CHAPTER XIV
A TRIP TO GOODFIELDS SAETER
Mother Goodfields had made us a regular promise,—and shaken hands on it,—that we should go to the saeter some time during the summer. Goodfields saeter lay about fourteen miles west in the mountains. Every day I reminded Mother Goodfields of her promise so that she should not forget it, you see. For it often seems to me that grown-up people forget very easily.
We had decided beforehand that it was to be Petter Kloed, Karsten, Andrine, and I who should go.
None of the grown-ups would join us. Mrs. Proet said she should have to be well paid to go, and really, such fine, fashionable ladies as she aren't fit for a saeter anyway. Miss Mangelsen was afraid there would be fleas, and Miss Melby was afraid that she being so stout, the boat we had to cross the mountain lake in would not be strong enough to bear her. Miss Jordan had been at a hundred saeters, she said, and the only difference among them was that one was a little dirtier than another; and that degree of difference she wouldn't bother herself to see, she said. Mrs. Kloed is so nervous she never dares do anything. So at last there were none to go but Petter, Karsten, Andrine, and myself, as I have said.
Karsten had taken it into his head that at saeters there were always bears, and that cream at saeters was always exactly an inch thick; and bears and inch-thick cream were what he wanted to see. Petter Kloed wished to get hold of certain mountain flowers that he could classify. Such botany I will have nothing to do with. I smell the flowers and think they are charming, but I don't care a button which class they belong to, not I! As for going to the saeter, Andrine and I wanted to go just for the fun of going.
Well, one day in August, Olsen, the farm-boy, and Trond Oppistuen were going to the saeter to cut hay. If we wished, we were welcome to go along with them.
If we wished! Hurrah!
The next morning off we went. The lunch, and Andrine, and I, and Karsten, and Petter Kloed were in a wagon, and Trond and Olsen walked alongside with their scythes and rakes on their shoulders.
Far, far up the mountain we were to go—away up where the trees looked no taller than half a pin's length, and the thin light air was white and shining; up there and then far along to the west.
Olsen was red-haired and freckled, small and wiry. He kept step with the horse the whole way, but Trond lagged behind us down the slope.
We all sang, each our own tune, as we climbed. The air was clear, oh! so clear! The farms in the valley grew smaller and smaller, and the birch trees we passed were little and stunted.
Whenever Petter Kloed jumped out of the wagon after a flower or anything, we whipped the horse so as to get as far ahead of him as possible; Petter is as lazy as a log and hates to walk a step, so it was good enough for him.
Any boy with more grown-up, mannish airs than Petter Kloed puts on could not be found the world over. He wears long trousers and has been in the theatre a thousand times, he says; he smokes cigarettes too; and, always, about everything, no matter what it is, he says, pooh! he has seen that before; so it seems as if there were nothing left that could amuse him. Andrine admires him sometimes, I know that very well, but such silly puppies can go or stay for all I care. However, it was jolly to have him with us on the saeter trip,—just for the fun of teasing him, you know.
Karsten and Petter disputed the whole time as to how high we were in the air and how high up it was possible to breathe. At last they got all the way to the moon and Jupiter.
"I'll bet you anything you choose that Jupiter has air that people could breathe," said Karsten.
"That's just the kind of thing such a cabbage-head as you would bet on," said Petter Kloed.
At that—only think! Karsten pitched into Petter and then they began to fight in the back of the wagon.
"Are you Tartars both of you?" said I, and took a tight grip in the back of Karsten's jacket. "Don't you jump out of your skin now! If you fly at people this way as you are always doing, you shall trot back to Goodfields alone!"
"He—he is just as much of a cabbage-head as I am," mumbled Karsten, but he didn't dare to say another word, for after all, he has to respect me, you see.
Then I suggested that we should eat some of our luncheon. It's so pleasant to eat out-of-doors!
We were high, high up on the mountain, where we could see nothing but forests and mountains, a whole sea of dark, thick pine forests, and just mountains and mountains and mountains. There we drank toasts to Norway, to the summer, and to each other, and sang: "Ja, vi elsker dette landet," our national song, you know, and had an awfully jolly time.
But up there it was so still, so still! Nothing but gray-brown moor and dwarf birches, and willows and ice-cold mountain brooks. Far over across the moor we could see the road like a narrow gray ribbon in the monotonous brown. Far west were the snow-capped peaks, sharp, jagged and blue, and with great snow-drifts. It was very beautiful, unspeakably strange and still. We all grew silent.
"Ugh! I wouldn't be alone here for a good deal," said Andrine.
"I would just as soon be here in pitch darkness—if I only had my knife with me," said Karsten.
At that instant a ptarmigan flew up right at the side of the road, and Karsten came near falling backwards out of the cart and measuring his length on the ground.
