it is not of any use to you, " and I smile to givehim the impression that I take it easily. 

"Everything has to be of such a popular nature to be of any use to us, " hereplies; "you know the kind of public we have. But can't you try and writesomething a little more commonplace, or hit upon something that peopleunderstand better?"

His forbearance astonishes me. I understand that my article is rejected, and yet I could not have received a prettier refusal. Not to take up histime any longer, I reply:

"Oh yes, I daresay I can. "

I go towards the door. Hem--he must pray forgive me for having taken uphis time with this . . . I bow, and turn the door handle. 

"If you need it, " he says, "you are welcome to draw a little in advance;you can write for it, you know. "

Now, as he had just seen that I was not capable of writing, this offerhumiliated me somewhat, and I answered:

"No, thanks; I can pull through yet a while, thanking you very much, allthe same. Good-day!"

"Good-day!" replies the "commandor, " turning at the same time to his deskagain. 

He had none the less treated me with undeserved kindness, and I wasgrateful to him for it--and I would know how to appreciate it too. I madea resolution not to return to him until I could take something with me, that satisfied me perfectly; something that would astonish the "commandor"a bit, and make him order me to be paid half-a-sovereign without amoment's hesitation. I went home, and tackled my writing once more. 

During the following evenings, as soon as it got near eight o'clock andthe gas was lit, the following thing happened regularly to me. 

As I come out of my room to take a walk in the streets after the labourand troubles of the day, a lady, dressed in black, stands under thelamp-post exactly opposite my door. 

She turns her face towards me and follows me with her eyes when I pass herby--I remark that she always has the same dress on, always the same thickveil that conceals her face and falls over her breast, and that shecarries in her hand a small umbrella with an ivory ring in the handle. This was already the third evening I had seen her there, always in thesame place. As soon as I have passed her by she turns slowly and goes downthe street away from me. My nervous brain vibrated with curiosity, and Ibecame at once possessed by the unreasonable feeling that I was the objectof her visit. At last I was almost on the point of addressing her, ofasking her if she was looking for any one, if she needed my assistance inany way, or if I might accompany her home. Badly dressed, as Iunfortunately was, I might protect her through the dark streets; but I hadan undefined fear that it perhaps might cost me something; a glass ofwine, or a drive, and I had no money left at all. My distressingly emptypockets acted in a far too depressing way upon me, and I had not even thecourage to scrutinize her sharply as I passed her by. Hunger had once moretaken up its abode in my breast, and I had not tasted food since yesterdayevening. This, 'tis true, was not a long period; I had often been able tohold out for a couple of days at a time, but latterly I had commenced tofall off seriously; I could not go hungry one quarter as well as I used todo. A single day made me feel dazed, and I suffered from perpetualretching the moment I tasted water. Added to this was the fact that I layand shivered all night, lay fully dressed as I stood and walked in thedaytime, lay blue with cold, lay and froze every night with fits of icyshivering, and grew stiff during my sleep. The old blanket could not keepout the draughts, and I woke in the mornings with my nose stopped by thesharp outside frosty air which forced its way into the dilapidated room. 

I go down the street and think over what I am to do to keep myself aliveuntil I get my next article finished. If I only had a candle I would tryto fag on through the night; it would only take a couple of hours if Ionce warmed to my work, and then tomorrow I could call on the "commandor. "

I go without further ado into the Opland Cafe and look for my youngacquaintance in the bank, in order to procure a penny for a candle. Ipassed unhindered through all the rooms; I passed a dozen tables at whichmen sat chatting, eating, and drinking; I passed into the back of thecafe, ay, even into the red alcove, without succeeding in finding my man. 

Crestfallen and annoyed I dragged myself out again into the street andtook the direction to the Palace. 

Wasn't it now the very hottest eternal devil existing to think that myhardships never would come to an end! Taking long, furious strides, withthe collar of my coat hunched savagely up round my ears, and my handsthrust in my breeches pockets, I strode along, cursing my unlucky starsthe whole way. Not one real untroubled hour in seven or eight months, notthe common food necessary to hold body and soul together for the space ofone short week, before want stared me in the face again. Here I had, intothe bargain, gone and kept straight and honourable all through mymisery--Ha! ha! straight and honourable to the heart's core. God preserveme, what a fool I had been! And I commenced to tell myself how I had evengone about conscience-stricken because I had once brought Hans Pauli'sblanket to the pawn-broker's. I laughed sarcastically at my delicaterectitude, spat contemptuously in the street, and could not find wordshalf strong enough to mock myself for my stupidity. Let it only happennow! Were I to find at this moment a schoolgirl's savings or a poorwidow's only penny, I would snatch it up and pocket it; steal itdeliberately, and sleep the whole night through like a top. I had notsuffered so unspeakably much for nothing--my patience was gone--I wasprepared to do anything. 

I walked round the palace three, perhaps four, times, then came to theconclusion that I would go home, took yet one little turn in the park andwent back down Carl Johann. It was now about eleven. The streets werefairly dark, and the people roamed about in all directions, quiet pairsand noisy groups mixed with one another. The great hour had commenced, thepairing time when the mystic traffic is in full swing--and the hour ofmerry adventures sets in. Rustling petticoats, one or two still short, sensual laughter, heaving bosoms, passionate, panting breaths, and fardown near the Grand Hotel, a voice calling "Emma!" The whole street was aswamp, from which hot vapours exuded. 

I feel involuntarily in my pockets for a few shillings. The passion thatthrills through the movements of every one of the passers-by, the dimlight of the gas lamps, the quiet pregnant night, all commence to affectme--this air, that is laden with whispers, embraces, trembling admissions, concessions, half-uttered words and suppressed cries. A number of cats aredeclaring their love with loud yells in Blomquist's doorway. And I did notpossess even a florin! It was a misery, a wretchedness without parallel tobe so impoverished. What humiliation, too; what disgrace! I began again tothink about the poor widow's last mite, that I would have stolen aschoolboy's cap or handkerchief, or a beggar's wallet, that I would havebrought to a rag-dealer without more ado, and caroused with the proceeds. 

In order to console myself--to indemnify myself in some measure--I take topicking all possible faults in the people who glide by. I shrug myshoulders contemptuously, and look slightingly at them according as theypass. These easily-pleased, confectionery-eating students, who fancy theyare sowing their wild oats in truly Continental style if they tickle asempstress under the ribs! These young bucks, bank clerks, merchants, flâneurs--who would not disdain a sailor's wife; blowsy Molls, ready tofall down in the first doorway for a glass of beer! What sirens! The placeat their side still warm from the last night's embrace of a watch-man or astable-boy! The throne always vacant, always open to newcomers! Pray, mount!

I spat out over the pavement, without troubling if it hit any one. I feltenraged; filled with contempt for these people who scrapedacquaintanceship with one another, and paired off right before my eyes. Ilifted my head, and felt in myself the blessing of being able to keep myown sty clean. At Stortingsplads (Parliament Place) I met a girl wholooked fixedly at me as I came close to her. 

"Good-night!" said I. 

"Good-night!" She stopped. 

Hum! was she out walking so late? Did not a young lady run rather a riskin being in Carl Johann at this time of night? Really not? Yes; but wasshe never spoken to, molested, I meant; to speak plainly, asked to goalong home with any one?

She stared at me with astonishment, scanned my face closely, to see what Ireally meant by this, then thrust her hand suddenly under my arm, andsaid:

"Yes, and we went too!"

I walked on with her. But when we had gone a few paces past the car-standI came to a standstill, freed my arm, and said:

"Listen, my dear, I don't own a farthing!" and with that I went on. 

At first she would not believe me; but after she had searched all mypockets, and found nothing, she got vexed, tossed her head, and called mea dry cod. 

"Good-night!" said I. 

"Wait a minute, " she called; "are those eyeglasses that you've got gold?"

"No. "

"Then go to blazes with you!" and I went. 

A few seconds after she came running behind me, and called out to me:

"You can come with me all the same!"

I felt humiliated by this offer from an unfortunate street wench, and Isaid "No. " Besides, it was growing late at night, and I was due at aplace. Neither could she afford to make sacrifices of that kind. 

"Yes; but now I will have you come with me. "

"But I won't go with you in this way. "

"Oh, naturally; you are going with some one else. "

"No, " I answered. 

But I was conscious that I stood in a sorry plight in face of this uniquestreet jade, and I made up my mind to save appearances at least. 

"What is your name?" I inquired. "Mary, eh? Well, listen to me now, Mary!"and I set about explaining my behaviour. The girl grew more and moreastonished in measure as I proceeded. Had she then believed that I, too, was one of those who went about the street at night and ran after littlegirls? Did she really think so badly of me? Had I perhaps said anythingrude to her from the beginning? Did one behave as I had done when one wasactuated by any bad motive? Briefly, in so many words, I had accosted her, and accompanied her those few paces, to see how far she would go on withit. For the rest, my name was So-and-so--Pastor So-and-so. "Good-night;depart, and sin no more!" With these words I left her. 

I rubbed my hands with delight over my happy notion, and soliloquizedaloud, "What a joy there is in going about doing good actions. " Perhaps Ihad given this fallen creature an upward impulse for her whole life; saveher, once for all, from destruction, and she would appreciate it when shecame to think over it; remember me yet in her hour of death with thankfulheart. Ah! in truth, it paid to be honourable, upright, and righteous!

My spirits were effervescing. I felt fresh and courageous enough to faceanything that might turn up. If I only had a candle, I might perhapscomplete my article. I walked on, jingling my new door-key in my hand;hummed, and whistled, and speculated as to means of procuring a candle. There was no other way out of it. I would have to take my writingmaterials with me into the street, under a lamp-post. I opened the door, and went up to get my papers. When I descended once more I locked the doorfrom the outside, and planted myself under the light. All around wasquiet; I heard the heavy clanking footstep of a constable down inTaergade, and far away in the direction of St. Han's Hill a dog barked. There was nothing to disturb me. I pulled my coat collar up round my ears, and commenced to think with all my might. 

It would be such an extraordinary help to me if I were lucky enough tofind a suitable winding up for this little essay. I had stuck just at arather difficult point in it, where there ought to be a quiteimperceptible transition to something fresh, then a subdued glidingfinale, a prolonged murmur, ending at last in a climax as bold and asstartling as a shot, or the sound of a mountain avalanche--full stop. Butthe words would not come to me. I read over the whole piece from thecommencement; read every sentence aloud, and yet failed absolutely tocrystallize my thoughts, in order to produce this scintillating climax. And into the bargain, whilst I was standing labouring away at this, theconstable came and, planting himself a little distance away from me, spoilt my whole mood. Now, what concern was it of his if I stood andstrove for a striking climax to an article for the _Commandor_? Lord, how utterly impossible it was for me to keep my head above water, nomatter how much I tried! I stayed there for the space of an hour. Theconstable went his way. The cold began to get too intense for me to keepstill. Disheartened and despondent over this abortive effort, I opened thedoor again, and went up to my room. 

It was cold up there, and I could barely see my window for the intensedarkness. I felt my towards the bed, pulled off my shoes, and set aboutwarming my feet between my hands. Then I lay down, as I had done for along time now, with all my clothes on. 

The following morning I sat up in bed as soon as it got light, and set towork at the essay once more. I sat thus till noon; I had succeeded by thenin getting ten, perhaps twenty lines down, and still I had not found anending. 

I rose, put on my shoes, and began to walk up and down the floor to tryand warm myself. I looked out; there was rime on the window; it wassnowing. Down in the yard a thick layer of snow covered the paving-stonesand the top of the pump. I bustled about the room, took aimless turns toand fro, scratched the wall with my nail, leant my head carefully againstthe door for a while, tapped with my forefinger on the floor, and thenlistened attentively, all without any object, but quietly and pensively asif it were some matter of importance in which I was engaged; and all thewhile I murmured aloud, time upon time, so that I could hear my own voice. 

But, great God, surely this is madness! and yet I kept on just as before. After a long time, perhaps a couple of hours, I pulled myself sharplytogether, bit my lips, and manned myself as well as I could. There must bean end to this! I found a splinter to chew, and set myself resolutely toagain. 

A couple of short sentences formed themselves with much trouble, a scoreof poor words which I tortured forth with might and main to try andadvance a little. Then I stopped, my head was barren; I was incapable ofmore. And, as I could positively not go on, I set myself to gaze with wideopen eyes at these last words, this unfinished sheet of paper; I stared atthese strange, shaky letters that bristled up from the paper like smallhairy creeping things, till at last I could neither make head nor tail ofany of it. I thought on nothing. 

Time went; I heard the traffic in the street, the rattle of cars and trampof hoofs. Jens Olaj's voice ascended towards me from the stables as hechid the horses. I was perfectly stunned. I sat and moistened my lips alittle, but otherwise made no effort to do anything; my chest was in apitiful state. The dusk closed in; I sank more and more together, grewweary, and lay down on the bed again. In order to warm my fingers a littleI stroked them through my hair backwards and forwards and crosswise. Smallloose tufts came away, flakes that got between my fingers, and scatteredover the pillow. I did not think anything about it just then; it was as ifit did not concern me. I had hair enough left, anyway. I tried afresh toshake myself out of this strange daze that enveloped my whole being like amist. I sat up, struck my knees with my flat hands, laughed as hard as mysore chest permitted me--only to collapse again. Naught availed; I wasdying helplessly, with my eyes wide open--staring straight up at the roof. At length I stuck my forefinger in my mouth, and took to sucking it. Something stirred in my brain, a thought that bored its way in there--astark-mad notion. 

Supposing I were to take a bite? And without a moment's reflection, I shutmy eyes, and clenched my teeth on it. 

I sprang up. At last I was thoroughly awake. A little blood trickled fromit, and I licked it as it came. It didn't hurt very much, neither was thewound large, but I was brought at one bound to my senses. I shook my head, went to the window, where I found a rag, and wound it round the soreplace. As I stood and busied myself with this, my eyes filled with tears;I cried softly to myself. This poor thin finger looked so utterlypitiable. God in Heaven! what a pass it had come to now with me! The gloomgrew closer. It was, maybe, not impossible that I might work up my finalethrough the course of the evening, if I only had a candle. My head wasclear once more. Thoughts came and went as usual, and I did not sufferparticularly; I did not even feel hunger so badly as some hourspreviously. I could hold out well till the next day. Perhaps I might beable to get a candle on credit, if I applied to the provision shop andexplained my situation--I was so well known in there; in the good olddays, when I had the means to do it, I used to buy many a loaf there. There was no doubt I could raise a candle on the strength of my honestname; and for the first time for ages I took to brushing my clothes alittle, got rid as well as the darkness allowed me of the loose hairs onmy collar, and felt my way down the stairs. 

When I got outside in the street it occurred to me that I might perhapsrather ask for a loaf. I grew irresolute, and stopped to consider. "On noaccount, " I replied to myself at last; I was unfortunately not in acondition to bear food. It would only be a repetition of the same oldstory--visions, and presentiments, and mad notions. My article would neverget finished, and it was a question of going to the "Commandor" before hehad time to forget me. On no account whatever! and I decided upon thecandle. With that I entered the shop. 

A woman is standing at the counter making purchases; several small parcelsin different sorts of paper are lying in front of her. The shopman, whoknows me, and knows what I usually buy, leaves the woman, and packswithout much ado a loaf in a piece of paper and shoves it over to me. 

"No, thank you, it was really a candle I wanted this evening, " I say. Isay it very quietly and humbly, in order not to vex him and spoil mychance of getting what I want. 

My answer confuses him; he turns quite cross at my unexpected words; itwas the first time I had ever demanded anything but a loaf from him. 

"Well then, you must wait a while, " he says at last, and busies himselfwith the woman's parcels again. 

She receives her wares and pays for them---gives him a florin, out ofwhich she gets the change, and goes out. Now the shop-boy and I are alone. He says:

"So it was a candle you wanted, eh?" He tears open a package, and takesone out for me. He looks at me, and I look at him; I can't get my requestover my lips. 

"Oh yes, that's true; you paid, though!" he says suddenly. He simplyasserts that I had paid. I heard every word, and he begins to count somesilver out of the till, coin after coin, shining stout pieces. He gives meback change for a crown. 

"Much obliged, " he says. 

Now I stand and look at these pieces of money for a second. I am conscioussomething is wrong somewhere. I do not reflect; do not think aboutanything at all--I am simply struck of a heap by all this wealth which islying glittering before my eyes--and I gather up the money mechanically. 

I stand outside the counter, stupid with amazement, dumb, paralyzed. Itake a stride towards the door, and stop again. I turn my eyes upon acertain spot in the wall, where a little bell is suspended to a leathercollar, and underneath this a bundle of string, and I stand and stare atthese things. 

The shop-boy is struck by the idea that I want to have a chat as I take mytime so leisurely, and says, as he tidies a lot of wrapping-papers strewnover the counter:

"It looks as if we were going to have winter snow!"

"Humph! Yes, " I reply; "it looks as if we were going to have winter inearnest now; it looks like it, " and a while after, I add: "Ah, well, it isnone too soon. "

I could hear myself speak, but each word I uttered struck my ear as if itwere coming from another person. I spoke absolutely unwittingly, involuntarily, without being conscious of myself. 

"Oh, do you think so?" says the boy. 

I thrust the hand with the money into my pocket, turned the door-handle, and left. I could hear that I said good-night, and that the shop-boyreplied to me. 

I had gone a few paces away from the shop when the shop-door was tornopen, and the boy called after me. I turned round without anyastonishment, without a trace of fear; I only collected the money into myhand, and prepared to give it back. 

"Beg pardon, you've forgotten your candle, " says the boy. 

"Ah, thanks, " I answered quietly. "Thanks, thanks"; and I strolled on, down the street, bearing it in my hand. 

My first sensible thought referred to the money. I went over to alamp-post, counted it, weighed it in my hand, and smiled. So, in spite ofall, I was helped--extraordinarily, grandly, incredibly helped--helped fora long, long time; and I thrust my hand with the money into my pocket, andwalked on. 

