Gösta Berling

“ I only know that that night a beautiful young woman risked her life, her honor, her reputation, her health, to bring back a poor wretch to the right way. I only know that that night Gösta Berling left the beloved Ekeby fall to follow her who for his sake had conquered the fear of death, the fear of shame, the fear of punishment. ”

“ It so happens that just before the decisive moment Gösta catches sight of a woman who is sitting on a stone at the water’s edge. The flames from the bonfire light her up where she sits staring out over the waves; he cannot see her clearly and distinctly through the mist and spray, but his eyes are continually drawn to her. ”

“ Gösta Berling stood a short distance away and looked down into the water. Perhaps the young woman would not wish to see him. He did not know it, but his thoughts played and smiled. “Nobody knows where she is,” he thought; “we can take her with us to Ekeby. We will keep her hidden there, we pensioners, and we will be good to her. She shall be our queen, our mistress, but no one shall know that she is there. We will guard her so well, so well. She perhaps would be happy with us; she would be cherished like a daughter by all the old men.” ”

“ They help Gösta Berling to go from house to house and see that no one is starving. And no more brandy is made now.”
It was as if the major’s wife had sat in the sledge and listened to a long divine service. She had come to a blessed land. She saw old, furrowed faces brighten, when they spoke of the time which had come. The sick forgot their pains to tell of the day of joy.
“We all want to be like the good Captain Lennart,” they said. “We all want to be good. We want to believe good of every one. We will not injure any one. It shall hasten the coming of God’s Kingdom.” ”

“ Where are the little flower-pickers, where are the little princesses of the fairy tale about whose feet roses grow, where are they who should strew flowers on the weary ways?
Gösta Berling has decided to get married. He is searching for a bride who is poor enough, humble enough for a mad priest.
Beautiful and high-born women have loved him, but they may not compete for his hand. The outcast chooses from among outcasts.
Whom shall he choose, whom shall he seek out?
To Ekeby a poor girl sometimes comes from a lonely forest hamlet far away among the mountains, and sells brooms. ”

“ She is of a melancholy, Madonna-like type, such as is still found among the lovely girls by the shores of Löfven’s long lake.
Well, Gösta has found his sweetheart; a half-crazy broom-girl is just the wife for a mad priest. Nothing can be more suitable.
All he needs to do is to go to Karlstad for the rings, and then they can once more have a merry day by Löfven’s shore. Let them laugh at Gösta Berling when he betroths himself to the broom-girl, when he celebrates his wedding with her! Let them laugh! ”

“ But without paying any attention to the warning cries, Gösta Berling rushes up to the countess and seizes her.
He lifts her in his arms and rushes from the room out into the hall and then on to the steps with her.
The astonished women’s screams could not check him. When they hurry after, they only see how he throws himself into a sledge with the countess in his arms.
They hear the driver crack his whip and see the horse set off. They know the driver: it is Beerencreutz. They know the horse: it is Don Juan. And in deep distress over the countess’s fate they call their husbands. ”

“ People will believe all evil of me and turn away from me. It has pleased you to do this, O Love, for why should I stand higher than my beloved? Hand in hand we will wander out into the world. Gösta Berling’s bride is penniless; he found her in a snow-drift. We shall not live in lofty halls, but in a cottage at the edge of the wood. I shall help him to watch the kiln, I shall help him to set snares for partridges and hares, I shall cook his food and mend his clothes. Oh, my beloved, how I shall long and mourn, while I sit there alone by the edge of the wood and wait for you! ”

“ Ought he not to hate her, when she is in love with Gösta Berling and kisses him? Should he not cast her out, shut his door against her, when she will disgrace her greatness by loving such a man? Let her stay at Ekeby, let her run to the neighbors for shelter, let her sleep in the snow-drifts; it’s all the same, she has already been dragged in the dirt, the lovely Marianne. The bloom is gone. The lustre of her life is gone.
He lies there in his bed, and hears how she beats on the door. What does that matter to him? He is asleep. Outside stands one who will marry a dismissed priest ”