You may be sure we all made fun of him then.
"He would like to be alone on the mountain, he would! And yet he tumbles over in fright at a ptarmigan!"
"If you can stand like a lamp-post in a cart that wobbles the way this rickety old cart does, I'll cover you with gold," said Karsten, offended.
That's the way we kept on. We quarreled and had a jolly time.
All at once a flock of goats came scrambling down the road as scared as if their lives were in danger. And we all wished that we might see a bear. Can you think of anything more exciting than to meet a bear on the road?
Petter Kloed would just go very quietly to him and scratch his back. He had done that a hundred times in the menagerie, he said. For if you just approached a bear in the right way it was a very good-natured beast, said Petter Kloed, as he lit a cigarette back there in the cart.
Karsten would rather wrestle with the bear and strangle him; for if any one wanted to see a muscle that was a stunner, they could just look here; and Karsten turned up his jacket sleeves while we all examined his muscle.
The road was unspeakably long, however. The horse jogged on and on but we didn't seem to get a bit farther. After we had eaten all the luncheon, I thought that never in the world would this road come to an end. When we asked Olsen how much farther we had to go, he would only say, "Far away there—and far away there." All I could think of was the fairy tale about the prince who had to go beyond the mountain into the blue. Andrine got drowsy and wanted to sleep, and I had to take Karsten in front with us; for, strangely enough, the longer we rode the less room there was for Karsten's and Petter's legs in the back of the wagon. At last they did nothing but kick each other, so Karsten had to come in front and Petter could sit in lonely grandeur on the wooden lunch-box.
Finally we came in sight of the water that we had to cross. It was a large lake, black and still.
"Hurrah! You must wake up now, Andrine!"
There lay the boat we were to row over in, and there was the enclosure where the horse was to be left. Oh, how good it was to stretch one's legs after sitting so long!
But now Karsten began to put on airs. He wanted to show how clever he was in a boat, so he took command, gave orders, and thrashed the air with his arms,—you never saw such behavior.
"He's a great fellow in a boat," said Trond.
The stones at the edge of the lake were wet and slimy. Petter Kloed clambered into the boat with great care.
"Look out for yourself, you landlubber!" said Karsten. Then he pressed an oar hard against a stone to shove the boat out from shore. Everything was to go at full speed, you see, but the oar slipped and Karsten went head over heels into the water. It was only by a hair's breadth that we escaped having that flat, rickety boat turn upside down with us all. I can tell you I was thoroughly frightened then. I have always heard that there is no bottom to these mountain lakes, but that the water goes straight through the earth! Although we were scarcely more than a fathom's length from shore, the water was deep black, and you couldn't see any bottom.
"Oh! Karsten! Karsten!"
His head bobbed up between the water-lilies and broad green leaves, and Olsen hauled him up into the boat.
"Ah-chew! Pshaw! Ah-chew! that horrid oar!" sneezed and scolded Karsten, as soon as he got his breath. "Horrid old boat! Horrid old water! Ah-chew!"
"Now we must row fast," said Trond—"so that this body doesn't get sick, he is so wet." And Trond and Olsen began rowing briskly over the water. But Karsten lay in the bottom of the boat with Andrine's and my raincoats over him, looking awfully fierce and gloomy. I can't tell you how tempted we were to tease him, but we were so high-minded and considerate that we didn't do it. Of course, I might have teased him myself, but if Petter Kloed had tried it, he would have had me to reckon with. Karsten was furious if we even spoke to him.
"Are you cold?" I asked.
"Hold your tongue," said Karsten.
Trond and Olsen rowed so that the sweat ran down their faces, and soon there we were, across. We saw Goodfields saeter above the hill and began running, all four of us. Nobody was to be seen outside the hut, and we nearly frightened the life out of Augusta, the milkmaid, when we stormed in upon her. But when she had gathered herself together, she laughed and her white teeth fairly glistened.
"Now this is grand! I never could have thought of anything like this!" said Augusta, the milkmaid.
Then Karsten had to be undressed and put into Augusta's bed, and all his clothes were hung by the hearth and Augusta built up such a hot fire to dry them that they made everything steamy. Suddenly she remembered that the son from Broker farm was staying at a near-by saeter just now. Perhaps he had some clothes that Karsten might borrow. Olsen was sent over there and came home with some things. It was mighty good that Karsten could get up, for he wasn't very agreeable while he lay in bed, you may be sure.
What a sight he was when he was dressed! I shall never forget it. With a jacket that reached below his knees and Augusta's kerchief on his head—oh, he did look so funny! But not the least shadow of a smile did we dare allow ourselves, for he would at once have flown under the sheepskin bedclothes again, crosser than ever. That's the way Karsten is, you see.