Outside an eating-house in Grand Street I stopped, and turned over in mymind, calmly and quietly, if I should venture so soon to take a littlerefreshment. I could hear the rattle of knives and plates inside, and thesound of meat being pounded. The temptation was too strong for me--Ientered. 

"A helping of beef, " I say. 

"One beef!" calls the waitress down through the door to the lift. 

I sat down by myself at a little table next to the door, and prepared towait. It was somewhat dark where I was sitting, and I felt tolerably wellconcealed, and set myself to have a serious think. Every now and then thewaitress glanced over at me inquiringly. My first downright dishonesty wasaccomplished--my first theft. Compared to this, all my earlier escapadeswere as nothing--my first great fall. . . . Well and good! There was no helpfor it. For that matter, it was open to me to settle it with theshopkeeper later on, on a more opportune occasion. It need not go anyfarther with me. Besides that, I had not taken upon myself to live morehonourably than all the other folk; there was no contract that. . . . 

"Do you think that beef will soon be here?"

"Yes; immediately"; the waitress opens the trapdoor, and looks down intothe kitchen. 

But suppose the affair did crop up some day? If the shop-boy were to getsuspicious and begin to think over the transaction about the bread, andthe florin of which the woman got the change? It was not impossible thathe would discover it some day, perhaps the next time I went there. Well, then, Lord!. . . I shrugged my shoulders unobserved. 

"If you please, " says the waitress, kindly placing the beef on the table, "wouldn't you rather go to another compartment, it's so dark here?"

"No, thanks; just let me be here, " I reply; her kindliness touches me atonce. I pay for the beef on the spot, put whatever change remains into herhand, close her fingers over it. She smiles, and I say in fun, with thetears near my ears, "There, you're to have the balance to buy yourself afarm. . . . Ah, you're very welcome to it. "

I commenced to eat, got more and more greedy I as I did so, swallowedwhole pieces without chewing them, enjoyed myself in an animal-like way atevery mouthful, and tore at the meat like a cannibal. 

The waitress came over to me again. 

"Will you have anything to drink?" she asks, bending down a little towardsme. I looked at her. She spoke very low, almost shyly, and dropped hereyes. "I mean a glass of ale, or whatever you like best . . . From me . . . Without . . . That is, if you will. . . . "

"No; many thanks, " I answer. "Not now; I shall come back another time. "

She drew back, and sat down at the desk. I could only see her head. What asingular creature!

When finished, I made at once for the door. I felt nausea already. Thewaitress got up. I was afraid to go near the light--afraid to show myselftoo plainly to the young girl, who never for a moment suspected the depthof my misery; so I wished her a hasty good-night, bowed to her, and left. 

The food commenced to take effect. I suffered much from it, and could notkeep it down for any length of time. I had to empty my mouth a little atevery dark corner I came to. I struggled to master this nausea whichthreatened to hollow me out anew, clenched my hands, and tried to fight itdown; stamped on the pavement, and gulped down furiously whatever soughtto come up. All in vain. I sprang at last into a doorway, doubled up, headforemost, blinded with the water which gushed from my eyes, and vomitedonce more. I was seized with bitterness, and wept as I went along thestreet. . . . I cursed the cruel powers, whoever they might be, thatpersecuted me so, consigned them to hell's damnation and eternal tormentsfor their petty persecution. There was but little chivalry in fate, reallylittle enough chivalry; one was forced to admit that. 

I went over to a man staring into a shop-window, and asked him in greathaste what, according to his opinion, should one give a man who had beenstarving for a long time. It was a matter of life and death, I said; hecouldn't even keep beef down. 

"I have heard say that milk is a good thing--hot milk, " answered the man, astonished. "Who is it, by the way, you are asking for?"

"Thanks, thanks, " I say; "that idea of hot milk might not be half a badnotion;" and I go. 

I entered the first café I came to going along, and asked for some boiledmilk. I got the milk, drank it down, hot as it was, swallowed it greedily, every drop, paid for it, and went out again. I took the road home. 

Now something singular happened. Outside my door, leaning against thelamp-post, and right under the glare of it, stands a person of whom I geta glimpse from a long distance--it is the lady dressed in black again. Thesame black-clad lady of the other evenings. There could be no mistakeabout it; she had turned up at the same spot for the fourth time. She isstanding perfectly motionless. I find this so peculiar that Iinvoluntarily slacken my pace. At this moment my thoughts are in goodworking order, but I am much excited; my nerves are irritated by my lastmeal. I pass her by as usual; am almost at the door and on the point ofentering. There I stop. All of a sudden an inspiration seizes me. Withoutrendering myself any account of it, I turn round and go straight up to thelady, look her in the face, and bow. 

"Good-evening. "

"Good-evening, " she answers. 

Excuse me, was she looking for anything? I had noticed her before; could Ibe of assistance to her in any way? begged pardon, by-the-way, soearnestly for inquiring. 

Yes; she didn't quite know. . . . 

No one lived inside that door besides three or four horses and myself; itwas, for that matter, only a stable and a tinker's workshop. . . . She wascertainly on a wrong track if she was seeking any one there. 

At this she turns her head away, and says: "I am not seeking for anybody. I am only standing here; it was really only a whim. I" . . . She stops. 

Indeed, really, she only stood there, just stood there, evening afterevening, just for a whim's sake!

That was a little odd. I stood and pondered over it, and it perplexed memore and more. I made up my mind to be daring; I jingled my money in mypocket, and asked her, without further ado, to come and have a glass ofwine some place or another . . . In consideration that winter had come, ha, ha! . . . It needn't take very long . . . But perhaps she would scarcely. . . . 

Ah, no, thanks; she couldn't well do that. No! she couldn't do that; butwould I be so kind as to accompany her a little way? She . . . It was ratherdark to go home now, and she was rather nervous about going up Carl Johannafter it got so late. 

We moved on; she walked at my right side. A strange, beautiful feelingempowered me; the certainty of being near a young girl. I looked at herthe whole way along. The scent of her hair; the warmth that irradiatedfrom her body; the perfume of woman that accompanied her; the sweet breathevery time she turned her face towards me--everything penetrated in anungovernable way through all my senses. So far, I just caught a glimpse ofa full, rather pale, face behind the veil, and a high bosom that curvedout against her cape. The thought of all the hidden beauty which Isurmised lay sheltered under the cloak and veil bewildered me, making meidiotically happy without any reasonable grounds. I could not endure itany longer; I touched her with my hand, passed my fingers over hershoulder, and smiled imbecilely. 

"How queer you are, " said I. 

"Am I, really; in what way?"

Well, in the first place, simply, she had a habit of standing outside astable door, evening after evening, without any object whatever, just fora whim's sake. . . . 

Oh, well, she might have her reason for doing so; besides, she likedstaying up late at night; it was a thing she had always had a great fancyfor. Did I care about going to bed before twelve?

I? If there was anything in the world I hated it was to go to bed beforetwelve o'clock at night. 

Ah, there, you see! She, too, was just the same; she took this little tourin the evenings when she had nothing to lose by doing so. She lived up inSt. Olav's Place. 

"Ylajali, " I cried. 

"I beg pardon?"

"I only said 'Ylajali' . . . It's all right. Continue. . . . "

She lived up in St. Olav's Place, lonely enough, together with her mother, to whom one couldn't talk because she was so deaf. Was there anything oddin her liking to get out for a little?

"No, not at all, " I replied. 

"No? well, what then?"

I could hear by her voice that she was smiling. 

Hadn't she a sister?

Yes; an older sister. But, by-the-way, how didI know that? She had gone to Hamburg. 

"Lately?"

"Yes; five weeks ago. " From where did I learn that she had a sister?

I didn't learn it at all; I only asked. 

We kept silence. A man passes us, with a pair of shoes under his arm;otherwise, the street is empty as far as we can see. Over at the Tivoli along row of coloured lamps are burning. It no longer snows; the sky isclear. 

"Gracious! don't you freeze without an overcoat?" inquires the lady, suddenly looking at me. 

Should I tell her why I had no overcoat; make my sorry condition known atonce, and frighten her away? As well first as last. Still, it wasdelightful to walk here at her side and keep her in ignorance yet a whilelonger. So I lied. I answered:

"No, not at all"; and, in order to change the subject, I asked, "Have youseen the menagerie in the Tivoli?"

"No, " she answered; "is there really anything to see?"

Suppose she were to take it into her head to wish to go there? Into thatblaze of light, with the crowd of people. Why, she would be filled withshame; I would drive her out again, with my shabby clothes, and lean face;perhaps she might even notice that I had no waistcoat on. . . . 

"Ah, no; there is sure to be nothing worth seeing!"

And a lot of happy ideas occurred to me, of which I at once made use; afew sparse words, fragments left in my dessicated brain. What would oneexpect from such a small menagerie? On the whole, it did not interest mein the least to see animals in cases. These animals know that one isstanding staring at them; they feel hundreds of inquisitive looks uponthem; are conscious of them. No; I would prefer to see animals that didn'tknow one observed them; shy creatures that nestle in their lair, and liewith sluggish green eyes, and lick their claws, and muse, eh?

Yes; I was certainly right in that. 

It was only animals in all their peculiar fearfulness and peculiarsavagery that possessed a charm. The soundless, stealthy tread in thetotal darkness of night; the hidden monsters of the woods; the shrieks ofa bird flying past; the wind, the smell of blood, the rumbling in space;in short, the reigning spirit of the kingdom of savage creatures hoveringover savagery . . . The unconscious poetry!. . . But I was afraid this boredher. The consciousness of my great poverty seized me anew, and crushed me. If I had only been in any way well-enough dressed to have given her thepleasure of this little tour in the Tivoli! I could not make out thiscreature, who could find pleasure in letting herself be accompanied up thewhole of Carl Johann Street by a half-naked beggar. What, in the name ofGod, was she thinking of? And why was I walking there, giving myself airs, and smiling idiotically at nothing? Had I any reasonable cause, either, for letting myself be worried into a long walk by this dainty, silken-cladbird? Mayhap it did not cost me an effort? Did I not feel the ice of deathgo right into my heart at even the gentlest puff of wind that blew againstus? Was not madness running riot in my brain, just for lack of food formany months at a stretch? Yet she hindered me from going home to get evena little milk into my parched mouth; a spoonful of sweet milk, that Imight perhaps be able to keep down. Why didn't she turn her back on me, and let me go to the deuce?. . . 

I became distracted; my despair reduced me to the last extremity. I said:

"Considering all things, you ought not to walk with me. I disgrace youright under every one's eyes, if only with my clothes. Yes, it ispositively true; I mean it. "

She starts, looks up quickly at me, and is silent; then she exclaimssuddenly:

"Indeed, though!" More she doesn't say. 

"What do you mean by that?" I queried. 

"Ugh, no; you make me feel ashamed. . . . We have not got very far now"; andshe walked on a little faster. 

We turned up University Street, and could already see the lights in St. Olav's Place. Then she commenced to walk slowly again. 

"I have no wish to be indiscreet, " I say; "but won't you tell me your namebefore we part? and won't you, just for one second, lift up your veil sothat I can see you? I would be really so grateful. "

A pause. I walked on in expectation. 

"You have seen me before, " she replies. 

"Ylajali, " I say again. 

"Beg pardon. You followed me once for half-a-day, almost right home. Wereyou tipsy that time?"

I could hear again that she smiled. 

"Yes, " I said. "Yes, worse luck, I was tipsy that time. "

"That was horrid of you!"

And I admitted contritely that it was horrid of me. 

We reached the fountains; we stop and look up at the many lighted windowsof No. 2. 

"Now, you mustn't come any farther with me, " she says. "Thank you forcoming so far. "

I bowed; I daren't say anything; I took off my hat and stood bareheaded. Iwonder if she will give me her hand. 

"Why don't you ask me to go back a little way with you?" she asks, in alow voice, looking down at the toe of her shoe. 

"Great Heavens!" I reply, beside myself, "Great Heavens, if you onlywould!"

"Yes; but only a little way. "

And we turned round. 

I was fearfully confused. I absolutely did not know if I were on my heador my heels. This creature upset all my chain of reasoning; turned ittopsy-turvy. I was bewitched and extraordinarily happy. It seemed to me asif I were being dragged enchantingly to destruction. She had expresslywilled to go back; it wasn't my notion, it was her own desire. I walk onand look at her, and get more and more bold. She encourages me, draws meto her by each word she speaks. I forget for a moment my poverty, myhumble position, my whole miserable condition. I feel my blood coursemadly through my whole body, as in the days before I caved in, andresolved to feel my way by a little ruse. 

"By-the-way, it wasn't you I followed that time, " said I. "It was yoursister. "

"Was it my sister?" she questions, in the highest degree amazed. Shestands still, looks up at me, and positively waits for an answer. She putsthe question in all sober earnest. 

"Yes, " I replied. "Hum--m, that is to say, it was the younger of the twoladies who went on in front of me. "

"The youngest, eh? eh? a-a-ha!" she laughed out all at once, loudly, heartily, like a child. "Oh, how sly you are; you only said that just toget me to raise my veil, didn't you? Ah, I thought so; but you may justwait till you are blue first . . . Just for punishment. "

We began to laugh and jest; we talked incessantly all the time. I do notknow what I said, I was so happy. She told me that she had seen me oncebefore, a long time ago, in the theatre. I had then comrades with me, andI behaved like a madman; I must certainly have been tipsy that time too, more's the shame. 

Why did she think that?

Oh, I had laughed so. 

"Really, a-ah yes; I used to laugh a lot in those days. "

"But now not any more?"

"Oh yes; now too. It is a splendid thing to exist sometimes. "

We reached Carl Johann. She said: "Now we won't go any farther, " and wereturned through University Street. When we arrived at the fountain oncemore I slackened my pace a little; I knew that I could not go any fartherwith her. 

"Well, now you must turn back here, " she said, and stopped. 

"Yes, I suppose I must. "

But a second after she thought I might as well go as far as the door withher. Gracious me, there couldn't be anything wrong in that, could there?

"No, " I replied. 

But when we were standing at the door all my misery confronted me clearly. How was one to keep up one's courage when one was so broken down? Here Istood before a young lady, dirty, ragged, torn, disfigured by hunger, unwashed, and only half-clad; it was enough to make one sink into theearth. I shrank into myself, bent my head involuntarily, and said:

"May I not meet you any more then?"

I had no hope of being permitted to see her again. I almost wished for asharp No, that would pull me together a bit and render me callous. 

"Yes, " she whispered softly, almost inaudibly. 

"When?"

"I don't know. "

A pause. . . . 

"Won't you be so kind as to lift your veil, only just for a minute, " Iasked. "So that I can see whom I have been talking to. Just for onemoment, for indeed I must see whom I have been talking to. "

Another pause. . . . 

"You can meet me outside here on Tuesday evening, " she said. "Will you?"

"Yes, dear lady, if I have permission to. "

"At eight o'clock. "

"Very well. "

I stroked down her cloak with my hand, merely to have an excuse fortouching her. It was a delight to me to be so near her. 

"And you mustn't think all too badly of me, " she added; she was smilingagain. 

"No. "

Suddenly she made a resolute movement and drew her veil up over herforehead; we stood and gazed at one another for a second. 

"Ylajali!" I cried. She stretched herself up, flung her arms round my neckand kissed me right on the mouth--only once, swiftly, bewilderinglyswiftly, right on the mouth. I could feel how her bosom heaved; she wasbreathing violently. She wrenched herself suddenly out of my clasp, calleda good-night, breathlessly, whispering, and turned and ran up the stairswithout a word more. . . . 

The hall door shut. 

 * * * * *

It snowed still more the next day, a heavy snow mingled with rain; greatwet flakes that fell to earth and were turned to mud. The air was raw andicy. I woke somewhat late, with my head in a strange state of confusion, my heart intoxicated from the foregone evening by the agitation of thatdelightful meeting. In my rapture (I had lain a while awake and fanciedYlajali at my side) I spread out my arms and embraced myself and kissedthe air. At length I dragged myself out of bed and procured a fresh cup ofmilk, and straight on top of that a plate of beef. I was no longer hungry, but my nerves were in a highly-strung condition. 

I went off to the clothes-shop in the bazaar. It occurred to me that Imight pick up a second-hand waistcoat cheaply, something to put on undermy coat; it didn't matter what. 

I went up the steps to the bazaar and took hold of one and began toexamine it. 

While I was thus engaged an acquaintance came by; he nodded and called upto me. I let the waistcoat hang and went down to him. He was a designer, and was on the way to his office. 

"Come with me and have a glass of beer, " he said. "But hurry up, I haven'tmuch time. . . . What lady was that you were walking with yesterday evening?"

"Listen here now, " said I, jealous of his barethought. "Supposing it was my _fiancée_. "

"By Jove!" he exclaimed. 

"Yes; it was all settled yesterday evening. "

This nonplussed him completely. He believed me implicitly. I lied in themost accomplished manner to get rid of him. We ordered the beer, drank it, and left. 

"Well, good-bye! O listen, " he said suddenly. "I owe you a few shillings. It is a shame, too, that I haven't paid you long ago, but now you shallhave them during the next few days. "

"Yes, thanks, " I replied; but I knew that he would never pay me back thefew shillings. The beer, I am sorry to say, went almost immediately to myhead. The thought of the previous evening's adventure overwhelmed me--mademe delirious. Supposing she were not to meet me on Tuesday! Supposing shewere to begin to think things over, to get suspicious . . . Get suspiciousof what?. . . My thoughts gave a jerk and dwelt upon the money. I grewafraid; deadly afraid of myself. The theft rushed in upon me in all itsdetails. I saw the little shop, the counter, my lean hands as I seized themoney, and I pictured to myself the line of action the police would adoptwhen they would come to arrest me. Irons on my hands and feet; no, only onmy hands; perhaps only on one hand. The dock, the clerk taking down theevidence, the scratch of his pen--perhaps he might take a new one for theoccasion--his look, his threatening look. There, Herr Tangen, to the cell, the eternally dark. . . . 