“ Fancy the monotonous sound of psalms from the kitchen!
Well, and then bells come ringing, eager feet stamp off the snow in the hall, and Gösta Berling comes into the room. He laughs and jokes. He is life, he is warmth. He opens the piano, and he plays so that they are surprised at the old strings. He can sing all songs, play any tune. He makes all the inmates of the house happy. He was never cold, he was never tired. ”

“ She is gay and playful like a child. She is fiery and captivating like a young woman. She is good and wise like the old who have lived a good life.
And then the pensioners began to play, so gently, so murmuringly soft.
It goes well, it goes brilliantly well. From the dead notes they charm Madame Musica herself. Spread out your magic cloak, dear Madame Musica, and take Gösta Berling to the land of gladness, where he used to live.
Alas that it is Gösta Berling who sits there pale and depressed, and whom the old men must amuse as if he were a child. There will be no more joy now in Värmland. ”

“ What did the banns matter? They had love. And the anger of men! Gösta Berling believed in fate; fate had mastered them: no one can resist fate.
If the stars had been the candles which had been lighted for her wedding, if Don Juan’s bells had been the church chimes, calling the people to witness her marriage to old Dahlberg, still she must have fled with Gösta Berling. So powerful is fate.
They had passed the vicarage and Munkerud. They had three miles to Berga and three miles more to Ekeby. The road skirted the edge of the wood ”

“ If that poor girl has lain down to die in the wood, it is not because they have set the dogs on her,—that they have never done,—but because Gösta Berling, a week ago, was married to Countess Elizabeth.
But what good is it to speak to that mob? They are tired, they are hungry; revenge drives them on, plunder tempts them. They rush down with wild cries, and before them rides the cottager, whom fear has driven mad.
The pensioners have hidden the young countess in their innermost room. Löwenborg and Eberhard are to sit there and guard her; the others go out to meet the people. ”

“ At these words Gösta Berling had stolen away to a beautiful dark-haired girl who sat at the big table.
“You were much at Borg five years ago, Anna,” he says. “Do you know if it was the major’s wife who told Ebba Dohna that I was a dismissed priest?”
“Help her, Gösta!” is the girl’s only answer.
“You must know that I will first hear if she has made me a murderer.”
“Oh, Gösta, what a thought! Help her, Gösta!”
“You won’t answer, I see. Then Sintram told the truth.” And Gösta goes back to the other pensioners. He does not lift a finger to help the major’s wife. ”

“ She stares and stares at the little blue stars; those happy ones who possess all hearts; those little prophets who, beautiful in themselves, are also glorified by the splendor of all the beauty which they herald, of all the beauty which is coming. And as she watches them a storm of wrath rises in her soul, rumbling like the thunder, deadening like the lightning. “By what right,” she thinks, “does Countess Dohna hold this bunch of hepaticas, picked by the shore at Ekeby?”
They were all tempters: Sintram, the countess, everybody wanted to allure Gösta Berling to what was evil. ”

“ Old Ulrika plays as if she would break the strings. There is so much to drown: the lamentations of the poor peasants, the curses of overworked cottagers, the sneers of insolent servants, and, first and last, the shame,—the shame of being the wife of a bad man.
To those notes Gösta Berling has led young Countess Dohna to the dance. Marianne Sinclair and her many admirers have danced to them, and the major’s wife at Ekeby has moved to their measure when Altringer was still alive. She can see them, couple after couple, in their youth and beauty, whirl by. ”

“ You have improved, indeed, under her treatment.”
“It was she who saved me,” says Gösta. “What had I been without her?”
“As if she did not know what she was about when she kept you here at Ekeby. You can lure others to the trap; you have great gifts. Once you tried [46] to get away from her; you let her give you a cottage, and you became a laborer; you wished to earn your bread. Every day she passed your cottage, and she had lovely young girls with her. Once it was Marianne Sinclair; then you threw aside your spade and apron, Gösta Berling, and came back as pensioner.” ”

“ You have drowned yourself in brandy, Gösta Berling, and you are dead.
“That which now moves in you is only death spasms, and you will not allow them to live, if you call that life. It is just as if you grudged the dead a dance over the graves in the starlight. ”

