Knut Hamsun

“ And today I was thinking—how would you take it, I wonder, if I came straight up to you in the street one day when I was nicely dressed, and did not say anything to hurt you as I have done, but gave you a rose which I had bought on purpose? Then the next moment I remembered that I could never again do what I wanted; for I can never be well again before I die. I cry so often, I lie still and cry ceaselessly and inconsolably; it does not hurt my chest if I do not sob. Johannes, dear, dear friend, my only beloved on earth, come to me now and be here a little while when it begins to grow dark. ”

“ The man rose abruptly; at the same instant his dark soul was illumined as if by torch-light. "You are so kind to every one," he said bitterly. "You even come to me." She made no answer, simply stood looking at him and her face turned dark red. "What do you want?" he asked as bitterly as before; "have you come to remind me of the past? If so, it is for the last time, my lady, for now I am going away for ever." And still the young mistress of the Castle made no answer, but her lips were trembling. ”

“ Victoria smiled and said:
"Look, here is Camilla, isn't this a surprise? You know one another."
She stood looking at them both for a moment, then she went out of the room.
For the first instant Johannes stood motionless, stiff and dazed. This was the surprise; Victoria had been kind enough to provide a substitute. Look here, you two people, go and take each other! Spring is in full bloom, the sun is shining; open the windows if you like, for the garden is full of the scent of flowers and the starlings are playing in the birch-tops. Why don't you talk to one another? ”

“ A second poem, "Love's Labyrinth," which he put into the mouth of Friar Vendt, made his name known.
Ah, what was Love? A breeze whispering in the roses; no, a yellow phosphorescence in the blood. Love was a music hot as hell which stirs even old men's hearts to dance. It was like the daisy that opens wide to the coming of night, and it was like the anemone that closes at a breath and dies at a touch.
Such a thing was Love.
It might ruin its man, raise him up again and brand him anew; it might love me today, you tomorrow and him tomorrow night, so inconstant was it. ”

“ It was lying dead and snowed under now, but he was writing about it all the same, and not of winter and snow at all, but spring and fragrance and mild breezes. And it was evening. The water below lay deep and still, like a leaden lake; the lilacs shed their perfume, hedge after hedge was in bud and green leaves, and the air was so still that the blackcock could be heard calling on the other side of the bay. On one of the paths of the garden stood Victoria, she was alone, dressed in white, twenty years old. ”

“ The frost had reddened his cheeks.
"Are you cold?" said Camilla, flying up to him.
Her voice trembled with emotion. Suddenly she hurried back to Johannes, put her arm through his and said:
"Excuse me for not asking whether you were cold. You didn't put on your overcoat; shall I go up and get it? No? Well, anyhow button your jacket."
She buttoned his jacket.
Johannes offered his hand to Richmond. He was in a strangely absent mood, as though what was happening did not concern him. He gave an uncertain half-smile and muttered:
"Glad to meet you again." ”

“ The head is a human head and now and then laughs quietly and silently. He follows it. It rolls for days and nights and he follows it; by the seashore it slips into the ground and hides. He wades out into the sea and dives. He finds himself in front of a huge doorway and meets a great barking fish. It has a mane on its back and it barks at him like a dog. Behind the fish stands Victoria. He stretches out his hands to her, she has no clothes on, she laughs to him and a storm blows through her hair. Then he calls to her, he hears his own cry—and wakes.
Johannes rose and went to the window. ”

“ Then the terrified old Miller uttered a shriek.
The Master turned his head and looked out of the window. Suddenly he jumped up and came close to the window, where he stood staring out. It was a face in which a world of suffering was depicted. His mouth was strangely distorted, he shook both his clenched fists at the window, silently threatening; at last he only threatened with one hand as he walked backwards across the cellar floor. As he struck against the chair the candle upset. At the same instant a huge flame shot up. ”

“ She purses up her mouth and dips the extreme tip of it into the drink and she gets desperate if you watch her hand while she is doing it. You must never in any circumstances look at a woman's hand. She can't stand it, she capitulates. She begins at once to draw in her hand, to pose it more and more elegantly, always with the object of concealing a wrinkle, a crookedness of the fingers or a rather misshapen nail. At last she can bear it no longer and asks, quite beside herself: what are you looking at?... She had once kissed him, once, one summer. ”

“ Oh, Love is the summer night with stars in the sky and fragrance on the earth. But why does it make the youth seek hidden paths and why does it make the greybeard stand tiptoe in his lonely chamber? Ah, Love turns the heart of man to a garden of fungus, a luxuriant and shameless garden wherein mysterious and immodest toadstools raise their heads. ”

