Jonas Lie

“ The narrow Tromö Sound, with its swarm of small coasters, lighters, pilot-boats, and vessels of larger build, suns itself there between fertile or wooded slopes and ridges, over which are scattered in every direction the red cottages of the sailor population, skippers' houses, and villas; and in every available spot, in every creek or bay where there is barely room for a vessel, the white timbers of ships in course of construction come into view. It is an idyllic dockyard, a very beautiful and very appropriate approach to Norway's principal seaport town ”

“ She came back then to Salvé, and as they sat tête-à-tête in the lamplit room with doors and windows thrown wide open, the moonlight gleaming on the dark trees outside, and the night air perfumed with the scent of flowers, she endeavoured to ingratiate herself with him by pouring out his rum-and-water and by rolling his cigarettes, an art in which it appeared from her laughter and gestures that she thought him awkward. She was in a state of feverish excitement, and kept darting off to the wicket and back again. ”

“ Nothing, I firmly believe; and that it is just you, Salvé, who are mad! Ah! if I could only really believe that there was nothing to quarrel about, after all! And I can believe it, if I have only been with her for a while," he sighed; and then added with a touch of self-contempt, "the fact is, I ought never to go away from home. I am like an anchovy; I don't bear taking out of the jar!
"She was so like the old Elizabeth as she stood there and told me all this; it is years since I have seen her like that. There's not her match to be found the whole world through. ”

“ Fru Beck's words, as she stood there so pale, and told her of her unhappiness, recurred to her again and again, more distinctly, it seemed, each time. "I am dying every day. I know best myself how much is left of me. It is very little, and will soon be less."
It seemed then all in a moment to flash upon her—
"That is just how Salvé and I are living. We are wasting away—we are dying every day beside each other. That is what people do who are unhappily married." ”

“ The gale showed no signs of moderating, and that night, as Salvé Kristiansen and another were taking their turn at the wheel, there gleamed suddenly out of the pitchy darkness to leeward of the fore-rigging the white crest of a tremendous eddy wave, which a moment after came crashing down upon the deck, carrying clean away the round-house, binnacle, and long-boat, damaging the wheel, and leaving many of the drenched and half—suffocated sailors deposited in the most unexpected places, and only glad to find that they still had the deck under them. ”

“ Now and then, when his granddaughter—a child with a thick crop of hair falling about her ears, and a rough dog constantly at her heels—would burst into the house with all the freshness of the outside air blowing round her, as it were, and deliver herself of her intelligence, he might be drawn, perhaps, to the window to look out over the sea, and afterwards, like a growling bear disturbed from its lair, even follow her with some difficulty out of the door with the spyglass. ”

“ Madam Garvloit came out with her work in her hand, and asked what the matter was.
"The matter is," replied her husband, dismally, "that I am ruined. There is Elizabeth up there sitting with some skipper, God knows whom, who she says is her lover."
"Is it possible?"
"Go and see for yourself;" and as his wife hurried past him up the stairs, he added in the same dismal tone—"Who shall we get to look after the house now? we shall never have another like her;" ”

“ He no longer wore the smart cloak he had on when he went out.
"I have gambled away all your money!" he cried, in English, to Salvé, as if careless of further reticence, and made some remark then with an unpleasant laugh to his sister, who had evidently by her expression perceived at once how matters stood.
"There's my last piastre for you," said Salvé, throwing it over to him.
"Try your luck with it."
"He is successful in love," said Paolina, tearfully, and with a naïve affectation of superstition—"he is engaged." ”

“ It was getting near bedtime, and she had been sitting half-asleep over the fire, and perhaps her suddenly awakened excitement lent a more than usual animation and attraction to a pair of eyes and a face that would nowhere have passed unnoticed; for Carl Beck, who was at the head of the party, seemed positively fascinated, and could not take his eyes off her, until, reddening with confusion, she instinctively stretched out her hand for her bodice, that lay beside her on the bench. ”

“ The brig and its possible loss did not occupy much of Elizabeth's thoughts. In the midst of their danger she was absolutely glad at heart at the thought that by her display of implicit confidence she had succeeded in winning a great victory with Salvé. After what she had gone through that night, this was everything to her.
There was a fine energetic look of determination in her face, and her eyes were moist with tears as she bent over the child in her lap and whispered—
"If he cannot trust us, we two must teach him—mustn't we, Gjert?" ”

