She seized the letter and flung it in Gösta’s face. The black paper fluttered out and fell on the floor. Gösta knew it too well.
“You have sinned against me, Gösta. You have misjudged one who has been a second mother to you. Do you dare to refuse your punishment? You shall accept Ekeby, and it shall ruin you, for you are weak. You shall send home your wife, so that there will be no one to save you. You shall die with a name as hated as mine. Margareta Celsing’s obituary is that of a witch. Yours shall be that of a spendthrift and an oppressor of the poor.”
She sank back on the pillows, and all was still. Through the silence rang a muffled blow, now one and then another. The sledge-hammer had begun its far-echoing work.
“Listen,” said Gösta Berling, “so sounds Margareta Celsing’s obituary! That is not a prank of drunken pensioners; that is the song of the victory of labor, raised in honor of a good, old worker. Do you hear what the hammer says? ‘Thanks,’ it says; ‘thanks for good work; thanks for bread, which you have given the poor; thanks for roads, which you have opened; thanks for districts, which you have cultivated! Thanks for pleasure, with which you have filled your halls!’—‘Thanks,’ it says, ‘and sleep in peace! Your work shall live and continue. Your house shall always be a home for happy labor.’—‘Thanks,’ it says, ‘and do not judge us who have sinned! You who are now starting on the journey to the regions of peace, think gentle thoughts of us who still live.’”
Gösta ceased, but the sledge-hammer went on speaking. All the voices which had ever spoken kindly to the major’s wife were mingled with the ring of the hammer. Gradually her features relaxed, as if the shadow of death had fallen over her.
Anna Lisa came in and announced that the gentlemen from Hogfors had come. The major’s wife let them go. She would not make any will.
“Oh, Gösta Berling, man of many deeds,” she said, “so you have conquered once more. Bend down and let me bless you!”
The fever returned with redoubled strength. The death-rattle began. The body toiled through dreary suffering; but the spirit soon knew nothing of it. It began to gaze into the heaven which is opened for the dying.
So an hour passed, and the short death-struggle was over. She lay there so peaceful and beautiful that those about her were deeply moved.