Humph! I clenched my hands tightly to try and summon courage, walkedfaster and faster, and came to the market-place. There I sat down. 

Now, no child's play. How in the wide world could any one prove that I hadstolen? Besides, the huckster's boy dare not give an alarm, even if itshould occur to him some day how it had all happened. He valued hissituation far too dearly for that. No noise, no scenes, may I beg!

But all the same, this money weighed in my pocket sinfully, and gave me nopeace. I began to question myself, and I became clearly convinced that Ihad been happier before, during the period in which I had suffered in allhonour. And Ylajali? Had I, too, not polluted her with the touch of mysinful hands? Lord, O Lord my God, Ylajali! I felt as drunk as a bat, jumped up suddenly, and went straight over to the cake woman who wassitting near the chemist's under the sign of the elephant. I might evenyet lift myself above dishonour; it was far from being too late; I wouldshow the whole world that I was capable of doing so. 

On the way over I got the money in readiness, held every farthing of it inmy hand, bent down over the old woman's table as if I wanted something, clapped the money without further ado into her hands. I spoke not a word, turned on my heel, and went my way. 

What a wonderful savour there was in feeling oneself an honest man oncemore! My empty pockets troubled me no longer; it was simply a delightfulfeeling to me to be cleaned out. When I weighed the whole matterthoroughly, this money had in reality cost me much secret anguish; I hadreally thought about it with dread and shuddering time upon time. I was nohardened soul; my honourable nature rebelled against such a low action. God be praised, I had raised myself in my own estimation again! "Do as Ihave done!" I said to myself, looking across the thronged market-place--"only just do as I have done!" I had gladdened a poor old cake vendor tosuch good purpose that she was perfectly dumbfounded. Tonight her childrenwouldn't go hungry to bed. . . . I buoyed myself up with these reflectionsand considered that I had behaved in a most exemplary manner. God bepraised! The money was out of my hands now!

Tipsy and nervous, I wandered down the street, and swelled withsatisfaction. The joy of being able to meet Ylajali cleanly andhonourably, and of feeling I could look her in the face, ran away with me. I was not conscious of any pain. My head was clear and buoyant; it was asif it were a head of mere light that rested and gleamed on my shoulders. Ifelt inclined to play the wildest pranks, to do something astounding, toset the whole town in a ferment. All up through Graendsen I conductedmyself like a madman. There was a buzzing in my ears, and intoxication ranriot in my brains. The whim seized me to go and tell my age to acommissionaire, who, by-the-way, had not addressed a word to me; to takehold of his hands, and gaze impressively in his face, and leave him againwithout any explanation. I distinguished every nuance in the voice andlaughter of the passers-by, observed some little birds that hopped beforeme in the street, took to studying the expression of the paving-stones, and discovered all sorts of tokens and signs in them. Thus occupied, Iarrive at length at Parliament Place. I stand all at once stock-still, andlook at the droskes; the drivers are wandering about, chatting andlaughing. The horses hang their heads and cower in the bitter weather. "Goahead!" I say, giving myself a dig with my elbow. I went hurriedly over tothe first vehicle, and got in. "Ullevoldsveien, No. 37, " I called out, andwe rolled off. 

On the way the driver looked round, stooped and peeped several times intothe trap, where I sat, sheltered underneath the hood. Had he, too, grownsuspicious? There was no doubt of it; my miserable attire had attractedhis attention. 

"I want to meet a man, " I called to him, in order to be beforehand withhim, and I explained gravely that I must really meet this man. We stopoutside 37, and I jump out, spring up the stairs right to the thirdstorey, seize a bell, and pull it. It gives six or seven fearful pealsinside. 

A maid comes out and opens the door. I notice that she has round, golddrops in her ears, and black stuff buttons on her grey bodice. She looksat me with a frightened air. 

I inquire for Kierulf--Joachim Kierulf, if I might add further--awool-dealer; in short, not a man one could make a mistake about. . . . 

The girl shook her head. "No Kierulf lives here, " said she. 

She stared at me, and held the door ready to close it. She made no effortto find the man for me. She really looked as if she knew the person Iinquired for, if she would only take the trouble to reflect a bit. Thelazy jade! I got vexed, turned my back on her, and ran downstairs again. 

"He wasn't there, " I called to the driver. 

"Wasn't he there?"

"No. Drive to Tomtegaden, No. 11. " I was in a state of the most violentexcitement, and imparted something of the same feeling to the driver. Heevidently thought it was a matter of life and death, and he drove on, without further ado. He whipped up the horse sharply. 

"What's the man's name?" he inquired, turning round on the box. 

"Kierulf, a dealer in wool--Kierulf. "

And the driver, too, thought this was a man one would not be likely tomake any mistake about. 

"Didn't he generally wear a light morning, coat?"

"What!" I cried; "a light morning-coat? Are you mad? Do you think it is atea-cup I am inquiring about?" This light morning-coat came mostinopportunely; it spoilt the whole man for me such as I had fancied him. 

"What was it you said he was called?--Kierulf?"

"Of course, " I replied. "Is there anything wonderful in that? The namedoesn't disgrace any one. "

"Hasn't he red hair?"

Well, it was quite possible that he had red hair, and now that the drivermentioned the matter, I was suddenly convinced that he was right. I feltgrateful to the poor driver, and hastened to inform him that he had hitthe man off to a T--he really was just as he described him, --and Iremarked, in addition, that it would be a phenomenon to see such a manwithout red hair. 

"It must be him I drove a couple of times, " said the driver; "he had aknobbed stick. "

This brought the man vividly before me, and Isaid, "Ha, ha! I suppose no one has ever yet seenthe man without a knobbed stick in his hand, ofthat you can be certain, quite certain. "

Yes, it was clear that it was the same man he had driven. He recognizedhim--and he drove so that the horse's shoes struck sparks as they touchedthe stones. 

All through this phase of excitement I had not for one second lost mypresence of mind. We pass a policeman, and I notice his number is 69. Thisnumber struck me with such vivid clearness that it penetrated like asplint into my brain--69--accurately 69. I wouldn't forget it. 

I leant back in the vehicle, a prey to the wildest fancies; crouched underthe hood so that no one could see me. I moved my lips and commenced to Italk idiotically to myself. Madness rages through my brain, and I let itrage. I am fully conscious that I am succumbing to influences over which Ihave no control. I begin to laugh, silently, passionately, without a traceof cause, still merry and intoxicated from the couple of glasses of ale Ihave drunk. Little by little my excitement abates, my calm returns moreand more to me. I feel the cold in my sore finger, and I stick it downinside my collar to warm it a little. At length we reach Tomtegaden. Thedriver pulls up. 

I alight, without any haste, absently, listlessly, with my head heavy. Igo through a gateway and come into a yard across which I pass. I come to adoor which I open and pass through; I find myself in a lobby, a sort ofanteroom, with two windows. There are two boxes in it, one on top of theother, in one corner, and against the wall an old, painted sofa-bed overwhich a rug is spread. To the right, in the next room, I hear voices andthe cry of a child, and above me, on the second floor, the sound of aniron plate being hammered. All this I notice the moment as I enter. 

I step quietly across the room to the opposite door without any haste, without any thought of flight; open it, too, and come out inVognmansgaden. I look up at the house through which I have passed. "Refreshment and lodgings for travellers. "

It is not my intention to escape, to steal away from the driver who iswaiting for me. I go very coolly down Vognmansgaden, without fear of beingconscious of doing any wrong. Kierulf, this dealer in wool, who hasspooked in my brain so long--this creature in whose existence I believe, and whom it was of vital importance that I should meet--had vanished frommy memory; was wiped out with many other mad whims which came and went inturns. I recalled him no longer, except as a reminiscence--a phantom. 

In measure, as I walked on, I become more and more sober; felt languid andweary, and dragged my legs after me. The snow still fell in great moistflakes. At last I reached Gronland; far out, near the church, I sat downto rest on a seat. All the passers-by looked at me with much astonishment. I fell a-thinking. 

Thou good God, what a miserable plight I have come to! I was so heartilytired and weary of all my miserable life that I did not find it worth thetrouble of fighting any longer to preserve it. Adversity had gained theupper hand; it had been too strong for me. I had become so strangelypoverty-stricken and broken, a mere shadow of what I once had been; myshoulders were sunken right down on one side, and I had contracted a habitof stooping forward fearfully as I walked, in order to spare my chest whatlittle I could. I had examined my body a few days ago, one noon up in myroom, and I had stood and cried over it the whole time. I had worn thesame shirt for many weeks, and it was quite stiff with stale sweat, andhad chafed my skin. A little blood and water ran out of the sore place; itdid not hurt much, but it was very tiresome to have this tender place inthe middle of my stomach. I had no remedy for it, and it wouldn't heal ofits own accord. I washed it, dried it carefully, and put on the sameshirt. There was no help for it, it. . . . 

I sit there on the bench and ponder over all this, and am sad enough. Iloathe myself. My very hands seem distasteful to me; the loose, almostcoarse, expression of the backs of them pains me, disgusts me. I feelmyself rudely affected by the sight of my lean fingers. I hate the wholeof my gaunt, shrunken body, and shrink from bearing it, from feeling itenvelop me. Lord, if the whole thing would come to an end now, I wouldheartily, gladly die!

Completely worsted, soiled, defiled, and debased in my own estimation, Irose mechanically and commenced to turn my steps homewards. On the way Ipassed a door, upon which the following was to be read on aplate--"Winding-sheets to be had at Miss Andersen's, door to the right. "Old memories! I muttered, as my thoughts flew back to my former room inHammersborg. The little rocking-chair, the newspapers near the door, thelighthouse director's announcement, and Fabian Olsen, the baker'snew-baked bread. Ah yes; times were better with me then than now; onenight I had written a tale for ten shillings, now I couldn't writeanything. My head grew light as soon as ever I attempted it. Yes, I wouldput an end to it now; and I went on and on. 

As I got nearer and nearer to the provision shop, I had the half-consciousfeeling of approaching a danger, but I determined to stick to my purpose;I would give myself up. I ran quickly up the steps. At the door I met alittle girl who was carrying a cup in her hands, and I slipped past herand opened the door. The shop boy and I stand face to face alone for thesecond time. 

"Well!" he exclaims; "fearfully bad weather now, isn't it?" What did thisgoing round the bush signify? Why didn't he seize me at once? I gotfurious, and cried:

"Oh, I haven't come to prate about the weather. "

This violent preliminary takes him aback; his little huckster brain failshim. It has never even occurred to him that I have cheated him of fiveshillings. 

"Don't you know, then, that I have swindled you?" I query impatiently, andI breathe quickly with the excitement; I tremble and am ready to use forceif he doesn't come to the point. 

But the poor man has no misgivings. 

Well, bless my soul, what stupid creatures one has to mix with in thisworld! I abuse him, explain to him every detail as to how it had allhappened, show him where the fact was accomplished, where the money hadlain; how I had gathered it up in my hand and closed my fingers overit--and he takes it all in and does nothing. He shifts uneasily from onefoot to the other, listens for footsteps in the next room, make signs tohush me, to try and make me speak lower, and says at last:

"It was a mean enough thing of you to do!"

"No; hold on, " I explained in my desire to contradict him--to aggravatehim. It wasn't quite so mean as he imagined it to be, in his hucksterhead. Naturally, I didn't keep the money; that could never have entered myhead. I, for my part, scorned to derive any benefit from it--that wasopposed to my thoroughly honest nature. 

"What did you do with it, then?"

"I gave it away to a poor old woman--every farthing of it. " He mustunderstand that that was the sort of person I was; I didn't forget thepoor so. . . . 

He stands and thinks over this a while, becomes manifestly very dubious asto how far I am an honest man or not. At last he says:

"Oughtn't you rather to have brought it back again?"

"Now, listen here, " I reply; "I didn't want to get you into trouble in anyway; but that is the thanks one gets for being generous. Here I stand andexplain the whole thing to you, and you simply, instead of being ashamedas a dog, make no effort to settle the dispute with me. Therefore I washmy hands of you, and as for the rest, I say, 'The devil take you!'Good-day. "

I left, slamming the door behind me. But when I got home to my room, intothe melancholy hole, wet through from the soft snow, trembling in my kneesfrom the day's wanderings, I dismounted instantly from my high horse, andsank together once more. 

I regretted my attack upon the poor shop-boy, wept, clutched myself by thethroat to punish myself for my miserable trick, and behaved like alunatic. He had naturally been in the most deadly terror for the sake ofhis situation; he had not dared to make any fuss about the five shillingsthat were lost to the business, and I had taken advantage of his fear, hadtortured him with my violent address, stabbed him with every loud wordthat I had roared out. And the master himself had perhaps been sittinginside the inner room, almost within an ace of feeling called upon to comeout and inquire what was the row. No, there was no longer any limit to thelow things I might be tempted to do. 

Well, why hadn't I been locked up? then it would have come to an end. Iwould almost have stretched out my wrists for the handcuffs. I would nothave offered the slightest resistance; on the contrary, I would haveassisted them. Lord of Heaven and Earth! one day of my life for one happysecond again! My whole life for a mess of lentils! Hear me only thisonce!. . . 

I lay down in the wet clothes I had on, with a vague idea that I might dieduring the night. And I used my last strength to tidy up my bed a little, so that it might appear a little orderly about me in the morning. I foldedmy hands and chose my position. 

All at once I remember Ylajali. To think that I could have forgotten herthe entire evening through! And light forces its way ever so faintly intomy spirit again--a little ray of sunshine that makes me so blessedly warm;and gradually more sun comes, a rare, silken, balmy light that caresses mewith soothing loveliness. And the sun grows stronger and stronger, burnssharply in my temples, seethes fiercely and glowingly in my emaciatedbrain. And at last, a maddening pyre of rays flames up before my eyes; aheaven and earth in conflagration men and beasts of fire, mountains offire, devils of fire, an abyss, a wilderness, a hurricane, a universe inbrazen ignition, a smoking, smouldering day of doom!

And I saw and heard no more. . . . 

 * * * * *

I woke in a sweat the next morning, moist all over, my whole body bathedin dampness. The fever had laid violent hands on me. At first I had noclear idea of what had happened to me; I looked about me in amazement, felt a complete transformation of my being, absolutely failed to recognizemyself again. I felt along my own arms and down my legs, was struck withastonishment that the window was where it was, and not in the oppositewall; and I could hear the tramp of the horses' feet in the yard below asif it came from above me. I felt rather sick, too--qualmish. 

My hair clung wet and cold about my forehead. I raised myself on my elbowand looked at the pillow; damp hair lay on it, too, in patches. My feethad swelled up in my shoes during the night, but they caused me no pain, only I could not move my toes much, they were too stiff. 

As the afternoon closed in, and it had already begun to grow a littledusk, I got up out of bed and commenced to move about the room a little. Ifelt my way with short, careful steps, taking care to keep my balance andspare my feet as much as possible. I did not suffer much, and I did notcry; neither was I, taking all into consideration, sad. On the contrary, Iwas blissfully content. It did not strike me just then that anything couldbe otherwise than it was. 

Then I went out. 

The only thing that troubled me a little, in spite of the nausea that thethought of food inspired in me, was hunger. I commenced to be sensible ofa shameless appetite again; a ravenous lust of food, which grew steadilyworse and worse. It gnawed unmercifully in my breast; carrying on asilent, mysterious work in there. It was as if a score of diminutivegnome-like insects set their heads on one side and gnawed for a little, then laid their heads on the other side and gnawed a little more, then layquite still for a moment's space, and then began afresh, boringnoiselessly in, and without any haste, and left empty spaces everywhereafter them as they went on. . . . 

I was not ill, but faint; I broke into a sweat. I thought of going to themarket-place to rest a while, but the way was long and wearisome; at lastI had almost reached it. I stood at the corner of the market and MarketStreet; the sweat ran down into my eyes and blinded me, and I had juststopped in order to wipe it away a little. I did not notice the place Iwas standing in; in fact, I did not think about it; the noise around mewas something frightful. 

Suddenly a call rings out, a cold, sharp warning. I hear this cry--hear itquite well, and I start nervously to one side, stepping as quickly as mybad foot allows me to. A monster of a bread-van brushes past me, and thewheel grazes my coat; I might perhaps have been a little quicker if I hadexerted myself. Well, there was no help for it; one foot pained me, acouple of toes were crunched. I felt that they, as it were, curled up inmy shoes. 

The driver reins in his horse with all his might. He turns round on thevan and inquires in a fright how it fares with me. Oh! it might have beenworse, far worse. . . . It was perhaps not so dangerous. . . . I didn't thinkany bones were broken. Oh, pray. . . . 

I rushed over as quickly as I could to a seat; all these people whostopped and stared at me abashed me. After all, it was no mortal blow;comparatively speaking, I had got off luckily enough, as misfortune wasbound to come in my way. The worst thing was that my shoe was crushed topieces; the sole was torn loose at the toe. I help up my foot, and sawblood inside the gap. Well, it wasn't intentional on either side; it wasnot the man's purpose to make things worse for me than they were; helooked much concerned about it. It was quite certain that if I had beggedhim for a piece of bread out of his cart he would have given it to me. Hewould certainly have given it to me gladly. God bless him in return, wherever he is!. . . 

I was terribly hungry, and I did not know what to do with myself and myshameless appetite. I writhed from side to side on the seat, and bowed mychest right down to my knees; I was almost distracted. When it got dark Ijogged along to the Town Hall--God knows how I got there--and sat on theedge of the balustrade. I tore a pocket out of my coat and took to chewingit; not with any defined object, but with dour mien and unseeing eyes, staring straight into space. I could hear a group of little childrenplaying around near me, and perceive, in an instinctive sort of way, somepedestrians pass me by; otherwise I observed nothing. 