“ The Juno lay ready to sail in the roads of Monte Video, where she had taken in hides as part of her home cargo. The remainder, of coffee, she was to load at Rio, and in the meantime she had filled up with coals for that port. She was lying in tropical costume, with awnings over the fore and after deck as a protection against the fierce rays of the sun; and the crew were going about in correspondingly airy clothing, with open shirts and tucked-up canvas trousers, brown and shiny with perspiration, and gasping after every breath. It was the hottest season of the year. ”

“ He became the very embodiment of restlessness. A hundred times a-day he went aloft to look out for some prospect of a change, and to strain his eyes after the streak of land to the north which was to be made out on clear days from the maintop-gallant mast-head, and which of course would be the coast of Norway. The dress, the silk handkerchiefs, the rings, and what he should say to Elizabeth—whether he should formally request a private interview with her, or wait till an opportunity offered—were running incessantly in his head. ”

“ She was not a woman to offend lightly.
"So they have fastened that lie upon Elizabeth, have they!—it's a shame for them, so it is! And you, Salvé, can soil your lips with it? Let me just tell you, then, for your pains, that the Becks' house is as respectable a one as any in Arendal; and it isn't you, and such as you, that can take its character away. Never fear but Elizabeth shall hear every word of your precious story—ay, and the captain, and the lieutenant, and Madam Beck, too; and you'll be hunted from the Juno like a dripping cur. ”

“ A married sailor is always an object of quiet respect to his comrades who have not had means to take the same step themselves; and without exaggeration it may be said that woman is present in her truest sense in the midst of the often outwardly rough life on board ship—warm, loving, and venerated, and surrounded by all the enchantment which distance can supply. If we are tempted to think otherwise, we have not penetrated to the simple, childlike nature which underlies the sailor's rough exterior.
The exteriors, indeed, in the dancing-room of the Aurora that evening were rough enough. ”

“ Or when I was admiring the North Star was I not thinking then too: If you, Salvé, were in command of her, they would see what she could really do with a proper man on board? What possible interest do you suppose I could have in the North Star, except in connection with you? Were not you, poor skipper of the Apollo, worth more, a thousand times more to me, than a hundred North Stars with all their bravery? ”

“ But it is to the captain who, on some pitch-dark winter night, when the sea is running mountains high, has come in beneath bare poles under the Torungens, and who knows that he is doomed if he cannot get a pilot, that these Merdö men are most familiar. When, perhaps, he has given up all hope, he suddenly hears himself hailed from the darkness; a line is thrown; and a dripping pilot stands upon the deck. When the sea is too rough to board a vessel in any other way, they do not think twice about taking a line round their waist and jumping overboard ”

“ When she returned to consciousness again, Salvé was by her side. They were fastened to the same rope, and all the crew had come aft, and lashed themselves there. The brig lay over on her side upon the inner bank, with her stern up, and with the mainmast lying over the side. She kept lifting and striking heavily against the bottom, while heavy seas, one after another, swept her forward.
"The rigging to leeward must be cleared away, and we shall get off, lads!" shouted Salvé, through his hollowed hand; and he sprang over with an axe to do it. ”

“ She had undone her luxuriant hair, and had put on a languishing look, and every now and then thrummed absently on her guitar, humming gently to herself as she fixed her black eyes upon him. Salvé saw himself in a manner besieged, and felt half inclined to brush past her and escape into the garden; but it would have seemed too deliberately unfriendly. The only sign which betrayed his consciousness of the situation was the somewhat hasty way in which he puffed his cigarette.
"You really mean to leave us?" she said at last sadly, in almost a beseeching tone. ”

“ Elizabeth had always had a pretty strong will of her own; and here, where she virtually had the control of everything, her tendency to self-assertion had been considerably developed. The force and decision with which she gave her opinion about everything seemed to Madam Garvloit sometimes (although she said nothing) rather like a reversing of their relative positions; and on days when she was in a captious humour—and those were her days of most feverish activity—she would even go so far as to set aside her mistress's orders altogether. ”