“ The ladies look for their wraps in the dreadful confusion of the dressing-room.
The young countess has been in great haste to leave this hateful ball. She is ready first of all the ladies. She stands smiling in the middle of the room and looks at the confusion, when the door is thrown open, and Gösta Berling shows himself on the threshold.
No man has a right to enter this room. The old ladies stand there with their thin hair no longer adorned with becoming caps; and the young ones have turned up their skirts under their cloaks, that the stiff ruffles may not be crushed on the way home. ”

“ The spurs clank on your heel.”
At these words the monk cast off his disguise, and Gösta Berling stood under the balcony in a knight’s dress of silk and gold. He heeded not the beauty’s warning, but climbed up one of the balcony supports, swung himself over the balustrade, and, just as Master Julius had arranged it, fell on his knees at the lovely Marianne’s feet. ”

“ But the major’s wife was silent and walked a couple of times up and down the room; then she took a seat before the fire, put her feet on the fender, and leaned her elbows on her knees.
“Thousand devils!” she said, and laughed softly to herself. “It is truer, what I am saying, than I myself thought. Don’t you believe, Gösta Berling, that most of the people in this world are dead or half-dead? Do you think that I am alive? No! No, indeed!
“Yes, look at me! I am the mistress of Ekeby, and I am the most powerful in Värmland. ”

“ There cannot be any question of love between them; he is just the man to find his happiness in a romantic, innocent adoration.
The young count is silent and serious, and Gösta is playfully gay. He is just such a companion as the young countess likes. No one who sees her fancies that she is hiding a forbidden love. She thinks of dancing,—of dancing and merry-making. She would like the earth to be quite flat, without stones, without hills or seas, so that she could dance everywhere. From the cradle to the grave she would like to dance in her small, thin-soled, satin slippers. ”

“ Let them inside stand with lifted glasses till the world’s last day; he cares nothing for them. The broom-girl can wait, Julius’s speech may die on his lips. There would be no rings exchanged that night, no paralyzing amazement would fall upon the shining assembly.
Now the waves must in truth fight for their freedom, for Gösta Berling has come, the people have found a leader. Terrified hearts take courage, a terrible struggle begins. ”

“ The young count’s face grew red.
“I ask what that means!” he repeated.
“I ask that too,” sneered Beerencreutz. “I ask what it means when Henrik Dohna’s countess will not dance with Gösta Berling.”
The count turned questioning to his wife.
“I could not, Henrik,” she cried. “I could not dance with him or any of them. I thought of the major’s wife, whom they allowed to languish in prison.”
The little count straightened his stiff body and stretched up his old-man’s head.
“We pensioners,” said Beerencreutz, “permit no one to insult us. She who will not dance with us must drive with us. ”

“ It is not for the dog’s sake the wolves are out to-night.”
Thereupon Gösta drove into the yard at Berga, but the wolves hunted him up to the very steps. He had to beat them off with the whip.
[76]
“Anna,” he said, as they drew up, “God would not have it. Keep a good countenance; if you are the woman I take you for, keep a good countenance!”
They had heard the sleigh-bells in the house, and came out.
“He has her!” they cried, “he has her! Long live Gösta Berling!” and the new-comers were embraced by one after another. ”

“ No, Gösta Berling is chasing the sea-nymph, his voice is silent, his commands lead no one.
So the temporary dam has to be sunk without him. The waves rush back, it sinks into the water and after it the stones and sand-bags. But how is the work carried out without a leader? No care, no order. The waves dash up again, they break with renewed rage against this new obstacle, they begin to roll the sand-bags over, tear the ropes, loosen the stones; and they succeed, they succeed. ”

“ He thinks life is so sad. He rests his head in his hands and weeps. The pensioners are dismayed. These are not mild, healing tears, such as Madame Musica generally calls forth. He is sobbing like one in despair. At their wits’ end they put their instruments away.
And the good Madame Musica, who loves Gösta Berling, she too almost loses courage; but then she remembers that she has still a mighty champion among the pensioners. ”