She rose, for the wind was icy told; she had not been long away, but as she went home again, she knew whither she was going.
The next day she stood at the director's door. Hot words were heard from within; one of the voices seemed to her like the bride's of yesterday; in another key, to-day, to be sure, but still it made Petra tremble. She waited a long time, but as it would not stop, at last she knocked. "Come in," said a man's voice angrily. "Oh!" screamed a lady, and as Petra entered, she saw a flying terror in a night dress, and with dishevelled hair, disappearing through a side door. The director, a tall man with blear eyes (which he hastened to hide with a pair of gold spectacles), was pacing backwards and forwards in agitation. His long nose so ruled his face, that all the rest was there for the nose's sake, the eyes stuck out like two gun barrels behind this rampart, the mouth was a trench before it, and the forehead, a light bridge over to the forest, or barricade of felled trees.--"What is it you want?" he stopped short; "is it you that wishes to join the chorus?" he asked hurriedly. "'The chorus,' what is that?"--"Ha! so you don't know that; what is it you want then?"--"I wish to be an actress."--"An actress indeed,--and don't know what a chorister is! But you speak the dialect?"--"'Dialect,' what is that?" "Eh! so you don't know that either, and will yet be an actress, well, well; yes, that's like the Norsemen. Dialect means, that you don't talk like we do."--"Yes, but I've been practising all the morning."--"Have you, indeed? Come, come, let me hear!" Petra took an attitude, and said with exactly the same accent as the bride of yesterday: "I greet you my love. Good morning!"--"I say, you are possessed, are you come here to make a fool of my wife!" A peal of laughter was heard in the adjoining room, the director opened the door, and without a trace of remembrance that but a moment since they had been fighting for life and death: "Here is a Norwegian hussy," he said, "caricaturing you, pray come and see her!" A lady's head with untidy, refractory black hair, dark eyes, and large mouth, peeped in and laughed. And yet Petra hastened towards her; for it must be the bride,--no, her mother, she thought as she drew nearer. She looked at the lady, and said: "I am not sure if it is you, or if it is your mother!" whereupon the director also laughed. The head had retreated, but laughed in the side room. Petra's embarrassment was clearly depicted in her face and attitude; it attracted the director's attention, he looked at her, and taking a book, said as though nothing in the world had happened: "Take this, my girl, and read, but read as you talk yourself."--She did so. "No, no, that is not right, read Norwegian,--Norwegian, I say!"--and Petra read, but the same as before. "No, I tell you, it is altogether wrong. Do you understand what I mean? Are you stupid?"--He tried her again and again, then took the book from her and gave her another: "See, that is the opposite, it is comic, read that!"--"Yes, Petra read, but with the same result till she wearied him out."--"No, no!" he cried, "for heavens sake give over,--what do you want with the stage, what the deuce is it you want to act?"--"The play I saw yesterday."--"Aha! To be sure! well, and then?"--"Yes," said she, feeling a little bashful, "I thought it was so delightful, yesterday, but I have been thinking today it would be still more delightful if it had a good ending, and I would give it that."--"Eh, that is it? Well, to be sure! There's nothing to hinder; the author is dead. Of course, he is no longer correct, and you, who can neither speak, nor read, will improve his works;--yes, that is Norwegian!" Petra did not understand the words, she understood only that they went against her, and she began to fear. "Will you let me?" she asked softly.--"Certainly, Lord preserve us, there's nothing to hinder, be so good!--Listen," he said in a different tone, as he went close up to her, "you have no more idea of the drama than a cat; and you have no talent for either the comedy or the tragedy; I have tried you in both. Because you have a pretty face, and a fine figure, I suppose people have put it into your head that you could play much better than my wife, and so you will take the first part in my 'répertoire,' and make alterations to begin with;--yes, that is the Norwegians, they are the people that can do it."--Petra could hardly breathe, she struggled and struggled; at last she ventured to say: "Will you really not allow me?" He had been standing looking out of the window, and was certain she had gone; he now turned round in surprise, and was struck with her emotion, and the wonderful strength with which it was pourtrayed in her whole being; he looked at her a moment, then suddenly seizing the book, he said with a voice and manner as if nothing had happened before: "See, take this piece here, and read it slowly, let me hear your voice. Come now!" But she could not read, for she could not see the letters. "Don't be afraid!" At last she began, but coldly, without any spirit; he bade her read it over again with more feeling; but it was still worse, so he quietly took the book from her: "I have tried you in all ways," he said "so I have no responsibility. I assure you, my good girl, if I were to send my boots upon the stage, or I were to send you, the impression would be just the same--viz., a very remarkable one. So that must end the matter!" But as a last endeavour, Petra ventured entreatingly: "I believe though I understand it, if only I get----" "Yes, to be sure,--every fishing village understands it a great deal better than we; the Norwegian public is the most enlightened in the world."--"Come now, if you won't disappear, I must!" She turned to the door, and burst into tears. "I say," this violent outburst had thrown a new light on the subject; "I say, I suppose it isn't you that made such a disturbance in the theatre last night?"--She turned round, fiery red; "Yes, to be sure, I know you now, Fisher Girl! I was in company with a gentleman from your town after the play, he 'knew you well.' Ha! so that is why you wanted to get on the stage; you would try your tricks there,--I understand!--Listen: My theatre is a respectable establishment, and I defy all attempts to transform it. Go! Will you go, I say!"--and Petra went, sobbing fearfully, down the steps, and out into the street. She ran crying past all the people, and a lady at mid-day, running and crying in the street created, as may be imagined, a great sensation. People stopped, the dogs ran after her, and more followed. The whirr behind her reminded her of those awful nights in the attic chamber, she remembered the faces in the air and ran faster. But the remembrance grew more vivid with every step, the noise behind her increased, and when she arrived at the house and shut the street door, reached her room and locked herself in, she threw herself down in a corner to defend herself from the faces; she struck them off with her hands, and threatened them, then sinking down exhausted, she wept more quietly,--and was saved.