“ The afternoon was still and warm; the river ran like a pulse through the heated landscape. A steamer glided in towards land, leaving a fan of white streaks over the surface of the bay. Then four carriages drove out of the Castle yard and took the road down to the pier.
The boat came alongside, some ladies and gentlemen landed and took their seats in the carriages. Then a series of shots began to ring out from the Castle; two men stood on the top of the round tower with shot-guns, loading and firing by turns. ”

“ Johannes stopped him at the door.
"Wait a moment. Oh, you ought to have seen how your face lighted up. I saw it as you turned, it was the lamp, it sent a gleam of sunshine over your forehead. You were not so angry any more, I saw that. I opened the window, I know, and I sang too loud. I was the happy brother of all the world. It sometimes happens like that. One takes leave of one's senses. ”

“ When Princess Victoria comes, bring her in! says Johannes in a loud voice. The dwarf bows to the dust again and vanishes. Johannes stretches himself comfortably on the soft divan and thinks. There he would lead her to a seat and offer her costly dishes of gold and silver plate; a blazing fire should light up the cave; behind the heavy curtain of gold brocade at the back of the cave her couch should be prepared and twelve knights should stand on guard....
Johannes got up, crept out of the cave and listened. There was a rustling of twigs and leaves on the path. ”

“ Johannes plunged his hands among the papers on his table and picked up a handful of sheets large and small.
"Look here!" he cried. "I tell you, I've never done so well. It was like one long flash of lightning. I once saw a flash run along a telegraph wire; God help you, it looked like a sheet of fire. That's how it has been streaming through me tonight. What am I to do? ”

“ They walked on.
"They say you're going to marry that little girl, that girl whose life you saved; what was her name?"
"Camilla, do you mean?"
"Camilla Seier. They say you are going to marry her."
"Do they? Why do you ask that? She is not grown up. I have been to her home, it is a big, fine house, a castle like your own; I have been there many times. No, she is not grown up." ”

“ A new favour and a great one had been vouchsafed to the Miller's son.
"The Mansion" looked like a little castle in the green landscape, indeed it was like a stupendous palace in its solitude. The house was built of wood and painted white, with many bow-windows in its walls and roof, and a flag flew on the round tower when there were visitors. People called it the Castle. And outside its grounds lay the bay to one side, and to the other the great forests; far away some little farms were to be seen.
Johannes appeared at the landing-stage and got the young people into the boat. ”

“ Outside his doorway a man was walking up and down, an old acquaintance, the former Tutor at the Castle.
Johannes greeted him.
He was dressed in a long, warm overcoat which was carefully brushed and there was a brisk and decided air about him.
"Here you see your friend and colleague," he said. "Give me your hand, young man. God has guided my ways marvellously since we last met; I am married, I have a home, a little garden, a wife. The days of miracles are not yet past. ”

“ It occurred to him that perhaps he might say: "Well, good evening, Miss Victoria," and go. From the place where he stood it was one step down to the next stone and from there one to her, and then he could withdraw as though quite naturally. She stood right in his path. She had on a yellow dress and a red hat, she was strangely beautiful; her throat was bare.
"I am blocking your way," he mumbled and stepped down. He controlled himself so as not to show any emotion.
There was now one pace between them. She did not make way for him, but stood still. They looked one another in the face. ”

“ You see, that's how it came about."
"Congratulations!" said Johannes.
"Stop! not a word more. I know what you're going to say. What about the first one, you will say, have you forgotten the eternal love of your youth? That's exactly what you will say. May I then ask you, my good sir, in my turn, what became of my first, only and eternal love? Didn't she take a captain in the artillery? Moreover I will ask you another little question: have you ever, ever seen a case of a man getting the one he should have got? ”

“ Today, as I cannot work, cannot think, cannot rest for memories, I will set myself to describe what befell me one night. Dear Reader, today I have had such a terribly bad day. It is snowing outside, there are scarcely any people in the streets, everything is dismal and my soul is so fearfully desolate. ”

“ He strode through the wilderness as in the days of his childhood, swimming with his hands and feeling his way with his feet. Insects and creeping things fled before the mighty man.
Up by the granite quarry he found black-thorn, wood anemones and violets. He plucked a quantity, their homely scent recalled to him bygone days. In the distance the mountain ridges showed in a purple haze and on the far side of the bay the cuckoo was beginning to call. ”

“ The Lord went into his chamber, threw acid on his face to disfigure it, and said to his wife:
"I have had the misfortune to get some acid on my face, my cheeks are covered with burns, and now you cannot love me any more?"
"Oh, my bridegroom, my beloved!" faltered the old woman, kissing his hands. "You are more beautiful than any man on earth, your voice kindles my heart even today and I love you till death."
XIII
Johannes met Camilla in the street; she was with her mother, her father and Young Richmond; they stopped their carriage and talked to him in a friendly way. ”