All at once, it enters my head to go to one of the meat bazaars underneathme, and beg a piece of raw meat. I go straight along the balustrade to theother side of the bazaar buildings, and descend the steps. When I hadnearly reached the stalls on the lower floor, I called up the archwayleading to the stairs, and made a threatening backward gesture, as if Iwere talking to a dog up there, and boldly addressed the first butcher Imet. 

"Ah, will you be kind enough to give me a bone for my dog?" I said; "onlya bone. There needn't be anything on it; it's just to give him somethingto carry in his mouth. "

I got the bone, a capital little bone, on which there still remained amorsel of meat, and hid it under my coat. I thanked the man so heartilythat he looked at me in amazement. 

"Oh, no need of thanks, " said he. 

"Oh yes; don't say that, " I mumbled; "it is kindly done of you, " and Iascended the steps again. 

My heart was throbbing violently in my breast. I sneaked into one of thepassages, where the forges are, as far in as I could go, and stoppedoutside a dilapidated door leading to a back-yard. There was no light tobe seen anywhere, only blessed darkness all around me; and I began to gnawat the bone. 

It had no taste; a rank smell of blood oozed from it, and I was forced tovomit almost immediately. I tried anew. If I could only keep it down, itwould, in spite of all, have some effect. It was simply a matter offorcing it to remain down there. But I vomited again. I grew wild, bitangrily into the meat, tore off a morsel, and gulped it down by sheerstrength of will; and yet it was of no use. Just as soon as the littlefragments of meat became warm in my stomach up they came again, worseluck. I clenched my hands in frenzy, burst into tears from sheerhelplessness, and gnawed away as one possessed. I cried, so that the bonegot wet and dirty with my tears, vomited, cursed and groaned again, criedas if my heart would break, and vomited anew. I consigned all the powersthat be to the lowermost torture in the loudest voice. 

Quiet--not a soul about--no light, no noise; I am in a state of the mostfearful excitement; I breathe hardly and audibly, and I cry with gnashingteeth, each time that the morsel of meat, which might satisfy me a little, comes up. As I find that, in spite of all my efforts, it avails me naught, I cast the bone at the door. I am filled with the most impotent hate;shriek, and menace with my fists towards Heaven; yell God's name hoarsely, and bend my fingers like claws, with ill-suppressed fury. . . . 

I tell you, you Heaven's Holy Baal, you don't exist; but that, if you did, I would curse you so that your Heaven would quiver with the fire of hell!I tell you, I have offered you my service, and you repulsed me; and I turnmy back on you for all eternity, because you did not know your time ofvisitation! I tell you that I am about to die, and yet I mock you! YouHeaven God and Apis! with death staring me in the face--I tell you, Iwould rather be a bondsman in hell than a freedman in your mansions! Itell you, I am filled with a blissful contempt for your divine paltriness;and I choose the abyss of destruction for a perpetual resort, where thedevils Judas and Pharaoh are cast down!

I tell you your Heaven is full of the kingdom of the earth's mostcrass-headed idiots and poverty-stricken in spirit! I tell you, you havefilled your Heaven with the grossest and most cherished harlots from herebelow, who have bent their knees piteously before you at their hour ofdeath! I tell you, you have used force against me, and you know not, youomniscient nullity, that I never bend in opposition! I tell you, all mylife, every cell in my body, every power of my soul, gasps to mockyou--you Gracious Monster on High. I tell you, I would, if I could, breathe it into every human soul, every flower, every leaf, every dewdropin the garden! I tell you, I would scoff you on the day of doom, and cursethe teeth out of my mouth for the sake of your Deity's boundlessmiserableness! I tell you from this hour I renounce all thy works and allthy pomps! I will execrate my thought if it dwell on you again, and tearout my lips if they ever utter your name! I tell you, if you exist, mylast word in life or in death--I bid you farewell, for all time andeternity--I bid you farewell with heart and reins. I bid you the lastirrevocable farewell, and I am silent, and turn my back on you and go myway. . . . Quiet. 

I tremble with excitement and exhaustion, and stand on the same spot, still whispering oaths and abusive epithets, hiccoughing after the violentcrying fit, broken down and apathetic after my frenzied outburst of rage. I stand there for maybe an hour, hiccough and whisper, and hold on to thedoor. Then I hear voices--a conversation between two men who are comingdown the passage. I slink away from the door, drag myself along the wallsof the houses, and come out again into the light streets. As I jog alongYoung's Hill my brain begins to work in a most peculiar direction. Itoccurs to me that the wretched hovels down at the corner of themarket-place, the stores for loose materials, the old booths forsecond-hand clothes, are really a disgrace to the place--they spoilt thewhole appearance of the market, and were a blot on the town, Fie! awaywith the rubbish! And I turned over in my mind as I walked on what itwould cost to remove the Geographical Survey down there--that handsomebuilding which had always attracted me so much each time I passed it. Itwould perhaps not be possible to undertake a removal of that kind undertwo or three hundred pounds. A pretty sum--three hundred pounds! One mustadmit, a tidy enough little sum for pocket-money! Ha, ha! just to make astart with, eh? and I nodded my head, and conceded that it was a tidyenough bit of pocket-money to make a start with. I was still tremblingover my whole body, and hiccoughed now and then violently after my cry. Ihad a feeling that there was not much life left in me--that I was reallysinging my last verse. It was almost a matter of indifference to me; itdid not trouble me in the least. On the contrary, I wended my way downtown, down to the wharf, farther and farther away from my room. I would, for that matter, have willingly laid myself down flat in the street todie. My sufferings were rendering me more and more callous. My sore footthrobbed violently; I had a sensation as if the pain was creeping upthrough my whole leg. But not even that caused me any particular distress. I had endured worse sensations. 

In this manner, I reached the railway wharf. There was no traffic, nonoise--only here and there a person to be seen, a labourer or sailorslinking round with their hands in their pockets. I took notice of a lameman, who looked sharply at me as we passed one another. I stopped himinstinctively, touched my hat, and inquired if he knew if the Nun hadsailed. Someway, I couldn't help snapping my fingers right under the man'snose, and saying, "Ay, by Jove, the _Nun_; yes, the _Nun_!"which I had totally forgotten. All the same, the thought of her had beensmouldering in me. I had carried it about unconsciously. 

Yes, bless me, the Nun had sailed. 

He couldn't tell me where she had sailed to?

The man reflects, stands on his long leg, keeps the other up in the air;it dangles a little. 

"No, " he replies. "Do you know what cargo she was taking in here?"

"No, " I answer. But by this time I had already lost interest in the_Nun_, and I asked the man how far it might be to Holmestrand, reckoned in good old geographical miles. 

"To Holmestrand? I should think. . . "

"Or to Voeblungsnaess?"

"What was I going to say? I should think to Holmestrand. . . "

"Oh, never mind; I have just remembered it, " I interrupted him again. "Youwouldn't perhaps be so kind as to give me a small bit of tobacco--onlyjust a tiny scrap?"

I received the tobacco, thanked the man heartily, and went on. I made nouse of the tobacco; I put it into my pocket. He still kept his eye onme--perhaps I had aroused his suspicions in some other way or another. Whether I stood still or walked on, I felt his suspicious look followingme. I had no mind to be persecuted by this creature. I turn round, and, dragging myself back to him, say:

"Binder"--only this one word, "Binder!" no more. I looked fixedly at himas I say it, indeed I was conscious of staring fearfully at him. It was asif I saw him with my entire body instead of only with my eyes. I stare fora while after I give utterance to this word, and then I jog along again tothe railway square. The man does not utter a syllable, he only keeps hisgaze fixed upon me. 

"Binder!" I stood suddenly still. Yes, wasn't that just what I had afeeling of the moment I met the old chap; a feeling that I had met himbefore! One bright morning up in Graendsen, when I pawned my waistcoat. Itseemed to me an eternity since that day. 

Whilst I stand and ponder over this, I lean and support myself against ahouse wall at the corner of the railway square and Harbour Street. Suddenly, I start quickly and make an effort to crawl away. As I do notsucceed in it, I stare case-hardened ahead of me and fling all shame tothe winds. There is no help for it. I am standing face to face with the"Commandor. " I get devil-may-care--brazen. I take yet a step farther fromthe wall in order to make him notice me. I do not do it to awake hiscompassion, but to mortify myself, place myself, as it were, on thepillory. I could have flung myself down in the street and begged him towalk over me, tread on my face. I don't even bid him good-evening. 

Perhaps the "Commandor" guesses that something is amiss with me. Heslackens his pace a little, and I say, in order to stop him, "I would havecalled upon you long ago with something, but nothing has come yet!"

"Indeed?" he replies in an interrogative tone. "You haven't got itfinished, then?"

"No, it didn't get finished. "

My eyes by this time are filled with tears at his friendliness, and Icough with a bitter effort to regain my composure. The "Commandor" tweakshis nose and looks at me. 

"Have you anything to live on in the meantime?" he questions. 

"No, " I reply. "I haven't that either; I haven't eaten anything today, but. . . . "

"The Lord preserve you, man, it will never do for you to go and starveyourself to death, " he exclaims, feeling in his pocket. 

This causes a feeling of shame to awake in me, and I stagger over to thewall and hold on to it. I see him finger in his purse, and he hands mehalf-a-sovereign. 

He makes no fuss about it, simply gives me half-a-sovereign, reiteratingat the same time that it would never do to let me starve to death. Istammered an objection and did not take it all at once. It is shameful ofme to . . . It was really too much. . . . 

"Hurry up, " he says, looking at his watch. "I have been waiting for thetrain; I hear it coming now. "

I took the money; I was dumb with joy, and never said a word; I didn'teven thank him once. 

"It isn't worth while feeling put out about it, " said the "Commandor" atlast. "I know you can write for it. "

And so off he went. 

When he had gone a few steps, I remembered all at once that I had notthanked him for this great assistance. I tried to overtake him, but couldnot get on quickly enough; my legs failed me, and I came near tumbling onmy face. He went farther and farther away from me. I gave up the attempt;thought of calling after him, but dared not; and when after all I didmuster up courage enough and called once or twice, he was already at toogreat a distance, and my voice had become too weak. 

I was left standing on the pavement, gazing after him. I wept quietly andsilently. "I never saw the like!" I said to myself. "He gave me half-a-sovereign. " I walked back and placed myself where he had stood, imitatedall his movements held the half-sovereign up to my moistened eyes, inspected it on both sides, and began to swear--to swear at the top of myvoice, that there was no manner of doubt that what I held in my hand washalf-a-sovereign. An hour after, maybe--a very long hour, for it had grownvery silent all around me--I stood, singularly enough, outside No. 11Tomtegaden. After I had stood and collected my wits for a moment andwondered thereat, I went through the door for the second time, right intothe "Entertainment and lodgings for travellers. " Here I asked for shelterand was immediately supplied with a bed. 

 * * * * *

Tuesday. 

Sunshine and quiet--a strangely bright day. The snow had disappeared. There was life and joy, and glad faces, smiles, and laughter everywhere. The fountains threw up sprays of water in jets, golden-tinted from thesun-light, azure from the sky. . . . 

At noon I left my lodgings in Tomtegaden, where I still lived and foundfairly comfortable, and set out for town. I was in the merriest humour, and lazied about the whole afternoon through the most frequented streetsand looked at the people. Even before seven o'clock I took a turn up St. Olav's Place and took a furtive look up at the window of No. 2. In an hourI would see her. I went about the whole time in a state of tremulous, delicious dread. What would happen? What should I say when she came downthe stairs? Good-evening? or only smile? I concluded to let it rest withthe smile. Of course I would bow profoundly to her. 

I stole away, a little ashamed to be there so early, wandered up CarlJohann for a while, and kept my eyes on University Street. When the clocksstruck eight I walked once more towards St. Olav's Place. On the way itstruck me that perhaps I might arrive a few minutes too late, and Iquickened my pace as much as I could. My foot was very sore, otherwisenothing ailed me. 

I took up my place at the fountain and drew breath. I stood there a longwhile and gazed up at the window of No. 2, but she did not come. Well, Iwould wait; I was in no hurry. She might be delayed, and I waited on. Itcouldn't well be that I had dreamt the whole thing! Had my first meetingwith her only existed in imagination the night I lay in delirium? I beganin perplexity to think over it, and wasn't at all sure. 

"Hem!" came from behind me. I heard this, and I also heard light stepsnear me, but I did not turn round, I only stared up at the wide staircasebefore me. 

"Good-evening, " came then. I forget to smile; I don't even take off my hatat first, I am so taken aback to see her come this way. 

"Have you been waiting long?" she asks. She is breathing a little quicklyafter her walk. 

"No, not at all; I only came a little while ago, " I reply. "And besides, would it matter if I had waited long? I expected, by-the-way, that youwould come from another direction. "

"I accompanied mamma to some people. Mamma is spending the evening withthem. "

"Oh, indeed, " I say. 

We had begun to walk on involuntarily. A policeman is standing at thecorner, looking at us. 

"But, after all, where are we going to?" she asks, and stops. 

"Wherever you wish; only where _you_ wish. "

"Ugh, yes! but it's such a bore to have to decide oneself. "

A pause. 

Then I say, merely for the sake of saying something:

"I see it's dark up in your windows. "

"Yes, it is, " she replies gaily; "the servant has an evening off, too, soI am all alone at home. "

We both stand and look up at the windows of No. 2 as if neither of us hadseen them before. 

"Can't we go up to your place, then?" I say; "I shall sit down at the doorthe whole time if you like. "

But then I trembled with emotion, and regretted greatly that I had perhapsbeen too forward. Supposing she were to get angry, and leave me. Suppose Iwere never to see her again. Ah, that miserable attire of mine! I waiteddespairingly for her reply. 

"You shall certainly not sit down by the door, " she says. She says itright down tenderly, and says accurately these words: "You shall certainlynot sit down by the door. "

We went up. 

Out on the lobby, where it was dark, she took hold of my hand, and led meon. There was no necessity for my being so quiet, she said, I could verywell talk. We entered. Whilst she lit the candle--it was not a lamp shelit, but a candle--whilst she lit the candle, she said, with a littlelaugh:

"But now you mustn't look at me. Ugh! I amso ashamed, but I will never do it again. "

"What will you never do again?"

"I will never . . . Ugh . . . No . . . Good gracious . . . I will never kiss youagain!"

"Won't you?" I said, and we both laughed. I stretched out my arms to her, and she glided away; slipped round to the other side of the table. Westood a while and gazed at one another; the candle stood right between us. 

"Try and catch me, " she said; and with much laughter I tried to seize holdof her. Whilst she sprang about, she loosened her veil, and took off herhat; her sparkling eyes hung on mine, and watched my movements. I made afresh sortie, and tripped on the carpet and fell, my sore foot refusing tobear me up any longer. I rose in extreme confusion. 

"Lord, how red you did get!" she said. "Well it was awfully awkward ofyou. "

"Yes, it was, " I agreed, and we began the chase afresh. 

"It seems to me you limp. "

"Yes; perhaps I do--just a little--only just a little, for that matter. "

"Last time you had a sore finger, now you have got a sore foot; it isawful the number of afflictions you have. "

"Ah, yes. I was run over slightly, a few days ago. "

"Run over! Tipsy again? Why, good heavens! what a life you lead, youngman!" and she threatened me with her forefinger, and tried to appeargrave. "Well, let us sit down, then; no, not down there by the door; youare far too reserved! Come here--you there, and I here--so, that's it . . . Ugh, it's such a bore with reticent people! One has to say and doeverything oneself; one gets no help to do anything. Now, for example, youmight just as well put your arm over the back of my chair; you couldeasily have thought of that much out of your own head, couldn't you? Butif I say anything like that, you open your eyes as wide as if you couldn'tbelieve what was being said. Yes, it is really true; I have noticed itseveral times; you are doing it now, too; but you needn't try to persuademe that you are always so modest; it is only when you don't dare to beotherwise than quiet. You were daring enough the day you were tipsy--whenyou followed me straight home and worried me with your witticisms. 'Youare losing your book, madam; you are quite certainly losing your book, madam!' Ha, ha, ha! it was really shameless of you. "

I sat dejectedly and looked at her; my heart beat violently, my bloodraced quickly through my veins, there was a singular sense of enjoyment init!

"Why don't you say something?"

"What a darling you are, " I cried. "I am simply sitting here gettingthoroughly fascinated by you--here this very moment thoroughlyfascinated. . . . There is no help for it. . . . You are the most extraordinarycreature that . . . Sometimes your eyes gleam so, that I never saw theirmatch; they look like flowers . . . Eh? No, well, no, perhaps, not likeflowers, either, but . . . I am so desperately in love with you, and it isso preposterous . . . For, great Scott! there is naturally not an atom of achance for me. . . . What is your name? Now, you really must tell me what youare called. "

"No; what is _your_ name? Gracious, I was nearly forgetting thatagain! I thought about it all yesterday, that I meant to ask you--yes, that is to say, not _all_ yesterday, but--"

"Do you know what I named you? I named you Ylajali. How do you like that?It has a gliding sound. . . . "

"Ylajali?"

"Yes. "

"Is that a foreign language?"

"Humph--no, it isn't that either!"

"Well, it isn't ugly!"

After a long discussion we told one another our names. She seated herselfclose to my side on the sofa, and shoved the chair away with her foot, andwe began to chatter afresh. 

"You are shaved this evening, too, " she said; look on the whole a littlebetter than the last time--that is to say, only just a scrap better. Don'timagine . . . No; the last time you were really shabby, and you had a dirtyrag round your finger into the bargain; and in that state you absolutelywanted me to go to some place, and take wine with you--thanks, not me!"

"So it was, after all, because of my miserable appearance that you wouldnot go with me?" I said. 

"No, " she replied and looked down. "No; God knows it wasn't. I didn't eventhink about it. "

"Listen, " said I; "you are evidently sitting here labouring under thedelusion that I can dress and live exactly as I choose, aren't you? Andthat is just what I can't do; I am very, very poor. "

She looked at me. "Are you?" she queried. 

