The outcast

by Selma Lagerlöf

Sven brought the boat round again. "Why do you say that?" he asked between clenched teeth. "Why is it a good thing the place was burnt? I have heard that the folk in Applum were pleased enough with the building."

"I have heard so, too," she said. "But what was the good of that when the children would not go there?"

"Children would not go there?" he repeated, helplessly. "I have not been over to the mainland since it started—I knew nothing of that."

Fru Rhånge could see he was astonished at her saying it was well the place was burnt, and she went on eagerly to explain. From the very first, the children had taken a dislike to the new school. They had heard it was built by a man who had eaten human flesh, and they feared they would lose all chance of salvation if they sat at their lessons in a place that smelt of Christian blood.

And, as she told all this, she wondered why the man before her sat there so quietly, as if unconscious, with a far-away look in his eyes and a patient, suffering smile on his lips.

And in order to justify what she had already said, she went on to relate how the schoolmaster and, most of all, the mistress in charge of the little ones, had done all they could. Had spoken kindly and sensibly to the children, shown them how well the new school was built and fitted, and how all had been thought out to make it useful and comfortable for them. But the children had no ears for that, and persisted all the same: the place had been built by a wicked man, a dreadful sinner, and it was unclean.

Some of them had suddenly begun to cry during the lessons. Others had fancied they saw visions, and the fear and horror grew day by day. At last the parents could hardly get their children to go at all; it was even feared that some of the more excitable would go out of their minds.

Sven Elversson sat looking straight before him. "I wished her to be my judge," he said to himself. "And so it has come about. She condemns me, like all the rest."

She went on to say that it was of the children she had been thinking when she had said it was a good thing the school had been burnt. The fire had been caused by a pure accident. The woman who came to clean the rooms had upset a lamp: the fire had spread at once, and before she could get help it was beyond control.

The man at the helm looked up. "Well, well," he said. "Now Sven Elversson has been judged by God and man. Now it will be said that God would not suffer such unclean hands to build a house for children."