“ I love you, I was not telling you a lie the other day and I'm not telling you one now; but there is so much that keeps us apart. I am very fond of you, I like talking to you, would rather talk to you than to any one else, but.... Well, I daren't stay here any longer, they can see us from the windows. Johannes, there are so many reasons that you don't know, so you must not ask me any more what I mean. ”

“ At a bridge stands a man waiting for him, he is collecting shadows; the man is of musk. A freezing terror seizes him at the sight of this man who wants to take his shadow. He spits at him and threatens him with clenched fists; the man does not budge but stands waiting for him. ”

“ He was just going out again when he saw the glimmer of a candle in the Castle cellar. He stopped. Through the little barred windows he could plainly see a man come into the cellar with a candle in one hand and a chair upholstered in red silk in the other. It was the Master. He was shaved and dressed as though for a great occasion. Perhaps I might knock at the window and give him the Lady's message, thought the Miller, but stood still. ”

“ I tell you, Nature has ordained it so wisely that he bears it remarkably well. Just look at me."
Johannes said:
"I can see that you're doing well."
"Excellently for that matter. Look, feel and listen! Has a set of unenticing troubles swept over my person? I have clothes, shoes, house and home, wife and children—well, the hopeful anyhow. What was I saying?—with regard to my poetry I'll answer the question on the spot. Oh, my young colleague, I am older than you and perhaps a little better equipped by Nature. ”

“ It is all deserted, not a tree to be seen, not a sound to be heard, it is nothing but a deserted market-place. But in the sand are prints of people's shoes and the air seems still to hold the last words spoken in the place, so lately was it abandoned. ”

“ When a few minutes later he and Johannes came to the place, the whole Castle, the big old timber house, was in flames. A couple of men from the pier had also come up; but they could not do anything either. Everything was destroyed.
But the Miller's lips were silent as the grave.
XI
Ask of some what Love is and it will be no more than a breeze murmuring among the roses and then dying away. But again it is often like an inviolable seal that lasts for life, lasts till death. God has created it of many kinds and seen it endure or perish:
Two mothers are walking along a road and talking together. ”

“ One of them is dressed in gay blue garments because her lover has come home from a journey. The other is dressed in mourning. She had three daughters, two of them dark, the third fair, and the fair one died. That is ten years ago, ten whole years, and still the mother wears mourning for her.
"It is so glorious today!" cries the blue-clad mother exulting, and claps her hands. "The warmth goes to my head, love has gone to my head, I am full of happiness. I could strip myself naked here on the road and stretch out my arms to the sun and send it kisses." ”

“ All my poems are to you, there are only a few that are not, and they are not printed. But you won't have read those that are printed either. Now I've begun on a big book. God, how thankful I am to you, for I am so full of you and that is all my joy. At every moment of the day, at night too, I see or hear something that reminds me of you. ”

“ But he is a well-bred man. And that means something."
"That was one for me, thanks!" He laughed aloud and added with insolence: "And there's money in his pockets; that means more."
She left him at once.
He drifted about from one wall to the other like an outlaw. Camilla talked to him, asked a question and he did not hear it and made no answer. Again she said something, touched his arm even and asked another question in vain.
"Oh, now he's lost in thought," she cried with a laugh. "He's thinking, he's thinking!"
Victoria heard and answered:
"He wants to be alone. He sent me away too." ”

“ Miss Victoria was right. She had been so kind as to remind him that he was not only their neighbour's son, but also the playmate of the Castle children, and it was to this latter circumstance he owed his presence here. He thanked her, that was how it was. He belonged to the place, the Castle woods were once his whole world, beyond them loomed the unknown country, fairyland. But in those days he would often have a message from Ditlef and Victoria that they wanted him to join them in an excursion or a game—those were the great events of his childhood. ”

“ Often and often it pours out of me, at night I swing up and down my room because I am so full of visions. There's a man in the room next to me, he can't sleep, he knocks on the wall. When it begins to dawn he comes into my room and he's furious. That doesn't matter, I don't worry about him, for then I have thought so long about you that you seem to be with me. I go to the window and sing, it begins to get light, the poplars are rustling outside. ”

“ The old Tutor remembered Johannes as a boy and a conversation was started between them. He said that he too had written poetry in his young days, he had kept his manuscripts, Johannes could read them some day. Now they had sent for him on this great occasion that he might participate in the joy of the family over Victoria's engagement. The Master and Mistress of the Castle had given him this surprise for the sake of old friendship.
"I have read nothing of yours," he said; "I read myself when I want to read anything; I have a drawer full of poems and tales. ”