“Is’t here?” said the first man, passing his fingers across his neck.
“Hush!” replied the gamekeeper, frowning at the questioner.
“Ef it’s me you’re talkin’ about,” said Sören, “don’t set there an’ cackle, but say what you got to say.”
“Ay,” said the gamekeeper, laying great stress on the word and looking at Sören with a serious air of making up his mind. “Ay, Sören, it is you we’re talkin’ about. Good Lord!” he folded his hands and seemed lost in dark musings. “Sören,” he began, “it’s a hangin’ matter what ye’re doin’, and I give you warnin’”—he spoke as if reading from a book—“mend your ways, Sören! There stands the gallows and the block”—he pointed to the manor-house—“and there a Christian life an’ a decent burial”—he waved his hand in the direction of the stable. “For you must answer with your neck, that’s the sacred word of the law, ay, so it is, so it is, think o’ that!”
“Huh!” said Sören defiantly. “Who’ll have the law on me?”
“Ay,” repeated the gamekeeper in a tone as if something had been brought forward that made the situation very much worse. “Who’ll have the law on you? Sören, Sören, who’ll have the law on you? But devil split me, you’re a fool,” he went on in a voice from which the solemnity had flown, “an’ it’s fool’s play to be runnin’ after an old woman, when there’s such a risk to it. If she’d been young! An’ such an ill-tempered satan, too—let Blue-face keep her in peace, there’s other women in the world besides her, Heaven be praised.”
Sören had neither courage nor inclination to explain to them that he could no longer live without Marie Grubbe. In fact, he was almost ashamed of his foolish passion, and he knew that if he confessed the truth, it would only mean that the whole pack of men and maids would hound him, so he lied and denied his love.
“’Tis a wise way you’re pointin’, but look ’ee here, folks, I’ve got a rix-dollar when you haven’t any, an’ I’ve got a bit of clothes an’ another bit an’ a whole wagon-load, my dear friends, and once I get my purse full, I’ll run away just as quiet, an’ then one o’ you can try your luck.”
“All well an’ good,” answered Sören Gamekeeper, “but it’s stealin’ money with your neck in a noose, I say. It’s all very fine to have clothes and silver given you for a gift, an’ most agreeable to lie in bed here an’ say you’re sick an’ get wine an’ roasted meat an’ all kinds o’ belly-cheer sent down, but it won’t go long here with so many people round. It’ll get out some day, an’ then you’re sure o’ the worst that can befall any one.”