"Yes, worse luck, I am. "

After an interval. 

"Well, gracious, so am I, too, " she said, with a cheerful movement of herhead. 

Every one of her words intoxicated me, fell on my heart like drops ofwine. She enchanted me with the trick she had of putting her head a littleon one side, and listening when I said anything, and I could feel herbreath brush my face. 

"Do you know, " I said, "that . . . But, now, you mustn't get angry--when Iwent to bed last night I settled this arm for you . . . So . . . As if you layon it . . . And then I went to sleep. "

"Did you? That was lovely!" A pause. "But of course it could only be froma distance that you would venture to do such a thing, for otherwise. . . . "

"Don't you believe I could do it otherwise?"

"No, I don't believe it. "

"Ah, from me you may expect everything, " I said, and I put my arm aroundher waist. 

"Can I?" was all she said. 

It annoyed me, almost wounded me, that she should look upon me as being soutterly inoffensive. I braced myself up, steeled my heart, and seized herhand; but she withdrew it softly, and moved a little away from me. Thatjust put an end to my courage again; I felt ashamed, and looked outthrough the window. I was, in spite of all, in far too wretched acondition; I must, above all, not try to imagine myself any one inparticular. It would have been another matter if I had met her during thetime that I still looked like a respectable human being--in my old, well-off days when I had sufficient to make an appearance; and I feltfearfully downcast!

"There now, one can see!" she said, "now one can just see one can snub youwith just the tiniest frown--make you look sheepish by just moving alittle away from you" . . . She laughed, tantalizingly, roguishly, withtightly-closed eyes, as if she could not stand being looked at, either. 

"Well, upon my soul!" I blurted out, "now you shall just see, " and I flungmy arms violently around her shoulders. I was mortified. Was the girl outof her senses? Did she think I was totally inexperienced! Ha! Then Iwould, by the living. . . . No one should say of me that I was backward onthat score. The creature was possessed by the devil himself! If it wereonly a matter of going at it, well. . . . 

She sat quite quietly, and still kept her eyes closed; neither of usspoke. I crushed her fiercely to me, pressed her body greedily against mybreast, and she spoke never a word. I heard her heart's beat, both hersand mine; they sounded like hurrying hoofbeats. 

I kissed her. 

I no longer knew myself. I uttered some nonsense, that she laughed at, whispered pet names into her mouth, caressed her cheek, kissed her manytimes. . . . 

She winds her arms about my neck, quite slowly, tenderly, the breath ofher pink quivering nostrils fans me right in the face; she strokes down myshoulders with her left hand, and says, "What a lot of loose hair thereis. "

"Yes, " I reply. 

"What can be the reason that your hair falls out so?"

"Don't know. "

"Ah, of course, because you drink too much, and perhaps . . . Fie, I won'tsay it. You ought to be ashamed. No, I wouldn't have believed that of you!To think that you, who are so young, already should lose your hair! Now, do please just tell me what sort of way you really spend your life--I amcertain it is dreadful! But only the truth, do you hear; no evasions. Anyway, I shall see by you if you hide anything--there, tell now!"

"Yes; but let me kiss you first, then. "

"Are you mad?. . . Humph, . . . I want to hear what kind of a man you are. . . . Ah, I am sure it is dreadful. "

It hurt me that she should believe the worst of me; I was afraid ofthrusting her away entirely, and I could not endure the misgivings she hadas to my way of life. I would clear myself in her eyes, make myself worthyof her, show her that she was sitting at the side of a person almostangelically disposed. Why, bless me, I could count my falls up to date onmy fingers. I related--related all--and I only related truth. I made outnothing any worse than it was; it was not my intention to rouse hercompassion. I told her also that I had stolen five shillings one evening. 

She sat and listened, with open mouth, pale, frightened, her shining eyescompletely bewildered. I desired to make it good again, to disperse thesad impression I had made, and I pulled myself up. 

"Well, it is all over now!" I said; "there can be no talk of such a thinghappening again; I am saved now. . . . "

But she was much dispirited. "The Lord preserve me!" was all she said, then kept silent. She repeated this at short intervals, and kept silentafter each "the Lord preserve me. "

I began to jest, caught hold of her, tried to tickle her, lifted her up tomy breast. I was irritated not a little--indeed, downright hurt. Was Imore unworthy in her eyes now, than if I had myself been instrumental incausing the falling out of my hair? Would she have thought more of me if Ihad made myself out to be a _roué_?. . . No nonsense now;. . . It wasjust a matter of going at it; and if it was only just a matter of going atit, so, by the living. . . 

"No;. . . What do you want?" she queried, and she added these distressingwords, "I can't be sure that you are not insane!"

I checked myself involuntarily, and I said: "You don't mean that!"

"Indeed, God knows I do! you look so strangely. And the forenoon youfollowed me--after all, you weren't tipsy that time?"

"No; but I wasn't hungry then, either; I had just eaten. . . . "

"Yes; but that made it so much the worse. "

"Would you rather I had been tipsy?"

"Yes . . . Ugh . . . I am afraid of you! Lord, can't you let me be now!"

I considered a moment. No, I couldn't let her be. . . . I happened, as ifinadvertently, to knock over the light, so that it went out. She made adespairing struggle--gave vent at last to a little whimper. 

"No, not that! If you like, you may rather kiss me, oh, dear, kind. . . . "

I stopped instantly. Her words sounded so terrified, so helpless, I wasstruck to the heart. She meant to offer me a compensation by giving meleave to kiss her! How charming, how charmingly naïve. I could have fallendown and knelt before her. 

"But, dear pretty one, " I said, completely bewildered, "I don'tunderstand. . . . I really can't conceive what sort of a game this is. . . . "

She rose, lit the candle again with trembling hands. I leant back on thesofa and did nothing. What would happen now? I was in reality very ill atease. 

She cast a look over at the clock on the wall, and started. 

"Ugh, the girl will soon come now!" she said; this was the first thing shesaid. I took the hint, and rose. She took up her jacket as if to put iton, bethought herself, and let it lie, and went over to the fireplace. Sothat it should not appear as if she had shown me the door, I said:

"Was your father in the army?" and at the same time I prepared to leave. 

"Yes; he was an officer. How did you know?"

"I didn't know; it just came into my head. "

"That was odd. "

"Ah, yes; there were some places I came to where I got a kind ofpresentiment. Ha, ha!--a part of my insanity, eh?"

She looked quickly up, but didn't answer. I felt I worried her with mypresence, and determined to make short work of it. I went towards thedoor. Would she not kiss me any more now? not even give me her hand? Istood and waited. 

"Are you going now, then?" she said, and yet she remained quietly standingover near the fireplace. 

I did not reply. I stood humbly in confusion, and looked at her withoutsaying anything. Why hadn't she left me in peace, when nothing was to comeof it? What was the matter with her now? It didn't seem to put her outthat I stood prepared to leave. She was all at once completely lost to me, and I searched for something to say to her in farewell--a weighty, cuttingword that would strike her, and perhaps impress her a little. And in theface of my first resolve, hurt as I was, instead of being proud and cold, disturbed and offended, I began right off to talk of trifles. The tellingword would not come; I conducted myself in an exceedingly aimless fashion. Why couldn't she just as well tell me plainly and straightly to go my way?I queried. Yes, indeed, why not? There was no need of feeling embarrassedabout it. Instead of reminding me that the girl would soon come home, shecould have simply said as follows: "Now you must run, for I must go andfetch my mother, and I won't have your escort through the street. " So itwas not that she had been thinking about? Ah, yes; it was that all thesame she had thought about; I understood that at once. It did not requiremuch to put me on the right track; only, just the way she had taken up herjacket, and left it down again, had convinced me immediately. As I saidbefore, I had presentiments; and it was not altogether insanity that wasat the root of it. . . . 

"But, great heavens! do forgive me for that word! It slipped out of mymouth, " she cried; but yet she stood quite quietly, and did not come overto me. 

I was inflexible, and went on. I stood there and prattled, with thepainful consciousness that I bored her, that not one of my words wenthome, and all the same I did not cease. 

At bottom one might be a fairly sensitive nature, even if one were notinsane, I ventured to say. There were natures that fed on trifles, anddied just for one hard word's sake; and I implied that I had such anature. The fact was, that my poverty had in that degree sharpened certainpowers in me, so that they caused me unpleasantness. Yes, I assure youhonestly, unpleasantness; worse luck! But this had also its advantages. Ithelped me in certain situations in life. The poor intelligent man is a farnicer observer than the rich intelligent man. The poor man looks about himat every step he takes, listens suspiciously to every word he hears fromthe people he meets, every step he takes affords in this way a task forhis thoughts and feelings--an occupation. He is quick of hearing, andsensitive; he is an experienced man, his soul bears the sears of thefire. . . . 

And I talked a long time over these sears my soul had. But the longer Italked, the more troubled she grew. At last she muttered, "My God!" acouple of times in despair, and wrung her hands. I could see well that Itormented her, and I had no wish to torment her--but did it, all the same. At last, being of the opinion that I had succeeded in telling her in rudeenough terms the essentials of what I had to say, I was touched by herheart-stricken expression. I cried:

"Now I am going, now I am going. Can't you see that I already have my handon the handle of the door? Good-bye, good-bye, " I say. "You might answerme when I say good-bye twice, and stand on the point of going. I don'teven ask to meet you again, for it would torment you. But tell me, whydidn't you leave me in peace? What had I done to you? I didn't get in yourway, now, did I? Why did you turn away from me all at once, as if youdidn't know me any longer? You have plucked me now so thoroughly bare, made me even more wretched than I ever was at any time before; but, indeed, I am not insane. You know well, if you think it over, that nothingis the matter with me now. Come over, then, and give me your hand--or giveme leave to go to you, will you? I won't do you any harm; I will onlykneel before you, only for a minute--kneel down on the floor before you, only for a minute, may I? No, no; there, I am not to do it then, I see. You are getting afraid. I will not, I will not do it; do you hear? Lord, why do you get so terrified. I am standing quite still; I am not moving. Iwould have knelt down on the carpet for a moment--just there, upon thatpatch of red, at your feet; but you got frightened--I could see it at oncein your eyes that you got frightened; that was why I stood still. I didn'tmove a step when I asked you might I, did I? I stood just as immovable asI stand now when I point out the place to you where I would have kneltbefore you, over there on the crimson rose in the carpet. I don't evenpoint with my finger. I don't point at all; I let it be, not to frightenyou. I only nod and look over at it, like this! and you know perfectlywell which rose I mean, but you won't let me kneel there. You are afraidof me, and dare not come near to me. I cannot conceive how you could havethe heart to call me insane. It isn't true; you don't believe it, either, any longer? It was once in the summer, a long time ago, I was mad; Iworked too hard, and forgot to go to dine at the right hour, when I hadtoo much to think about. That happened day after day. I ought to haveremembered it; but I went on forgetting it--by God in Heaven, it is true!God keep me from ever coming alive from this spot if I lie. There, you cansee, you do me an injustice. It was not out of need I did it; I can getcredit, much credit, at Ingebret's or Gravesen's. I often, too, had a gooddeal of money in my pocket, and did not buy food all the same, because Iforgot it. Do you hear? You don't say anything; you don't answer; youdon't stir a bit from the fire; you just stand and wait for me to go. . . . "

She came hurriedly over to me, and stretched out her hand. I looked ather, full of mistrust. Did she do it with any true heartiness, or did sheonly do it to get rid of me? She wound her arms round my neck; she hadtears in her eyes; I only stood and looked at her. She offered her mouth;I couldn't believe in her; it was quite certain she was making a sacrificeas a means of putting an end to all this. 

She said something; it sounded to me like, "I am fond of you, in spite ofall. " She said it very lowly and indistinctly; maybe I did not heararight. She may not have said just those words; but she cast herselfimpetuously against my breast, clasped both her arms about my neck for alittle while, stretched even up a bit on her toes to get a good hold, andstood so for perhaps a whole minute. I was afraid that she was forcingherself to show me this tenderness, and I only said:

"What a darling you are now!"

More I didn't say. I crushed her in my arms, stepped back, rushed to thedoor, and went out backwards. She remained in there behind me. 

Part IV

Winter had set in--a raw, wet winter, almost without snow. A foggy, dark, and everlasting night, without a single blast of fresh wind the whole weekthrough. The gas was lighted almost all the day in the streets, and yetpeople jostled one another in the fog. Every sound, the clang of thechurch bells, the jingling of the harness of the droske horses, thepeople's voices, the beat of the hoofs, everything, sounded choked andjangling through the close air, that penetrated and muffled everything. 

Week followed week, and the weather was, and remained, still the same. 

And I stayed steadily down in Vaterland. I grew more and more closelybound to this inn, this lodging-house for travellers, where I had foundshelter, in spite of my starving condition. My money was exhausted longsince; and yet I continued to come and go in this place as if I had aright to it, and was at home there. The landlady had, as yet, saidnothing; but it worried me all the same that I could not pay her. In thisway three weeks went by. I had already, many days ago, taken to writingagain; but I could not succeed in putting anything together that satisfiedme. I had not longer any luck, although I was very painstaking, and stroveearly and late; no matter what I attempted, it was useless. Good fortunehad flown; and I exerted myself in vain. 

It was in a room on the second floor, the best guest-room, that I sat andmade these attempts. I had been undisturbed up there since the firstevening when I had money and was able to settle for what I got. All thetime I was buoyed up by the hope of at last succeeding in getting togetheran article on some subject or another, so that I could pay for my room, and for whatever else I owed. That was the reason I worked on sopersistently. I had, in particular, commenced a piece from which Iexpected great things--an allegory about a fire--a profound thought uponwhich I intended to expend all my energy, and bring it to the "Commander"in payment. The "Commandor" should see that he had helped a talent thistime. I had no doubt but that he would eventually see that; it only was amatter of waiting till the spirit moved me; and why shouldn't the spiritmove me? Why should it not come over me even now, at a very early date?There was no longer anything the matter with me. My landlady gave me alittle food every day, some bread and butter, mornings and evenings, andmy nervousness had almost flown. I no longer used cloths round my handswhen I wrote; and I could stare down into the street from my window on thesecond floor without getting giddy. I was much better in every way, and itwas becoming a matter of astonishment to me that I had not alreadyfinished my allegory. I couldn't understand why it was. . . . 

But a day came when I was at last to get a clear idea of how weak I hadreally become; with what incapacity my dull brain acted. Namely, on thisday my landlady came up to me with a reckoning which she asked me to lookover. There must be something wrong in this reckoning, she said; it didn'tagree with her own book; but she had not been able to find out themistake. 

I set to work to add up. My landlady sat right opposite and looked at me. I added up these score of figures first once down, and found the totalright; then once up again, and arrived at the same result. I looked at thewoman sitting opposite me, waiting on my words. I noticed at the same timethat she was pregnant; it did not escape my attention, and yet I did notstare in any way scrutinizingly at her. 

"The total is right, " said I. 

"No; go over each figure now, " she answered. "I am sure it can't be somuch; I am positive of it. "

And I commenced to check each line--2 loaves at 2 1/2d. , 1 lamp chimney, 3d. , soap, 4d. , butter, 5d. . . . It did not require any particularly shrewdhead to run up these rows of figures--this little huckster account inwhich nothing very complex occurred. I tried honestly to find the errorthat the woman spoke about, but couldn't succeed. After I had muddledabout with these figures for some minutes I felt that, unfortunately, everything commenced to dance about in my head; I could no longerdistinguish debit or credit; I mixed the whole thing up. Finally, I cameto a dead stop at the following entry--"3. 5/16ths of a pound of cheese at9d. " My brain failed me completely; I stared stupidly down at the cheese, and got no farther. 

"It is really too confoundedly crabbed writing, " I exclaimed in despair. "Why, God bless me, here is 5/16ths of a pound of cheese entered--ha, ha!did any one ever hear the like? Yes, look here; you can see for yourself. "

"Yes, " she said; "it is often put down like that; it is a kind of Dutchcheese. Yes, that is all right--five-sixteenths is in this case fiveounces. "

"Yes, yes; I understand that well enough, " I interrupted, although intruth I understood nothing more whatever. 

I tried once more to get this little account right, that I could havetotted up in a second some months ago. I sweated fearfully, and thoughtover these enigmatical figures with all my might, and I blinked my eyesreflectingly, as if I was studying this matter sharply, but I had to giveit up. These five ounces of cheese finished me completely; it was as ifsomething snapped within my forehead. But yet, to give the impression thatI still worked out my calculation, I moved my lips and muttered a numberaloud, all the while sliding farther and farther down the reckoning as ifI were steadily coming to a result. She sat and waited. At last I said:

"Well, now, I have gone through it from first to last, and there is nomistake, as far as I can see. "

"Isn't there?" replied the woman, "isn't there really?" But I saw wellthat she did not believe me, and she seemed all at once to throw a dash ofcontempt into her words, a slightly careless tone that I had never heardfrom her before. She remarked that perhaps I was not accustomed to reckonin sixteenths; she mentioned also that she must only apply to some one whohad a knowledge of sixteenths, to get the account properly revised. Shesaid all this, not in any hurtful way to make me feel ashamed, butthoughtfully and seriously. When she got as far as the door, she said, without looking at me:

"Excuse me for taking up your time then. "

Off she went. 

A moment after, the door opened again, and she re-entered. She couldhardly have gone much farther than the stairs before she had turned back. 

"That's true, " said she; "you mustn't take it amiss; but there is a littleowing to me from you now, isn't there? Wasn't it three weeks yesterdaysince you came?" Yes, I thought it was. "It isn't so easy to keep thingsgoing with such a big family, so that I can't give lodging on credit, more's the. . . . "

I stopped her. "I am working at an article that I think I told you aboutbefore, " said I, "and as soon as ever that is finished, you shall haveyour money; you can make yourself quite easy. . . . "

"Yes; but you'll never get that article finished, though. "

"Do you think that? Maybe the spirit will move me tomorrow, or perhapsalready, tonight; it isn't at all impossible but that it may move me sometime tonight, and then my article will be completed in a quarter of anhour at the outside. You see, it isn't with my work as with otherpeople's; I can't sit down and get a certain amount finished in a day. Ihave just to wait for the right moment, and no one can tell the day orhour when the spirit may move one--it must have its own time. . . . "

My landlady went, but her confidence in me was evidently much shaken. 

