Arne and the Christmas star: A story of Norway

by Alta Halverson Seymour

The schoolroom clock had ticked an hour away when the boy laid his exercises on Herr Professor’s desk. He put on his skis, settled his knapsack on his back, and set off on his trip up the mountain through the falling snow.

The boy felt confident and light-hearted as he hastened up toward his uncle’s saeter. Though the familiar landmarks looked different in their winter dress, he could recognize them without difficulty. He knew he was making better time alone than the others could in a large company. As he sped along he began to hope he might overtake them, or at least get there in time to help bring in the greens.

The snow, which fell heavily at first, began to slacken a little. He managed to go along at a steady pace, but it seemed a long time before he came out where Uncle Jens’s cabin faced the fjord. The little log house looked forlorn with all its windows boarded over for winter, and Arne was anxious to hurry on. Far out at sea he could detect the faint light of a ship. He wondered if it could possibly be the Stjerne.

The snow had stopped now, and strong winds blew in steadily from the sea. Dusk had closed in, and Arne shivered as he stood there, not sure how to go ahead. “Take the Ahlness trail,” Bergel’s note had said. There was more than one path zigzagging about up here, he knew, but as far as he could remember, there was only one good trail that led way up the mountain. That must be the one. Those folks up there ahead must have left plenty of tracks. But he had difficulty in finding them because of the drifting snow. At last, however, with the aid of his flashlight, he did manage to find some traces.

If only Bergel had said how far it was! It seemed to Arne that the way was much longer than he had expected it to be. Though he got out his flashlight often, he didn’t see anything of three saeter cabins in a cluster, to say nothing of a fork in the trail. The way was very steep in places, and he did wish those tracks were plainer.

And now he had come to a place where the snow was so drifted he couldn’t see any tracks at all. He was uncertain what to do, which way to take, and almost wished he had never started on this difficult journey alone.

Then he looked up toward the mountain top, and just above it, where the wind had ripped the clouds apart, he saw one bright star shining. Christmas star again, thought Arne, and felt a little better. He pressed on and at last came to the three small houses. Now for the fork in the trail!

But he could not make out any tracks in the drifted snow, and there didn’t seem to be any real trail, though there was a break in the bushes here. He’d start that way. But he hadn’t gone far when he was brought up short by a great boulder in the way. This certainly could not be the trail. He went back and started again, but this time a thicket of bushes blocked the path. Perhaps, after all, he had come the wrong way. Perhaps those three cabins were not the ones Bergel had meant. His heart was thumping. What if he was lost in these mountains?

He stood there straining his eyes in the gray darkness. If only he could catch some gleam of the campfire! He could see no sign of light on the dark mountain, but as he stood, trying to think of something he could do, a familiar sound came down to him—a long-drawn blast that could only come from a saeter horn. Someone was certainly sending him a signal, and he felt sure it was Bergel.

Arne stood still, trying to determine just where that call had come from. As he waited, it came again, over and over. The star would be a good guide now, for the horn’s blast had come from exactly that direction. Now, a little to the left, he found a way through the thicket; with the help of the horn and of his bright star, he forged steadily ahead.