Oh, pshaw! A fine rain had begun, the mountains were perfectly black, and patches of fog lay all around.
"Perhaps you'd like to fish," said Augusta; "they usually bite in such weather."
Trond and Olsen had begun to cut the grass around the hut, and Petter Kloed and Karsten started off with fishing-rods over their shoulders. You should have seen Karsten with the fishing-rod and with the kerchief on his head.
Andrine and I wanted to help Augusta get dinner, for it was exactly like playing in a doll-house, only much more fun! Augusta made some cream-porridge and her face shone like a polished sun—with the heat and the anxiety that the porridge should be good. We had salt in a paper cornucopia, milk in wooden bowls, and shining yellow wooden spoons to eat with.
What fun! Even if the rain were trickling down the window, we were enjoying ourselves tremendously.
Well, now you shall hear what a hullabaloo there was at the saeter that afternoon.
It had begun to grow dark, for it was the last of August. Trond and Olsen had gone to another saeter to see some friends of theirs. Immediately after dinner Petter and Karsten had gone out to fish again, because before dinner they had caught only a baby trout about as long as your finger. However, Karsten broiled that, insides and all.
Just as Augusta, Andrine and I were milking out in the barn, we heard a scream that I shall never forget. I thought it was Karsten's voice, and I was so frightened I didn't know what to do with myself. The whole moor was so dark that nothing was to be seen. There came another scream, and without a word Augusta ran out on the moor. But an instant after Karsten came rushing around the corner of the barn, with face pale as death and his hair standing straight up.
"A bear! A bear! He is after me! Oh, help! Oh, oh!"
Into the barn he dashed, Andrine and I at his heels, hastily shutting the door. It was pitch-dark in the barn.
"Was he after you? Where is Petter?"
My heart was pounding. Bears usually knocked a barn-door in with one whack, and here we stood in pitch-black darkness.
Karsten was so out of breath he could scarcely speak.
"Oh! the way he ran! I never would have believed a bear could run so!" panted Karsten.
"Oh!—oh!—oh!" shrieked some one outside the barn. "Help! oh, help!"
It was Petter's voice, and we heard also an animal breathing quickly and then something like a growl.
As with one impulse Andrine, Karsten, and I sprang into a stall behind a cow. The bear would surely take the cow first before it took us. How unspeakably frightened I was! Karsten wanted to get behind Andrine and me too, and puffed and pushed himself in, and we got to fighting there in the stall just from sheer fright.
There came a horrible thump against the barn-door, it burst open and Petter Kloed tumbled into the barn on all fours; and leaping on his back was a big black beast.
How Petter howled I could never give you any idea, for such a howl must be heard if you are to know what it was like. Karsten and I shrieked with him; and all the cows got up, rattled their chains, and bellowed.
"Ha ha! Ha ha!" laughed Augusta from the barn-door. "Did any one ever see such doings! Oh, I really must laugh! I was pretty sure it was the dog, old Burmann. There hasn't been a bear on this mountain the whole year. Shame on you, Burmann, to frighten folk this way!"
"How you did howl, Petter!" said Karsten, coming out of the stall.
"Perhaps you didn't scream," said Petter Kloed.
They quarreled and disputed till the sparks flew, as to which had been the most scared. But my knees trembled so I had to sit down on a milking-stool, and Andrine cried and sobbed, she had been so frightened.
Karsten got braver and braver.
"I was no more scared out of my wits than I ever am," said he. "I screamed only because—because—well, just so that Petter could hear where I was!"
"Such a horrid dog!" said Petter, reaching after Burmann.
"You could just have scratched his back as you do to bears in menageries," said I. Augusta laughed so that her laughter echoed through the whole place, and I teased them as much as I could. When I really make a point of it, I'm awful at teasing—it is such fun.
"Ugh! Girls are nothing but rubbish," said Karsten.
"To think that you didn't strangle the bear with such muscles as you have," I said.
"If you don't keep still!" said Karsten threateningly.
It was such fun! I laughed till my cheeks ached.
My! but that was an awfully jolly and delightful visit to the saeter. But at night Andrine and I slept in a bed that was as hard as a stone, and Andrine lay the whole night right across the bed and squeezed me almost to death.
In the morning the air and everything was oh, so fresh! Our hair blew all over our faces; we washed in the brook and the water was so cold that our finger-nails ached.
After breakfast we started home again. We stood up in the wagon and shouted hurrah as long as we could see Augusta in the saeter hut door, and after that we sang all the way down the mountain.
But that story of the bear at the saeter Petter and Karsten had to hear all summer long, for they were just as puffed up as ever.
Nothing impresses such conceited boys, you know.