The same day towards evening, she left Bergen and started for the country; she did not know where to, but she would go where she was not known. She went in a carriole, the driver boy sitting on her trunk strapped on behind. It rained fast, she sat crouched together under a great rain hat, and looked uneasily at the mountain above her, and then at the precipice below. The forest before her was a dense mass of fog, teeming with spectres; the next moment she would enter it, but the fog was parting at every step she took towards it. A mighty rumbling that grew stronger and stronger increased the feeling that she was entering upon an unknown region, where everything had its own meaning and some dark and mysterious connection, where man was only a nervous traveller, who had yet to discover whether or not he could get further. The rumbling came from several waterfalls, that in the wet weather had grown up to battle, and now hurled themselves precipitately from rock to rock with a terrific crash. Now and then they passed over narrow bridges; she could see the water boiling and seething in the hollows below. Soon the road began to bend and wind down the mountain; here and there lay a cultivated field, and a few turf houses stood together; then again it turned up towards the forest and rumbling. She was wet through, and shivered, but still she would go further, as long as the day lasted,--further also the next day, ever deeper in, till she came to a place she dare trust herself to. Thereto He Himself would help her, the Almighty, who now led them through the darkness and the storm.
VIII.
[AT THE RURAL DEAN'S.]
Quite late in autumn, among the mountains in Bergen's shire, where the land is sheltered and fruitful, there are occasionally days almost like summer. On such afternoons, the cattle, even if they have already begun with the winter feeding, are again let out into the pasture; they are well fed and frisky, and when they are driven home at night, the scene is lively. Thus they came down over the mountain track, cows, sheep, and goats, bellowing, butting, and skipping, their bells merrily ringing, and were just approaching the farm as Petra was driving by. It was a beautiful day, the window panes in the long white wooden buildings glittered in the sun, and above the houses, towered the mountains, so thickly covered with firs, birch, ash, bird cherry, rowan trees, and the projecting rocks with juniper bushes, that the houses seemed quite sheltered by them. Facing the road, in front of the house, was a garden, apples, cherry, and plum trees flourished in abundance; red and black currant, and gooseberry bushes grew along the walks and fences, and above all, towered some grand old ash trees with their broad and stately crowns. The house looked like a nest half hidden among the branches, out of reach for everything but the sun. But just this seclusion awakened a longing in Petra, and when she heard it was the deanery, she exclaimed: "I must go in here!" and pulling in the reins, she turned along the garden.
A couple of Finnish dogs rushed out upon her as she drove into the farm yard, a large square, enclosed with buildings, the cattle stall opposite the house, another wing of the house to the right, and to the left the brewery, wash house, and labourers' room. The farm yard was now full of cattle, and in the midst of them stood a lady, tall and elegant; she wore a tight fitting dress, and a little silk handkerchief over her head; round about and above her[[2]] were goats, white, black, brown, and parti-coloured, all with their little bells sounding in harmony; she had a name for each of her goats, and now she had something nice for them in a dish, which the milkmaid continually replenished. Upon the low step leading from the house to the farm yard, the rural dean was standing with a plate of salt, and in front of him were the cows licking the salt out of his hand and off the step where he strewed it. The dean was not a tall man, but compact, with short neck and short forehead; the bushy eyebrows lay over eyes that did not often look straight before them, but now and then cast a flashing glance aside. His thick grey hair was cut short, and stood up on all sides, it grew down over his neck nearly as much as on his head; he wore no neckerchief, but a shirt stud; in the front the shirt was open,--one could see his hairy bosom; neither was it buttoned at the wrists, so the shirt cuffs came down over the small, powerful hands, now all licked over by the cows; both hands and arms were shaggy. He glanced sharply from the side, at the stranger lady who had alighted, and made her way between the goats to where his daughter was standing. It was impossible, for the noise of the cattle, dogs, and bells, to hear what they were saying, but now both the ladies were looking at him, and with the goats around them they came towards the step. The herdsman, on a sign from the dean, began to drive the cattle away. Signe, his daughter, called out: (Petra was struck with the harmony of her voice,) "Father, here is a lady travelling, who would like to rest a day with us."--"She shall be welcome!" cried the dean in reply, gave the dish to the lad, and went into his study, in the right wing of the house, apparently to tidy himself. Petra followed the young lady into the passage, which was more properly a hall, it was so light and broad; the driver boy was dismissed, her things carried in, and she herself shewn into a side room opposite the study, where she took off her things, and went out again into the passage, to be further shewn into the dining room.
What a large light room! Nearly the whole wall fronting the garden was windows, the middle one opened as a door to the garden. The windows were broad and high, reaching almost to the floor, and they were full of flowers, plants stood upon stands here and there in the room, and instead of curtains was interwoven ivy, hanging from two small hedges of flowers up in the frame above. As there were bushes and flowers on every side, growing up the walls, and on the greensward before her, it seemed like a conservatory in the midst of the garden; and yet one had not been a minute in the room, before the flowers were no longer seen; for the church standing by itself on a hill to the right was what one saw,--the blue waters reflecting its image, coursed sparkling on so far away between the mountains that one could not tell whether it was a lake, or an arm of the sea curving in. And then the mountains themselves! Not single, but chains of mountains, each one rearing its mighty front behind the other, as if the boundary of the world.