As soon as I was left alone I jumped up and tore my hair in despair. No, in spite of all, there was really no salvation for me--no salvation! Mybrain was bankrupt! Had I then really turned into a complete dolt since Icould not even add up the price of a piece of Dutch cheese? But could itbe possible I had lost my senses when I could stand and put such questionsto myself? Had not I, into the bargain, right in the midst of my effortswith the reckoning, made the lucid observation that my landlady was in thefamily way? I had no reason for knowing it, no one had told me anythingabout it, neither had it occurred to me gratuitously. I sat and saw itwith my own eyes, and I understood it at once, right at a despairingmoment where I sat and added up sixteenths. How could I explain this tomyself?

I went to the window and gazed out; it looked out into Vognmandsgade. Somechildren were playing down on the pavement; poorly dressed children in themiddle of a poor street. They tossed an empty bottle between them andscreamed shrilly. A load of furniture rolled slowly by; it must belong tosome dislodged family, forced to change residence between "flitting time. "[Footnote: In Norway, l4th of March and October. ] This struck me at once. Bed-clothes and furniture were heaped on the float, moth-eaten beds andchests of drawers, red-painted chairs with three legs, mats, old iron, andtin-ware. A little girl--a mere child, a downright ugly youngster, with arunning cold in her nose--sat up on top of the load, and held fast withher poor little blue hands in order not to tumble off. She sat on a heapof frightfully stained mattresses, that children must have lain on, andlooked down at the urchins who were tossing the empty bottle to oneanother. . . . 

I stood gazing at all this; I had no difficulty in apprehending everythingthat passed before me. Whilst I stood there at the window and observedthis, I could hear my landlady's servant singing in the kitchen rightalongside of my room. I knew the air she was singing, and I listened tohear if she would sing false, and I said to myself that an idiot could nothave done all this. 

I was, God be praised, all right in my senses as any man. 

Suddenly, I saw two of the children down in the street fire up and beginto abuse one another. Two little boys; I recognized one of them; he was mylandlady's son. I open the window to hear what they are saying to oneanother, and immediately a flock of children crowded together under mywindow, and looked wistfully up. What did they expect? That somethingwould be thrown down? Withered flowers, bones, cigar ends, or one thing oranother, that they could amuse themselves with? They looked up with theirfrost-pinched faces and unspeakably wistful eyes. In the meantime, the twosmall foes continued to revile one another. 

Words like great buzzing noxious insects swarm out of their childishmouths; frightful nicknames, thieves' slang, sailors' oaths, that theyperhaps had learnt down on the wharf; and they are both so engaged thatthey do not notice my landlady, who rushes out to see what is going on. 

"Yes, " explains her son, "he catched me by the throat; I couldn't breathsfor ever so long, " and turning upon the little man who is the cause of thequarrel, and who is standing grinning maliciously at him, he getsperfectly furious, and yells, "Go to hell, Chaldean ass that you are! Tothink such vermin as you should catch folk by the throat. I will, may theLord. . . . "

And the mother, this pregnant woman, who dominates the whole street withher size, answers the ten-year-old child, as she seizes him by the arm andtries to drag him in:

"Sh--sh. Hold your jaw! I just like to hear the way you swear, too, as ifyou had been in a brothel for years. Now, in with you. "

"No, I won't. "

"Yes, you will. "

"No, I won't. "

I stand up in the window and see that the mother's temper is rising; thisdisagreeable scene excites me frightfully. I can't endure it any longer. I call down to the boy to come up to me for a minute; I call twice, justto distract them--to change the scene. The last time I call very loudly, and the mother turns round flurriedly and looks up at me. She regains herself-possession at once, looks insolently at me, nay, downrightmaliciously, and enters the house with a chiding remark to her offspring. She talks loudly, so that I may hear it, and says to him, "Fie, you oughtto be ashamed of yourself to let people see how naughty you are. "

Of all this that I stood there and observed not one thing, not even onelittle accessory detail, was lost on me; my attention was acutely keen; Iabsorbed carefully every little thing as I stood and thought out my ownthought, about each thing according as it occurred. So it was impossiblethat there could be anything the matter with my brain. How could there, inthis case, be anything the matter with it?

Listen; do you know what, said I all at once to myself, that you have beenworrying yourself long enough about your brain, giving yourself no end ofworry in this matter? Now, there must be an end to this tomfoolery. Is ita sign of insanity to notice and apprehend everything as accurately as youdo? You make me almost laugh at you, I reply. To my mind it is not withoutits humorous side, if I am any judge of such a case. Why, it happens toevery man that he once in a way sticks fast, and that, too, just with thesimplest question. It is of no significance, it is often a pure accident. As I have remarked before, I am on the point of having a good laugh atyour expense. As far as that huckster account is concerned, that paltryfive-sixteenths of beggar-man's cheese, I can happily dub it so. Ha, ha!--a cheese with cloves and pepper in it; upon my word, a cheese inwhich, to put the matter plainly, one could breed maggots. As far as thatridiculous cheese is concerned, it might happen to the cleverest fellow inthe world to be puzzled over it! Why, the smell of the cheese was enoughto finish a man; . . . And I made the greatest fun of this and all otherDutch cheeses. . . . No; set me to reckon up something really eatable, saidI--set me, if you like, at five-sixteenths of good dairy butter. That isanother matter. 

I laughed feverishly at my own whim, and found it peculiarly diverting. There was positively no longer anything the matter with me. I was in goodform--was, so to say, still in the best of form; I had a level head, nothing was wanting there, God be praised and thanked! My mirth rose inmeasure as I paced the floor and communed with myself. I laughed aloud, and felt amazingly glad. Besides, it really seemed, too, as if I onlyneeded this little happy hour, this moment of airy rapture, without a careon any side, to get my head into working order once more. 

I seated myself at the table, and set to work at my allegory; itprogressed swimmingly, better than it had done for a long time; not veryfast, 'tis true, but it seemed to me that what I did was altogetherfirst-rate. I worked, too, for the space of an hour without getting tired. 

I am sitting working at a most crucial point in this Allegory of aConflagration in a Bookshop. It appears to me so momentous a point, thatall the rest I have written counted as nothing in comparison. I was, namely, just about to weave in, in a downright profound way, this thought. It was not books that were burning, it was brains, human brains; and Iintended to make a perfect Bartholomew's night of these burning brains. 

Suddenly my door was flung open with a jerk and in much haste; my landladycame sailing in. She came straight over to the middle of the room, she didnot even pause on the threshold. 

I gave a little hoarse cry; it was just as if I had received a blow. 

"What?" said she, "I thought you said something. We have got a traveller, and we must have this room for him. You will have to sleep downstairs withus tonight. Yes; you can have a bed to yourself there too. " And before shegot my answer, she began, without further ceremony, to bundle my paperstogether on the table, and put the whole of them into a state of direconfusion. 

My happy mood was blown to the winds; I stood up at once, in anger anddespair. I let her tidy the table, and said nothing, never uttered asyllable. She thrust all the papers into my hand. 

There was nothing else for me to do. I was forced to leave the room. Andso this precious moment was spoilt also. I met the new traveller alreadyon the stairs; a young man with great blue anchors tattooed on the backsof his hands. A quay porter followed him, bearing a sea-chest on hisshoulders. He was evidently a sailor, a casual traveller for the night; hewould therefore not occupy my room for any lengthened period. Perhaps, too, I might be lucky tomorrow when the man had left, and have one of mymoments again; I only needed an inspiration for five minutes, and my essayon the conflagration would be completed. Well, I should have to submit tofate. 

I had not been inside the family rooms before, this one common room inwhich they all lived, both day and night--the husband, wife, wife'sfather, and four children. The servant lived in the kitchen, where shealso slept at night. I approached the door with much repugnance, andknocked. No one answered, yet I heard voices inside. 

The husband did not speak as I stepped in, did not acknowledge my nodeven, merely glanced at me carelessly, as if I were no concern of his. Besides, he was sitting playing cards with a person I had seen down on thequays, with the by-name of "Pane o' glass. " An infant lay and prattled toitself over in the bed, and an old man, the landlady's father, sat doubledtogether on a settle-bed, and bent his head down Over his hands as if hischest or stomach pained him. His hair was almost white, and he looked inhis crouching position like a poke-necked reptile that sat cocking itsears at something. 

"I come, worse luck, to beg for house-room down here tonight, " I said tothe man. 

"Did my wife say so?" he inquired. 

"Yes; a new lodger came to my room. "

To this the man made no reply, but proceeded to finger the cards. Therethis man sat, day after day, and played cards with anybody who happened tocome in--played for nothing, only just to kill time, and have something inhand. He never did anything else, only moved just as much as his lazylimbs felt inclined, whilst his wife bustled up and down stairs, wasoccupied on all sides, and took care to draw customers to the house. Shehad put herself in connection with quay-porters and dock-men, to whom shepaid a certain sum for every new lodger they brought her, and she oftengave them, in addition, a shelter for the night. This time it was "Pane o'glass" that had just brought along the new lodger. 

A couple of the children came in--two little girls, with thin, freckled, gutter-snipe faces; their clothes were positively wretched. A while afterthe landlady herself entered. I asked her where she intended to put me upfor the night, and she replied that I could lie in here together with theothers, or out in the ante-room on the sofa, as I thought fit. Whilst sheanswered me she fussed about the room and busied herself with differentthings that she set in order, and she never once looked at me. 

My spirits were crushed by her reply. 

I stood down near the door, and made myself small, tried to make it appearas if I were quite content all the same to change my room for another forone night's sake. I put on a friendly face on purpose not to irritate herand perhaps be hustled right out of the house. 

"Ah, yes, " I said, "there is sure to be some way I . . . , " and then held mytongue. 

She still bustled about the room. 

"For that matter, I may as well just tell you that I can't afford to givepeople credit for their board and lodging, " said she, "and I told you thatbefore, too. "

"Yes; but, my dear woman, it is only for these few days, until I get myarticle finished, " I answered, "and I will willingly give you an extrafive shillings--willingly. "

But she had evidently no faith in my article, I could see that; and Icould not afford to be proud, and leave the house, just for a slightmortification; I knew what awaited me if I went out. 

 * * * * *

A few days passed over. 

I still associated with the family below, for it was too cold in theante-room where there was no stove. I slept, too, at night on the floor ofthe room. 

The strange sailor continued to lodge in my room, and did not seem likemoving very quickly. At noon, too, my landlady came in and related how hehad paid her a month in advance, and besides, he was going to take hisfirst-mate's examination before leaving, that was why he was staying intown. I stood and listened to this, and understood that my room was lostto me for ever. 

I went out to the ante-room, and sat down. If I were lucky enough to getanything written, it would have perforce to be here where it was quiet. Itwas no longer the allegory that occupied me; I had got a new idea, aperfectly splendid plot; I would compose a one-act drama--"The Sign of theCross. " Subject taken from the Middle Ages. I had especially thought outeverything in connection with the principal characters: a magnificentlyfanatical harlot who had sinned in the temple, not from weakness ordesire, but for hate against heaven; sinner right at the foot of thealtar, with the altar-cloth under her head, just out of delicious contemptfor heaven. 

I grew more and more obsessed by this creation as the hours went on. Shestood at last, palpably, vividly embodied before my eyes, and was exactlyas I wished her to appear. Her body was to be deformed and repulsive, tall, very lean, and rather dark; and when she walked, her long limbsshould gleam through her draperies at every stride she took. She was alsoto have large outstanding ears. Curtly, she was nothing for the eye todwell upon, barely endurable to look at. What interested me in her was herwonderful shamelessness, the desperately full measure of calculated sinwhich she had committed. She really occupied me too much, my brain wasabsolutely inflated by this singular monstrosity of a creature, and Iworked for two hours, without a pause, at my drama. When I had finishedhalf-a score of pages, perhaps twelve, often with much effort, at timeswith long intervals, in which I wrote in vain and had to tear the page intwo, I had become tired, quite stiff with cold and fatigue, and I aroseand went out into the street. For the last half-hour, too, I had beendisturbed by the crying of the children inside the family room, so that Icould not, in any case, have written any more just then. So I took a longtime up over Drammensveien, and stayed away till the evening, ponderingincessantly, as I walked along, as to how I would continue my drama. Before I came home in the evening of this day, the following happened:

I stood outside a shoemaker's shop far down in Carl Johann Street, almostat the railway square. God knows why I stood just outside this shoemaker'sshop. I looked into the window as I stood there, but did not, by the way, remember that I needed shoes then; my thoughts were far away in otherparts of the world. A swarm of people talking together passed behind myback, and I heard nothing of what was said. Then a voice greeted meloudly:

"Good-evening. "

It was "Missy" who bade me good-evening! I answered at random, I looked athim, too, for a while, before I recognized him. 

"Well, how are you getting along?" he inquired. 

"Oh, always well . . . As usual. "

"By the way, tell me, " said he, "are you, then, still with Christie?"

"Christie?"

"I thought you once said you were book-keeper at Christie's?"

"Ah, yes. No; that is done with. It was impossible to get along with thatfellow; that came to an end very quickly of its own accord. "

"Why so?"

"Well, I happened to make a mis-entry one day, and so--"

"A false entry, eh?"

False entry! There stood "Missy, " and asked me straight in the face if Ihad done this thing. He even asked eagerly, and evidently with muchinterest. I looked at him, felt deeply insulted, and made no reply. 

"Yes, well, Lord! that might happen to the best fellow, " he said, as if toconsole me. He still believed I had made a false entry designedly. 

"What is it that, 'Yes, well, Lord! indeed might happen to the bestfellow'?" I inquired. "To do that. Listen, my good man. Do you stand thereand really believe that I could for a moment be guilty of such a meantrick as that? I!"

"But, my dear fellow, I thought I heard you distinctlysay that. "

"No; I said that I had made a mis-entry once, a bagatelle; if you want toknow, a false date on a letter, a single stroke of the pen wrong--that wasmy whole crime. No, God be praised, I can tell right from wrong yet awhile. How would it fare with me if I were, into the bargain, to sully myhonour? It is simply my sense of honour that keeps me afloat now. But itis strong enough too; at least, it has kept me up to date. "

I threw back my head, turned away from "Missy, " and looked down thestreet. My eyes rested on a red dress that came towards us; on a woman ata man's side. If I had not had this conversation with "Missy, " I would nothave been hurt by his coarse suspicion, and I would not have given thistoss of my head, as I turned away in offence; and so perhaps this reddress would have passed me without my having noticed it. And at bottomwhat did it concern me? What was it to me if it were the dress of the Hon. Miss Nagel, the lady-in-waiting? "Missy" stood and talked, and tried tomake good his mistake again. I did not listen to him at all; I stood thewhole time and stared at the red dress that was coming nearer up thestreet, and a stir thrilled through my breast, a gliding delicate dart. Iwhispered in thought without moving my lips:

"Ylajali!"

Now "Missy" turned round also and noticed thetwo--the lady and the man with her, --raised hishat to them, and followed them with his eyes. Idid not raise my hat, or perhaps I did unconsciously. The red dress glided up Carl Johann, and disappeared. 

"Who was it was with her?" asked "Missy. "

"The Duke, didn't you see? The so-called 'Duke. ' Did you know the lady?"

"Yes, in a sort of way. Didn't you know her?"

"No, " I replied. 

"It appears to me you saluted profoundly enough. "

"Did I?"

"Ha, ha! perhaps you didn't, " said "Missy. " "Well, that is odd. Why, itwas only at you she looked, too, the whole time. "

"When did you get to know her?" I asked. He did not really know her. Itdated from an evening in autumn. It was late; they were three jovial soulstogether, they came out late from the Grand, and met this being goingalong alone past Cammermeyer's, and they addressed her. At first sheanswered rebuffingly; but one of the jovial spirits, a man who neitherfeared fire nor water, asked her right to her face if he might not havethe civilized enjoyment of accompanying her home? He would, by the Lord, not hurt a hair on her head, as the saying goes--only go with her to herdoor, reassure himself that she reached home in safety, otherwise he couldnot rest all night. He talked incessantly as they went along, hit upon onething or another, dubbed himself Waldemar Atterdag, and representedhimself as a photographer. At last she was obliged to laugh at this merrysoul who refused to be rebuffed by her coldness, and it finally ended byhis going with her. 

"Indeed, did it? and what came of it?" I inquired; and I held my breathfor his reply. 

"Came of it? Oh, stop there; there is the lady in question. "

We both kept silent a moment, both "Missy" and I. 

"Well, I'm hanged, was that 'the Duke'? So that's what he looks like, " headded, reflectively. "Well, if she is in contact with that fellow; well, then, I wouldn't like to answer for her. "

I still kept silent. Yes, of course "the Duke" would make the pace withher. Well, what odds? How did it concern me? I bade her good-day with allher wiles: a good-day I bade her; and I tried to console myself bythinking the worst thoughts about her; took a downright pleasure indragging her through the mire. It only annoyed me to think that I haddoffed my hat to the pair, if I really had done so. Why should I raise myhat to such people? I did not care for her any longer, certainly not; shewas no longer in the very slightest degree lovely to me; she had fallenoff. Ah, the devil knows how soiled I found her! It might easily have beenthe case that it was only me she looked at; I was not in the leastastounded at that; it might be regret that began to stir in her. But thatwas no reason for me to go and lower myself and salute, like a fool, especially when she had become so seriously besmirched of late. "The Duke"was welcome to her; I wish him joy! The day might come when I would justtake into my head to pass her haughtily by without glancing once towardsher. Ay, it might happen that I would venture to do this, even if she wereto gaze straight into my eyes, and have a blood-red gown on into thebargain. It might very easily happen! Ha, ha! that would be a triumph. IfI knew myself aright, I was quite capable of completing my drama duringthe course of the night, and, before eight days had flown, I would havebrought this young woman to her knees--with all her charms, ha, ha! withall her charms. . . . 