“ The crew gathered round. The Irishman seized a heavy iron pump-handle as a weapon, and Salvé a handspike; and Salvé kept his word. He pulled the boots off as the other lay senseless on the deck, and took them down to the Spaniard.
In point of physical strength, Salvé was far from being the equal of many of these men, who, he knew very well, were now only looking out for an occasion to get the better of him. His only chance was to take the initiative on all occasions, and to seem the most reckless and the most careless of life, and the most eager to fight of them all. ”

“ Salvé's patience was exhausted. He had been sitting all this time squeezed up in the narrow space between the bench and the wall with people on both sides of him, preventing his getting out; but now grasping his neighbour violently by the shoulder, he sprang all at once across the table and over to the unabashed Yankee, with an irresistible feeling that, come what might, he would get out into the freedom of the open air once more. ”

“ It represented the young cadet of seventeen years on the gunboat at the supreme moment.
Elizabeth stood with her hands clasped before her silently engrossed, while Salvé kept her from being pressed upon behind.
"Look!" she said, turning half round to him, but without taking her eyes off the picture,—"the Belgian captain is inviting him to surrender. He has no choice—they are too many for him. But don't you see the thought he has in his mind?—you can read it in his face. And what a fine fellow he looks, with his handsome uniform, and his epaulets, and his short sword!" ”

“ Of all the vessels in sight, the handsomest, without comparison, was the North Star, a Norwegian corvette, well known along the coast of Norway, and which had often aroused Elizabeth's enthusiasm in earlier days. She was crossing their course, and standing under full sail for the Channel. Elizabeth recognised her at once, and exclaimed decisively—
"That is the North Star—isn't she a magnificent ship, Salvé! See, they are taking in the topsails; they look like a flock of birds up there on the yard among those beautiful big sails. Did you ever see anything so grand as her shape? ”

“ Involuntarily he approached the berth, and looked into it.
"Elizabeth," he whispered, softly, as if he was afraid of waking her.
"Is that you, Salvé?" was the reply, in a perfectly calm voice.
"I thought you would be sitting up with the boy in this gale. She rolls so; and I—I haven't been down to see you," he said.
"I knew I had you on deck, Salvé," she replied. "The rest we must only leave to God. You have not had time to come down, poor fellow," she added, "you have been so busy." ”

“ The look askance over his brass spectacles with which he greeted any casual stranger who might come into the house had very little welcome in it, and an expression about his sunken mouth and sharp chin said plainly enough that the other might state his business at once and be gone. He sought no company; and the only time he had ever been seen at church was when he came rowing over to Tromö with his wife's body in her coffin. When the pastor sprinkled earth upon it, it was observed that the tears streamed down his cheeks, and it was long after dark before he quitted the churchyard to return. ”

“ With the same movement with which he had intended to embrace her, he lifted her quickly out of the berth, and told her to dress herself and the child, and come up to the top of the cabin stairs. The words were hardly out of his mouth when the vessel heeled over, and didn't right herself again.
"Fore-topmast gone, captain; rigging hanging!" bawled Nils Buvaagen down the stair.
Salvé turned to her for a moment with a face full of mute, crushing self-reproach, and sprang up on deck.
"Keep her away, if she'll answer her helm!" he shouted to the man at the wheel. "To the axes, men!" ”

“ Many things happen in life that would not be so easy to bear if we were cast down beforehand."
"Yes; but one could guard one's self," whispered Fru Beck, with a certain bitterness and hardness in her voice.
Elizabeth made no reply, and there was a pause, which seemed to Fru Beck to have broken the thread of the conversation. She deliberated how she should take it up again so as to get at what she wanted to say, and taking Elizabeth's hand with sudden warmth, she said—
"If there is anything your aunt wants, you know, I hope, that she has only to send to me." ”

“ Elizabeth was sitting meanwhile on the cabin-stairs, scarcely in a condition to comprehend what was passing.
As Salvé was occupied with this work, he suddenly heard a shout of joy round him. From behind a projection in the downs a group of men had appeared, carrying a large boat. They stopped at a corner of the beach. A number of them took their seats in the boat; and as a wave was curling over to break, the others ran her down, and the back flow carried her out to sea, the men setting to work at once with all their might at the oars. ”