Then Cordt walked across the room, up and down, with great, calm strides, and spoke and was silent and never for a moment released his son from his stern grasp.
His words seized Finn and lifted him up where things were great and beautiful and bitterly cold, he thought; then let him fall again, till he relapsed into his own dark corner; and seized him anew and carried him aloft.
But, when Cordt ceased, it was to Finn as though he heard a flourish of trumpets from the clouds proclaiming that other words were now coming, greater still and austerer, more loving, ever heavier to bear.
“You are right, Finn.... I am not a free man, I never was. I am bound up in the tradition that built my house and bore my race and, when I could not support the tradition, things broke for me. But that did not make me free.... Those were heavy days, Finn. I could not understand it, you see, and I fought to the end. I was young and strong and I was in love. You are fond of the old room ... you can hear the legends up there singing their powerful, melancholy song.... Remember, Finn, I am one of those on whom the legend is laid. I have lived in the secrecy of the old room.... I have stood, in my calm, proud right ... up there, where the room stood, unseen by any one except the master of the house and his wife ... always remote and locked and hidden in its time-honored might ... always open to him who owned it.... I left it like a beaten man. But I could not retire into a corner and mourn, for I had you, Finn. You were only a little child then, so I could not know how your paths would go. I knew only one thing, that you would never sit with your wife up there, where people became so small when they sat down in the big chairs and where it was so pleasant and so safe. I was the last. With me, the tradition of the old room was finished.... Then I had to try if I could find my way in the world which I did not understand. I had to go through all that which I disliked so desperately and which had killed my happiness. For myself, I had nothing to gain: I was a bound man and a wounded. But I had you, Finn.... And I had to know if they were building properly and honestly somewhere behind all the dancing and flirting and singing which I saw before my eyes. Or if it was no different from what my eyes saw and if I should not be doing best to carry my child out into the mountains and let the wild beasts tear it to pieces.... I was alone in this. Your mother went to live in an old house beside the old house where her happiness could not grow. There she found peace. But I needed no refuge. Where I was, I was at home: I only wanted to see the place where you and your children should flourish.... I did not spare myself, Finn. I sought honestly, south and north, east and west. I took their books ... the light ones burst like soap-bubbles in my hands and the powerful ones my thoughts had to struggle to understand. Not one of their green visions but has been with me in my room, not one of their bright swords but has flashed before my eyes.... I did not allow myself to be blinded by my own bitterness, or tricked by catch-words, or frightened by abuse. I went on as long as I could see the way ... and longer, Finn. I peered out into the farthest, where those who thought as I did saw nothing but horror and insanity.... And Finn ... I don’t know.... Perhaps it was your mother’s God that helped me ... perhaps it was my ancestor, who himself had sailed into harbor and raised our house on new ground for many a good, long day. Perhaps it was your little hand, which lay so trustingly in mine, when you used to come to me in those anxious, lonely days and say good-morning and good-night.... I don’t know. I daresay it was my love for you that lifted me above myself. I climbed as high up the mountains as a mortal can climb. It all lay under my feet like a cloud ... longing and happiness and daily bread and daily trouble. I could not see the valley in which my house was built. But out of the cloud, over the mountain, I saw the road where we hustle and strive, generation after generation, ever forward towards the goal which we cannot see, but which is there, because the road is there.... And I saw land ... the promised land of you and your children ... from the mountain where I stood. A land I did not know ... a land strange to my eyes ... people with other habits and other beliefs, with a different form of love and a different code of honor.... I saw it through the storm that flung the door of the old room wide open.... That was a strange time, Finn ... the strongest in my life and the happiest.”
Cordt stood at the window with his arms crossed over his chest. He looked at his son and smiled sadly. Finn sat still, with his head thrown back in his chair and his eyes closed.
“Then I equipped you for the journey, Finn.... I did not show you this way or that, for I was a bound man and could not go with you. I gave you books and masters, who opened all the gates of the world to you. I let you look into the mist where you wanted to ride. I feared nothing, because I wanted nothing for myself and because I had seen through the mist.... You grew up and I saw that you grew good and clever. Then I sat down and waited and longed for the day when I should wave to you from the balcony of my old house, when you marched forth to conquer your new land.... I was right to wait for the day.... Ah.... I have seen them, the poor devils, hungry and wounded, rush blindfold towards the new, which they did not know, because it could not possibly be worse than the old. I have heard them call for new laws because they had violated the old ... they were driven from their huts and sat on the deck of the emigrant-ship with their bundle and their uncertain hope for a better fate in the new world.... But you.... You had done no wrong and had nothing to revenge. Free as a king’s son, you rode over the bridge with your retinue and rode through the world and planted your banner wherever you chose to dwell. Born of your mother’s longing for excitement ... in your father’s house, whose walls are as thick as the walls of a castle ... with the strong air of the old room in your lungs and without its yoke upon your neck ... a rich and spotless nobleman, taking his place of his own free will in the ranks of the revolution.”
He was silent. His steps sounded heavily through the stillness:
“Are you with me, Finn?”
“Yes, father.”
“Come.”