"Good-bye, " I muttered, shortly; but "Missy" held me back. He queried:

"But what do you do all day now?"

"Do? I write, naturally. What else should I do? Is it not that I live by?For the moment, I am working at a great drama, 'The Sign of the Cross. 'Theme taken from the Middle Ages. "

"By Jove!" exclaimed "Missy, " seriously. "Well, if you succeed with that, why. . . . "

"I have no great anxiety on that score, " I replied. "In eight days' timeor so, I think you and all the folks will have heard a little more of me. "

With that I left him. 

When I got home I applied at once to my landlady, and requested a lamp. Itwas of the utmost importance to me to get this lamp; I would not go to bedtonight; my drama was raging in my brain, and I hoped so surely to be ableto write a good portion of it before morning. I put forward my requestvery humbly to her, as I had noticed that she made a dissatisfied face onmy re-entering the sitting-room. I said that I had almost completed aremarkable drama, only a couple of scenes were wanting; and I hinted thatit might be produced in some theatre or another, in no time. If she wouldonly just render me this great service now. . . . 

But madam had no lamp. She considered a bit, but could not call to mindthat she had a lamp in any place. If I liked to wait until twelve o'clock, I might perhaps get the kitchen lamp. Why didn't I buy myself a candle?

I held my tongue. I hadn't a farthing to buy a candle, and knew that rightwell. Of course I was foiled again! The servant-girl sat inside withus--simply sat in the sitting-room, and was not in the kitchen at all; sothat the lamp up there was not even lit. And I stood and thought overthis, but said no more. Suddenly the girl remarked to me:

"I thought I saw you come out of the palace a while ago; were you at adinner party?" and she laughed loudly at this jest. 

I sat down, took out my papers, and attempted to write something here, inthe meantime. I held the paper on my knees, and gazed persistently at thefloor to avoid being distracted by anything; but it helped not a whit;nothing helped me; I got no farther. The landlady's two little girls camein and made a row with the cat--a queer, sick cat that had scarcely a hairon it; they blew into its eyes until water sprang out of them and trickleddown its nose. The landlord and a couple of others sat at a table andplayed _cent et un_. The wife alone was busy as ever, and sat andsewed at some garment. She saw well that I could not write anything in themidst of all this disturbance; but she troubled herself no more about me;she even smiled when the servant-girl asked me if I had been out to dine. The whole household had become hostile towards me. It was as if I had onlyneeded disgrace of being obliged to resign my room to a stranger to betreated as a man of no account. Even the servant, a little, brown-eyed, street-wench, with a big fringe over her forehead, and a perfectly flatbosom, poked fun at me in the evening when I got my ration of bread andbutter. She inquired perpetually where, then, was I in the habit ofdining, as she had never seen me picking my teeth outside the Grand? Itwas clear that she was aware of my wretched circumstances, and took apleasure in letting me know of it. 

I fall suddenly into thought over all this, and am not able to find asolitary speech for my drama. Time upon time I seek in vain; a strangebuzzing begins inside my head, and I give it up. I thrust the papers intomy pocket, and look up. The girl is sitting straight opposite me. I lookat her--look at her narrow back and drooping shoulders, that are not yetfully developed. What business was it of hers to fly at me? Even supposingI did come out of the palace, what then? Did it harm her in any way? Shehad laughed insolently in the past few days at me, when I was a bitawkward and stumbled on the stairs, or caught fast on a nail and tore mycoat. It was not later than yesterday that she gathered up my rough copy, that I had thrown aside in the ante-room--stolen these rejected fragmentsof my drama, and read them aloud in the room here; made fun of them inevery one's hearing, just to amuse herself at my expense. I had nevermolested her in any way, and could not recall that I had ever asked her todo me a service. On the contrary, I made up my bed on the floor in theante-room myself, in order not to give her any trouble with it. She madefun of me, too, because my hair fell out. Hair lay and floated about inthe basin I washed in the mornings, and she made merry over it. Then myshoes, too, had grown rather shabby of late, particularly the one that hadbeen run over by the bread-van, and she found subject for jesting in them. "God bless you and your shoes!" said she, looking at them; "they are aswide as a dog's house. " And she was right; they were trodden out. But thenI couldn't procure myself any others just at present. 

Whilst I sit and call all this to mind, and marvel over the evident maliceof the servant, the little girls have begun to tease the old man over inthe bed; they are jumping around him, fully bent on this diversion. Theyboth found a straw, which they poked into his ears. I looked on at thisfor a while, and refrained from interfering. The old fellow did not move afinger to defend himself; he only looked at his tormentors with furiouseyes each time they prodded him, and jerked his head to escape when thestraws were already in his ears. I got more and more irritated at thissight, and could not keep my eyes away from it. The father looked up fromhis cards, and laughed at the youngsters; he also drew the attention ofhis comrades at play to what was going on. Why didn't the old fellow move?Why didn't he fling the children aside with his arms? I took a stride, andapproached the bed. 

"Let them alone! let them alone! he is paralysed, " called the landlord. 

And out of fear to be shown the door for the night, simply out of fear ofrousing the man's displeasure by interfering with this scene, I steppedback silently to my old place and kept myself quiet. Why should I risk mylodging and my portion of bread and butter by poking my nose into thefamily squabbles? No idiotic pranks for the sake of a half-dying old man, and I stood and felt as delightfully hard as a flint. 

The little urchins did not cease their plaguing; it amused them that theold chap could not hold his head quiet, and they aimed at his eyes andnostrils. He stared at them with a ludicrous expression; he said nothing, and could not stir his arms. Suddenly he raised the upper part of his bodya little and spat in the face of one of the little girls, drew himself upagain and spat at the other, but did not reach her. I stood and looked on, saw that the landlord flung the cards on the table at which he sat, andsprang over towards the bed. His face was flushed, and he shouted:

"Will you sit and spit right into people's eyes, you old boar?"

"But, good Lord, he got no peace from them!" I cried, beside myself. 

But all the time I stood in fear of being turned out, and I certainly didnot utter my protest with any particular force; I only trembled over mywhole body with irritation. He turned towards me, and said:

"Eh, listen to him, then. What the devil is it to you? You just keep yourtongue in your jaw, you--just mark what I tell you, 'twill serve youbest. "

But now the wife's voice made itself heard, and the house was filled withscolding and railing. 

"May God help me, but I think you are mad or possessed, the whole pack ofyou!" she shrieked. "If you want to stay in here you'll have to be quiet, both of you! Humph! it isn't enough that one is to keep open house andfood for vermin, but one is to have sparring and rowing and the devil'sown to-do in the sitting-room as well. But I won't have any more of it, not if I know it. Sh--h! Hold your tongues, you brats there, and wipe yournoses, too; if you don't, I'll come and do it. I never saw the like ofsuch people. Here they walk in out of the street, without even a penny tobuy flea-powder, and begin to kick up rows in the middle of the night andquarrel with the people who own the house, I don't mean to have any moreof it, do you understand that? and you can go your way, every one whodoesn't belong home here. I am going to have peace in my own quarters, Iam. "

I said nothing, I never opened my mouth once. I sat down again next thedoor and listened to the noise. They all screamed together, even thechildren, and the girl who wanted to explain how the whole disturbancecommenced. If I only kept quiet it would all blow over sometime; it wouldsurely not come to the worst if I only did not utter a word; and what wordafter all could I have to say? Was it not perhaps winter outside, and faradvanced into the night, besides? Was that a time to strike a blow, andshow one could hold one's own? No folly now!. . . So I sat still and made noattempt to leave the house; I never even blushed at keeping silent, neverfelt ashamed, although I had almost been shown the door. I stared coolly, case-hardened, at the wall where Christ hung in an oleograph, and held mytongue obstinately during all the landlady's attack. 

"Well, if it is me you want to get quit of, ma'am, there will be nothingin the way as far as I am concerned, " said one of the card-players as hestood up. The other card-players rose as well. 

"No, I didn't mean you--nor you either, " replied the landlady to them. "Ifthere's any need to, I will show well enough who I mean, if there's theleast need to, if I know myself rightly. Oh, it will be shown quick enoughwho it is. . . . "

She talked with pauses, gave me these thrusts at short intervals, and spunit out to make it clearer and clearer that it was me she meant. "Quiet, "said I to myself; "only keep quiet!" She had not asked me to go--notexpressly, not in plain words. Just no putting on side on my part--nountimely pride! Brave it out!. . . That was really most singular green hairon that Christ in the oleograph. It was not too unlike green grass, orexpressed with exquisite exactitude thick meadow grass. Ha! a perfectlycorrect remark--unusually thick meadow grass. . . . A train of fleeting ideasdarts at this moment through my head. From green grass to the text, Eachlife is like unto grass that is kindled; from that to the Day of Judgment, when all will be consumed; then a little detour down to the earthquake inLisbon, about which something floated before me in reference to a brassSpanish spittoon and an ebony pen handle that I had seen down atYlajali's. Ah, yes, all was transitory, just like grass that was kindled. It all ended in four planks and a winding-sheet. "Winding-sheets to be hadfrom Miss Andersen's, on the right of the door. . . . " And all this wastossed about in my head during the despairing moment when my landlady wasabout to thrust me from her door. 

"He doesn't hear, " she yelled. "I tell you, you'll quit this house. Nowyou know it. I believe God blast me, that the man is mad, I do! Now, outyou go, on the blessed spot, and so no more chat about it. "

I looked towards the door, not in order to leave--no, certainly not inorder to leave. An audacious notion seized me--if there had been a key inthe door, I would have turned it and locked myself in along with the restto escape going. I had a perfectly hysterical dread of going out into thestreets again. 

But there was no key in the door. 

Then, suddenly my landlord's voice mingled with that of his wife, and Istood still with amazement. The same man who had threatened me a while agotook my part, strangely enough now. He said:

"No, it won't do to turn folk out at night; do you know one can bepunished for doing that?"

"I didn't know if there was a punishment for that; I couldn't say, butperhaps it was so, " and the wife bethought herself quickly, grew quiet, and spoke no more. 

She placed two pieces of bread and butter before me for supper, but I didnot touch them, just out of gratitude to the man; so I pretended that Ihad had a little food in town. 

When at length I took myself off to the anteroom to go to bed, she cameout after me, stopped on the threshold, and said loudly, whilst herunsightly figure seemed to strut out towards me:

"But this is the last night you sleep here, so now you know it. "

"Yes, yes, " I replied. 

There would perhaps be some way of finding a shelter tomorrow, if I triedhard for it. I would surely be able to find some hiding-place. For thetime being I would rejoice that I was not obliged to go out tonight. 

I slept till between five and six in the morning--it was not yet lightwhen I awoke--but all the same I got up at once. I had lain in all myclothes on account of the cold, and had no dressing to do. When I haddrunk a little cold water and opened the door quietly, I went outdirectly, for I was afraid to face my landlady again. 

A couple of policemen who had been on watch all night were the only livingbeings I saw in the street. A while after, some men began to extinguishthe lamps. I wandered about without aim or end, reached Kirkegaden and theroad down towards the fortress. Cold and still sleepy, weak in the kneesand back after my long walk, and very hungry, I sat down on a seat anddozed for a long time. For three weeks I had lived exclusively on thebread and butter that my landlady had given me morning and evening. Now itwas twenty-four hours since I had had my last meal. Hunger began to gnawbadly at me again; I must seek a help for it right quickly. With thisthought I fell asleep again upon the seat. . . . 

I was aroused by the sound of people speaking near me, and when I hadcollected myself a little I saw that it was broad day, and that every onewas up and about. I got up and walked away. The sun burst over theheights, the sky was pale and tender, and in my delight over the lovelymorning, after the many dark gloomy weeks, I forgot all cares, and itseemed to me as if I had fared worse on other occasions. I clapped myselfon the chest and sang a little snatch for myself. My voice sounded sowretched, downright exhausted it sounded, and I moved myself to tears withit. This magnificent day, the white heavens swimming in light, had far toomighty an effect upon me, and I burst into loud weeping. 

"What is the matter with you?" inquired a man. I did not answer, buthurried away, hiding my face from all men. I reached the bridge. A largebarque with the Russian flag lay and discharged coal. I read her name, _Copégoro_, on her side. It distracted me for a time to watch whattook place on board this foreign ship. She must be almost discharged; shelay with IX foot visible on her side, in spite of all the ballast she hadalready taken in, and there was a hollow boom through the whole shipwhenever the coal-heavers stamped on the deck with their heavy boots. 

The sun, the light, and the salt breath from the sea, all this busy, merrylife pulled me together a bit, and caused my blood to run lustily. Suddenly it entered my head that I could work at a few scenes of my dramawhilst I sat here, and I took my papers out of my pocket. 

I tried to place a speech into a monk's mouth--a speech that ought toswell with pride and intolerance, but it was of no use; so I skipped overthe monk and tried to work out an oration--the Deemster's oration to theviolator of the Temple, --and I wrote half-a-page of this oration, uponwhich I stopped. The right local colour would not tinge my words, thebustle about me, the shanties, the noise of the gangways, and theceaseless rattle of the iron chains, fitted in so little with theatmosphere of the musty air of the dim Middle Ages, that was to envelop mydrama as with a mist. 

I bundled my papers together and got up. 

All the same, I got into a happy vein--a grand vein, --and I felt convincedthat I could effect something if all went well. 

If I only had a place to go to. I thought over it--stopped right there inthe street and pondered, but I could not bring to mind a single quiet spotin the town where I could seat myself for an hour. There was no other wayopen; I would have to go back to the lodging-house in Vaterland. I shrankat the thought of it, and I told myself all the while that it would notdo. I went ahead all the same, and approached nearer and nearer to theforbidden spot. Of course it was wretched. I admitted to myself that itwas degrading--downright degrading, but there was no help for it. I wasnot in the least proud; I dared make the assertion roundly, that I was oneof the least arrogant beings up to date. I went ahead. 

I pulled up at the door and weighed it over once more. Yes, no matter whatthe result was, I would have to dare it. After all said and done, what abagatelle to make such a fuss about. For the first it was only a matter ofa couple of hours; for the second, the Lord forbid that I should ever seekrefuge in such a house again. I entered the yard. Even whilst I wascrossing the uneven stones I was irresolute, and almost turned round atthe very door. I clenched my teeth. No! no pride! At the worst I couldexcuse myself by saying I had come to say good-bye, to make a properadieu, and come to a clear understanding about my debt to the house. . . . 

I took forth my papers once more, and determined to thrust all irrelevantimpressions aside. I had left off right in the middle of a sentence in theinquisitor's address--"Thus dictate God and the law to me, thus dictatesalso the counsel of my wise men, thus dictate I and my own conscience. . . . "I looked out of the window to think over what his conscience shoulddictate to him. A little row reached me from the room inside. Well, it wasno affair of mine anyway; it was entirely and totally indifferent to mewhat noise arose. Why the devil should I sit thinking about it? Keep quietnow! "Thus dictate I and my own conscience. . . . " But everything conspiredagainst me. Outside in the street, something was taking place thatdisturbed me. A little lad sat and amused himself in the sun on theopposite side of the pavement. He was happy and in fear of no danger--justsat and knotted together a lot of paper streamers, and injuring no one. Suddenly he jumps up and begins to curse; he goes backwards to the middleof the street and catches sight of a man, a grown-up man, with a redbeard, who is leaning out of an open window in the second storey, and whospat down on his head. The little chap cried with rage, and sworeimpatiently up at the window; and the man laughed in his face. Perhapsfive minutes passed in this way. I turned aside to avoid seeing the littlelad's tears. 

"Thus dictate I and my own conscience. . . . " I found it impossible to getany farther. At last everything began to get confused; it seemed to methat even that which I had already written was unfit to use, ay, that thewhole idea was contemptible rubbish. How could one possibly talk ofconscience in the Middle Ages? Conscience was first invented byDancing-master Shakespeare, consequently my whole address was wrong. Wasthere, then, nothing of value in these pages? I ran through them anew, andsolved my doubt at once. I discovered grand pieces--downright lengthypieces of remarkable merit--and once again the intoxicating desire to setto work again darted through my breast--the desire to finish my drama. 

I got up and went to the door, without paying any attention to mylandlord's furious signs to go out quietly; I walked out of the roomfirmly, and with my mind made up. I went upstairs to the second floor, andentered my former room. The man was not there, and what was to hinder mefrom sitting here for a moment? I would not touch one of his things. Iwouldn't even once use his table; I would just seat myself on a chair nearthe door, and be happy. I spread the papers hurriedly out on my knees. Things went splendidly for a few minutes. Retort upon retort stood readyin my head, and I wrote uninterruptedly. I filled one page after theother, dashed ahead over stock and stone, chuckled softly in ecstasy overmy happy vein, and was scarcely conscious of myself. The only sound Iheard in this moment was my own merry chuckle. 

A singularly happy idea had just struck me about a church bell--a churchbell that was to peal out at a certain point in my drama. All was goingahead with overwhelming rapidity. Then I heard a step on the stairs. Itremble, and am almost beside myself; sit ready to bolt, timorous, watchful, full of fear at everything, and excited by hunger. I listennervously, just hold the pencil still in my hand, and listen. I cannotwrite a word more. The door opens and the pair from below enter. 

Even before I had time to make an excuse for what I had done, the landladycalls out, as if struck of a heap with amazement:

"Well, God bless and save us, if he isn't sitting here again!"

"Excuse me, " I said, and I would have added more, but got no farther; thelandlady flung open the door, as far as it would go, and shrieked:

"If you don't go out, now, may God blast me, but I'll fetch the police!"

I got up. 

