now!”
And the boy went on. He kept his cap in his hand, and the wind blew his blond hair so that it stuck out in long wisps. He walked down the street, into the alley and down to the river where his mother stood out in the water by her washing bench, beating the heavy linen with her paddle. There was a current in the water because the sluices were open from the mill. The sheets were pulled by the current and almost knocked the bench over. The washerwoman had to push against it.
“I almost went for a sail!” she said, “It’s a good thing you came because I need a little something to build up my strength! It’s cold out here in the water. I’ve been standing here for six hours now. Have you got something for me?”
The boy took out the bottle, and his mother set it to her lips and took a gulp.
“Oh, that does me good! How it warms me up! It’s just as good as hot food, and not as expensive! Drink, my boy. You look so pale. You’re freezing in those thin clothes. It’s autumn, after all. Oh, the water is so cold. Just so I don’t get sick. But I won’t! Give me another swallow, and you drink too, but just a little bit. You mustn’t get dependent on it, my poor, pitiful boy.”
And she went over by the bridge where the boy was standing and climbed up on dry land. The water poured from the apron of rushes she had tied around her waist. Water was flowing from her skirts.
“I slave and toil and work my fingers to the bone, but it doesn’t matter, as long as I can honestly raise you, my sweet child!”
Just then an older woman came. She was poorly dressed and looked badly too. She was lame in one leg and had an enormously large false curl covering one eye. The curl was supposed to hide her eye, but it only made the defect more noticeable. She was a friend of the washerwoman. The neighbors called her “Gimpy-Maren with the Curl.”
“You poor thing, how you toil and slave standing in that cold water! You certainly need a little something to warm you up, but people begrudge you even the little drop you get!” And then the mayor’s words to the boy were repeated to the washerwoman because Maren had heard all of it, and it had annoyed her that he talked that way to the child about his mother, and the little she drank, when the mayor himself was having a big dinner party with bottles of wine in abundance. “Fine wines and strong wines! Many will more than quench their thirst, but that’s not drinking, oh no! And they’re just fine, but you’re no good!”
“So he’s been talking to you, my boy?” said the washerwoman, and her lips quivered. “You have a mother who’s no good! Maybe he’s right, but he shouldn’t say it to a child. I put up with a lot from those in that house.”
“That’s right, you worked there when the mayor’s parents lived there, didn’t you? It was many years ago. Many bushels of salt have been eaten since that time, so it’s no wonder we’re thirsty!” Maren laughed. “They’re having a big dinner today at the mayor’s. It should have been canceled, but it was too late because the food had been prepared. I heard about it from the yard boy. Just an hour ago a letter came with the news that the younger brother has died in Copenhagen.”
“Dead!” exclaimed the washerwoman and turned deathly pale.
“Oh my!” said the other woman, “You’re taking it rather to heart! Oh, you knew him, didn’t you, when you worked there?”
“Is he dead? He was the best, the most wonderful person! God won’t get many like him!” and the tears ran down her cheeks. “Oh, my God. I’m getting dizzy! It must be because I emptied the flask. It was too much for me. I feel so sick!” And she leaned against the wooden fence.
“Dear God, you’re quite ill, dear!” said the woman. “Maybe it’ll pass though—No, you really are bad off. I’d better get you home.”
“But the clothes there—”
“I’ll take care of it. Take my arm. The boy can stay here and watch things in the meantime, and I’ll come back and wash the rest. There’s just a little bit left.”
And the washerwoman’s legs buckled under her.
“I stood in the cold water too long, and I haven’t had anything to eat or drink since this morning. I have a fever. Oh, dear Jesus, help me home! My poor child!” and she cried.
The boy cried too and was soon sitting alone on the bank close to the wet clothes. The two women walked slowly, the washerwoman wobbling, up the alley, down the street, past the mayor’s house, and all at once she sank down on the cobblestones. People gathered around.
Gimpy-Maren ran into the house for help. The mayor and his guests looked out the windows.
“It’s the washerwoman,” he said. “She’s had a drop too much. She’s no good. It’s a real shame for that good- looking boy she has. I really like the little fellow, but his mother’s no good.”
She regained consciousness and was led to her humble home, where she was put to bed. Good-hearted Maren made her a bowl of warm beer with butter and sugar. She thought that would be the best medicine. Then she went back to the river and did some well-meant but half-hearted rinsing. She really only pulled the wet clothes to the shore and put them in a box.
In the evening she sat with the washerwoman in her humble room. She had gotten a couple of roasted potatoes and a lovely fatty piece of ham from the mayor’s cook for the sick woman. Maren and the boy enjoyed them. The sick woman was content with the smell. She said it was so nourishing.
The boy went to sleep in the same bed as his mother, but he had his spot crosswise at the foot of the bed. He had an old rug for a cover, sewn together from blue and red strips of cloth.
The washerwoman felt a little better. The warm beer had strengthened her, and the smell of the good food had helped.
“Thank you, you dear soul,” she said to Maren. “I want to tell you everything when the boy falls asleep. I think he’s already sleeping. Look how wonderful and sweet he looks with his eyes closed! He doesn’t know what his mother is going through. May God never let him experience it.—I was working for the Councilman, the mayor’s parents, and it happened that the youngest son came home, the student. I was young and wild in those days, but respectable, I swear to God,” said the washerwoman. “The student was so cheerful and gay, so wonderful! Every drop of his blood was honest and good! A better person has never walked the earth. He was a son of the house,
