Garman and Worse: A Norwegian Novel

by Alexander Lange Kielland

"It was not my fault--it was not my fault!" she repeated plaintively, like a child who has had the misfortune to break something.

He lifted his hard heavy hand, and laying it on her head, passed it gently over her hair. Now he understood it all, but not a word passed his lips.

"Lena, Lena!" cried the pastor from the door, "you must come and see what I have found. Here are twins. Lena, Lena! where are you? Make haste! What a good wife! Just think, twins the first time!"

It was not easy to tell what Per's thoughts were as he stood again alone looking over the sea. Thus had the billows rolled to and fro in storm and sunshine, whilst he had waited and waited. And this was what he had waited for! He drew a long breath, and his face seemed to grow clearer again as he slowly nodded his head several times towards the ocean.

Per's wife made many apologies, as is but right and proper on such occasions, for the repast, which, however, consisted of coffee, with cream and sugar, bread and butter and cakes, and lastly a dish of small lobsters. She insisted that it was a shame to offer such small lobsters to her guests. It was a pity they had not some larger ones.

But now it was just one of the pastor's favourite theories, and which he always defended with much energy and conviction, namely, that small lobsters are really better and more delicate than large ones. He was, therefore, in the best of humours, and made several innocent jokes with the friendly peasant woman.

Per now came in and begged they would begin their meal, as everything was ready. He then sat down by the side of the fireplace, with his elbows resting on his knees.

The sun shone so brightly through the small window-panes, the room was so clean and comfortable, the table-cloth so white, the cream so yellow, and the small lobsters so red and appetizing, that the pastor felt constrained to improve the occasion.

He chose as his text a fact which he had heard from the woman, namely, that Per had built the house entirely of the wreckage of a French brig, which had been stranded on the coast a little way to the northward. This was the vessel to which the board over the window had belonged.

The pastor dwelt on the uncertainty of human affairs, how often we are disappointed, but how there is a leading thread which seems to run through our existence.