"I only wanted to say good-bye to you, " I murmured; "and I had to wait foryou. I didn't touch anything; I only just sat here on the chair. . . . "

"Yes, yes; there was no harm in that, " said the man. "What the devil doesit matter? Let the man alone; he--"

By this time I had reached the end of the stairs. All at once I gotfurious with this fat, swollen woman, who followed close to my heels toget rid of me quickly, and I stood quiet a moment with the worst abusiveepithets on my tongue ready to sling at her. But I bethought myself intime, and held my peace, if only out of gratitude to the stranger man whofollowed her, and would have to hear them. She trod close on my heels, railing incessantly, and my anger increased with every step I took. 

We reached the yard below. I walked very slowly, still debating whether Iwould not have it out with her. I was at this moment completely blindedwith rage, and I searched for the worst word--an expression that wouldstrike her dead on the spot, like a kick in her stomach. A commissionairepasses me at the entrance. He touches his hat; I take no notice; heapplies to her; and I hear that he inquires for me, but I do not turnround. A couple of steps outside the door he overtakes and stops me. Hehands me an envelope. I tear it open, roughly and unwillingly. It containshalf-a-sovereign--no note, not a word. I look at the man, and ask:

"What tomfoolery is this? Who is the letter from?"

"Oh, that I can't say!" he replies; "but it was a lady who gave it to me. "

I stood still. The commissionaire left. 

I put the coin into the envelope again, crumple it up, coin and envelope, wheel round and go straight towards the landlady, who is still keeping aneye on me from the doorway, and throw it in her face. I said nothing; Iuttered no syllable--only noticed that she was examining the crumpledpaper as I left her. . . . Ha! that is what one might call comporting oneselfwith dignity. Not to say a word, not to mention the contents, but crumpletogether, with perfect calmness, a large piece of money, and fling itstraight in the face of one's persecutor! One might call that making one'sexit with dignity. That was the way to treat such beasts I. . . . 

When I got to the corner of Tomtegaden and the railway place, the streetcommenced suddenly to swim around before my eyes; it buzzed vacantly in myhead, and I staggered up against the wall of a house. I could simply go nofarther, couldn't even straighten myself from the cramped position I wasin. As I fell up against it, so I remained standing, and I felt that I wasbeginning to lose my senses. My insane anger had augmented this attack ofexhaustion. I lifted my foot, and stamped on the pavement. I also triedseveral other things to try and regain my strength: I clenched my teeth, wrinkled my brows, and rolled my eyes despairingly; it helped a little. Mythoughts grew more lucid. It was clear to me that I was about to succumb. I stretched out my hands, and pushed myself back from the wall. The streetstill danced wildly round me. I began to hiccough with rage, and Iwrestled from my very inmost soul with my misery; made a right gallanteffort not to sink down. It was not my intention to collapse; no, I woulddie standing. A dray rolls slowly by, and I notice there are potatoes init; but out of sheer fury and stubbornness, I take it into my head toassert that they are not potatoes, but cabbages, and I swore frightfuloaths that they were cabbages. I heard quite well what I was saying, and Iswore this lie wittingly; repeating time after time, just to have thevicious satisfaction of perjuring myself. I got intoxicated with thethought of this matchless sin of mine. I raised three fingers in the air, and swore, with trembling lips, in the name of the Father, Son, and HolyGhost, that they were cabbages. 

Time went. I let myself sink down on the steps near me, and dried thesweat from my brow and throat, drew a couple of long breaths, and forcedmyself into calmness. The sun slid down; it declined towards theafternoon. I began once more to brood over my condition. My hunger wasreally something disgraceful, and, in a few hours more, night would behere again. The question was, to think of a remedy while there was yettime. My thoughts flew again to the lodging-house from which I had beenhunted away. I could on no account return there; but yet one could nothelp thinking about it. Properly speaking, the woman was acting quitewithin her rights in turning me out. How could I expect to get lodgingwith any one when I could not pay for it? Besides, she had occasionallygiven me a little food; even yesterday evening, after I had annoyed her, she offered me some bread and butter. She offered it to me out of sheergood nature, because she knew I needed it, so I had no cause to complain. I began, even whilst I sat there on the step, to ask her pardon in my ownmind for my behaviour. Particularly, I regretted bitterly that I had shownmyself ungrateful to her at the last, and thrown half-a-sovereign in herface. . . . 

Half-a-sovereign! I gave a whistle. The letter the messenger brought me, where did it come from? It was only this instant I thought clearly overthis, and I divined at once how the whole thing hung together. I grew sickwith pain and shame. I whispered "Ylajali" a few times, with hoarse voice, and flung back my head. Was it not I who, no later than yesterday, haddecided to pass her proudly by if I met her, to treat her with thegreatest indifference? Instead of that, I had only aroused her compassion, and coaxed an alms from her. No, no, no; there would never be an end to mydegradation! Not even in her presence could I maintain a decent position. I sank, simply sank, on all sides--every way I turned; sank to my knees, sank to my waist, dived under in ignominy, never to rise again--never!This was the climax! To accept half-a-sovereign in alms without being ableto fling it back to the secret donor; scramble for half-pence whenever thechance offered, and keep them, use them for lodging money, in spite ofone's intense inner aversion. . . . 

Could I not regain the half-sovereign in some way or another? To go backto the landlady and try to get it from her would be of no use. There mustbe some way, if I were to consider--if I were only to exert myself rightwell, and consider it over. It was not, in this case, great God, sufficient to consider in just an ordinary way! I must consider so that itpenetrated my whole sentient being; consider and find some way to procurethis half-sovereign. And I set to, to consider the answer to this problem. 

It might be about four o'clock; in a few hours' time I could perhaps meetthe manager of the theatre; if only I had my drama completed. 

I take out my MSS. There where I am sitting, and resolve, with might andmain, to finish the last few scenes. I think until I sweat, and re-readfrom the beginning, but make no progress. No bosh! I say--no obstinacy, now! and I write away at my drama--write down everything that strikes me, just to get finished quickly and be able to go away. I tried to persuademyself that a new supreme moment had seized me; I lied right royally tomyself, deceived myself knowingly, and wrote on, as if I had no need toseek for words. 

That is capital! That is really a find! whispered I, interpolatingly; onlyjust write it down! Halt! they sound questionable; they contrast ratherstrongly with the speeches in the first scenes; not a trace of the MiddleAges shone through the monk's words. I break my pencil between my teeth, jump to my feet, tear my manuscript in two, tear each page in two, flingmy hat down in the street and trample upon it. I am lost! I whisper tomyself. Ladies and gentlemen, I am lost! I utter no more than these fewwords as long as I stand there, and tramp upon my hat. 

A policeman is standing a few steps away, watching me. He is standing inthe middle of the street, and he only pays attention to me. As I lift myhead, our eyes meet. Maybe he has been standing there for a long timewatching me. I pick up my hat, put it on, and go over to him. 

"Do you know what time it is?" I ask. He pauses a bit as he hauls out hiswatch, and never takes his eyes off me the whole time. 

"About four, " he replies. 

"Accurately, " I say, "about four, perfectly accurate. You know yourbusiness, and I'll bear you in mind. " Thereupon I left him. He lookedutterly amazed at me, stood and looked at me, with gaping mouth, stillholding his watch in his hand. 

When I got in front of the Royal Hotel I turned and looked back. He wasstill standing in the same position, following me with his eyes. 

Ha, ha! That is the way to treat brutes! With the most refined effrontery!That impresses the brutes--puts the fear of God into them. . . . I waspeculiarly satisfied with myself, and began to sing a little strain. Everynerve was tense with excitement. Without feeling any more pain, withouteven being conscious of discomfort of any kind, I walked, light as afeather, across the whole market, turned round at the stalls, and came toa halt--sat down on a bench near Our Saviour's Church. Might it not justas well be a matter of indifference whether I returned the half-sovereignor not? When once I received it, it was mine; and there was evidently nowant where it came from. Besides, I was obliged to take it when it wassent expressly to me; there could be no object in letting the messengerkeep it. It wouldn't do, either, to send it back--a whole half-sovereignthat had been sent to me. So there was positively no help for it. 

I tried to watch the bustle about me in the market, and distract myselfwith indifferent things, but I did not succeed; the half-sovereign stillbusied my thoughts. At last I clenched my fists and got angry. It wouldhurt her if I were to send it back. Why, then, should I do so? Alwaysready to consider myself too good for everything--to toss my head and say, No, thanks! I saw now what it led to. I was out in the street again. Evenwhen I had the opportunity I couldn't keep my good warm lodging. No; Imust needs be proud, jump up at the first word, and show I wasn't the manto stand trifling, chuck half-sovereigns right and left, and go my way. . . . I took myself sharply to task for having left my lodging and broughtmyself into the most distressful circumstances. 

As for the rest, I consigned the whole affair to the keeping of theyellowest of devils. I hadn't begged for the half-sovereign, and I hadbarely had it in my hand, but gave it away at once--paid it away toutterly strange people whom I would never see again. That was the sort ofman I was; I always paid out to the last doit whatever I owed. If I knewYlajali aright, neither did she regret that she had sent me the money, therefore why did I sit there working myself into a rage? To put itplainly, the least she could do was to send me half-a-sovereign now andthen. The poor girl was indeed in love with me--ha! perhaps even fatallyin love with me; . . . And I sat and puffed myself up with this notion. There was no doubt that she was in love with me, the poor girl. 

It struck five o'clock! Again I sank under the weight of my prolongednervous excitement. The hollow whirring in my head made itself felt anew. I stared straight ahead, kept my eyes fixed, and gazed at the chemist'sunder the sign of the elephant. Hunger was waging a fierce battle in me atthis moment, and I was suffering greatly. Whilst I sit thus and look outinto space, a figure becomes little by little clear to my fixed stare. Atlast I can distinguish it perfectly plainly, and I recognize it. It isthat of the cake-vendor who sits habitually near the chemist's under thesign of the elephant. I give a start, sit half-upright on the seat, andbegin to consider. Yes, it was quite correct--the same woman before thesame table on the same spot! I whistle a few times and snap my fingers, rise from my seat, and make for the chemist's. No nonsense at all! Whatthe devil was it to me if it was the wages of sin, or well-earnedNorwegian huckster pieces of silver from Kongsberg? I wasn't going to beabused; one might die of too much pride. . . . 

I go on to the corner, take stock of the woman, and come to a standstillbefore her. I smile, nod as to an acquaintance, and shape my words as ifit were a foregone conclusion that I would return sometime. 

"Good-day, " say I; "perhaps you don't recognize me again. "

"No, " she replied slowly, and looks at me. 

I smile still more, as if this were only an excellent joke of hers, thispretending not to know me again, and say:

"Don't you recollect that I gave you a lot of silver once? I did not sayanything on the occasion in question; as far as I can call to mind, I didnot; it is not my way to do so. When one has honest folk to deal with, itis unnecessary to make an agreement, so to say, draw up a contract forevery trifle. Ha, ha! Yes, it was I who gave you the money!"

"No, then, now; was it you? Yes, I remember you, now that I come to thinkover it. . . . "

I wanted to prevent her from thanking me for the money, so I say, therefore, hastily, whilst I cast my eye over the table in search ofsomething to eat:

"Yes; I've come now to get the cakes. "

She did not seem to take this in. 

"The cakes, " I reiterate; "I've come now to get them--at any rate, thefirst instalment; I don't need all of them today. "

"You've come to get them?"

"Yes; of course I've come to get them, " I reply, and I laugh boisterously, as if it ought to have been self-evident to her from the outset that Icame for that purpose. I take, too, a cake up from the table, a sort ofwhite roll that I commenced to eat. 

When the woman sees this, she stirs uneasily inside her bundle of clothes, makes an involuntary movement as if to protect her wares, and gives me tounderstand that she had not expected me to return to rob her of them. 

"Really not?" I say, "indeed, really not?" She certainly was anextraordinary woman. Had she, then, at any time, had the experience thatsome one came and gave her a heap of shillings to take care of, withoutthat person returning and demanding them again? No; just look at that now!Did she perhaps run away with the idea that it was stolen money, since Islung it at her in that manner? No; she didn't think that either. Well, that at least was a good thing--really a good thing. It was, if I might sosay, kind of her, in spite of all, to consider me an honest man. Ha, ha!yes indeed, she really was good!

But why did I give her the money, then? The woman was exasperated, andcalled out loudly about it. I explained why I had given her the money, explained it temperately and with emphasis. It was my custom to act inthis manner, because I had such a belief in every one's goodness. Alwayswhen any one offered me an agreement, a receipt, I only shook my head andsaid: No, thank you! God knows I did. 

But still the woman failed to comprehend it. I had recourse to otherexpedients--spoke sharply, and bade a truce to all nonsense. Had it neverhappened to her before that any one had paid her in advance in thismanner? I inquired--I meant, of course, people who could afford it--forexample, any of the consuls? Never? Well, I could not be expected tosuffer because it happened to be a strange mode of procedure to her. Itwas a common practice abroad. She had perhaps never been outside theboundaries of her own country? No? Just look at that now! In that case, she could of course have no opinion on the subject; . . . And I took severalmore cakes from the table. 

She grumbled angrily, refused obstinately to give up any more of herstores from off the table, even snatched a piece of cake out of my handand put it back into its place. I got enraged, banked the table, andthreatened to call the police. I wished to be lenient with her, I said. Were I to take all that was lawfully mine, I would clear her whole stand, because it was a big sum of money that I had given to her. But I had nointention of taking so much, I wanted in reality only half the value ofthe money, and I would, into the bargain, never come back to trouble heragain. Might God preserve me from it, seeing that that was the sort ofcreature she was. . . . At length she shoved some cakes towards me, four orfive, at an exorbitant price, the highest possible price she could thinkof, and bade me take them and begone. I wrangled still with her, persistedthat she had at least cheated me to the extent of a shilling, besidesrobbing me with her exorbitant prices. "Do you know there is a penalty forsuch rascally trickery, " said I; "God help you, you might get penalservitude for life, you old fool!" She flung another cake to me, and, withalmost gnashing teeth, begged me to go. 

And I left her. 

Ha! a match for this dishonest cake-vendor was not to be found. The wholetime, whilst I walked to and fro in the market-place and ate my cakes, Italked loudly about this creature and her shamelessness, repeated tomyself what we both had said to one another, and it seemed to me that Ihad come out of this affair with flying colours, leaving her nowhere. Iate my cakes in face of everybody and talked this over to myself. 

The cakes disappeared one by one; they seemed to go no way; no matter howI ate I was still greedily hungry. Lord, to think they were of no help! Iwas so ravenous that I was even about to devour the last little cake thatI had decided to spare, right from the beginning, to put it aside, infact, for the little chap down in Vognmandsgade--the little lad who playedwith the paper streamers. I thought of him continually--couldn't forgethis face as he jumped and swore. He had turned round towards the windowwhen the man spat down on him, and he had just looked up to see if I waslaughing at him. God knows if I should meet him now, even if I went downthat way. 

I exerted myself greatly to try and reach Vognmandsgade, passed quickly bythe spot where I had torn my drama into tatters, and where some scraps ofpapers still lay about; avoided the policeman whom I had amazed by mybehaviour, and reached the steps upon which the laddie had been sitting. 

He was not there. The street was almost deserted--dusk was gathering in, and I could not see him anywhere. Perhaps he had gone in. I laid the cakedown, stood it upright against the door, knocked hard, and hurried awaydirectly. He is sure to find it, I said to myself; the first thing he willdo when he comes out will be to find it. And my eyes grew moist withpleasure at the thought of the little chap finding the cake. 

I reached the terminus again. 

Now I no longer felt hungry, only the sweet stuff I had eaten began tocause me discomfort. The wildest thoughts, too surged up anew in my head. 

Supposing I were in all secretness to cut the hawser mooring one of thoseships? Supposing I were to suddenly yell out "Fire"? I walk farther downthe wharf, find a packing-case and sit upon it, fold my hands, and amconscious that my head is growing more and more confused. I do not stir; Isimply make no effort whatever to keep up any longer. I just sit there andstare at the _Copégoro_, the barque flying the Russian flag. 

I catch a glimpse of a man at the rail; the red lantern slung at the portshines down upon his head, and I get up and talk over to him. I had noobject in talking, as I did not expect to get a reply, either. 

I said:

"Do you sail tonight, Captain?"

"Yes; in a short time, " answered the man. He spoke Swedish. 

"Hem, I suppose you wouldn't happen to need a man?"

I was at this instant utterly indifferent as to whether I was met by arefusal or not; it was all the same to me what reply the man gave me, so Istood and waited for it. 

"Well, no, " he replied; "unless it chanced to be a young fellow. "

"A young fellow!" I pulled myself together, took off my glasses furtivelyand thrust them into my pocket, stepped up the gangway, and strode ondeck. 

"I have no experience, " said I; "but I can do anything I am put to. Whereare you bound for?"

"We are in ballast for Leith, to fetch coal for Cadiz. "

"All right, " said I, forcing myself upon the man; "it's all the same to mewhere I go; I am prepared to do my work. "

"Have you never sailed before?" he asked. 

"No; but as I tell you, put me to a task, and I'll do it. I am used to alittle of all sorts. "

He bethought himself again. 

I had already taken keenly into my head that I was to sail this voyage, and I began to dread being hounded on shore again. 

"What do you think about it, Captain?" I asked at last. "I can really doanything that turns up. What am I saying? I would be a poor sort of chapif I couldn't do a little more than just what I was put to. I can take twowatches at a stretch, if it comes to that. It would only do me good, and Icould hold out all the same. "

"All right, have a try at it. If it doesn't work, well, we can part inEngland. "

"Of course, " I reply in my delight, and I repeated over again that wecould part in England if it didn't work. 

And he set me to work. . . . 

Out in the fjord I dragged myself up once, wet with fever and exhaustion, and gazed landwards, and bade farewell for the present to the town--toChristiania, where the windows gleamed so brightly in all the homes.