and I was a servant, but we became sweethearts, chastely and with honor. A kiss is not a sin, after all, when you really love each other. And he told his mother. She was like God on earth to him, and so wise and loving. He went away, but he placed his gold ring on my finger. When he was gone, my mistress called me in. She spoke to me seriously but gently, like the Lord might do. She explained to me in spirit and in truth the gap between him and me. ‘Now he admires your beauty, but appearances will fade away! You haven’t been educated like him, and you aren’t on the same mental plane. That’s the problem. I have respect for the poor,’ she said. ‘They will perhaps have a higher standing with God in heaven than many rich people, but here on earth you can’t take the wrong road when you’re driving or the carriage will topple over, and you two would topple over! I know that a good man—a tradesman—Erik, the glove maker, has proposed to you. He’s a widower, has no children, and is well off. Think it over!’ Each word she spoke was like a knife in my heart, but she was right! And it crushed me and weighed on me. I kissed her hand and cried salty tears, and even more tears when I got to my room and lay on my bed. That night was a bad night. The Lord knows how I suffered and struggled! Then on Sunday I went to Communion, for guidance. It was like an act of Providence: as I left the church, I met Erik, the glove maker. Then there was no longer any doubt in my mind. We belonged together in position and circumstances. And he was quite well-off. So I went right over to him, took his hand, and asked, ‘Are you still thinking of me?’ ‘Yes, forever and always,’ he said. ‘Would you have a girl who respects and honors you, but doesn’t love you, although that might come?’ ‘It will come!’ he said, and we clasped hands. I went home to my mistress. I was carrying the gold ring that her son had given me against my bare breast. I couldn’t wear it on my finger during the day, only at night when I lay in my bed. I kissed the ring until my lips bled, and then I gave it to my mistress and told her that the next week the engagement between me and the glove maker would be announced at church. Then my mistress took me in her arms and kissed me—She didn’t say that I was no good, but in those days maybe I was better since I hadn’t yet experienced many of the world’s misfortunes. The wedding took place at Candlemas, and the first year went well. We had a journeyman and an apprentice, and you, Maren, worked for us.”
“Oh you were a wonderful mistress!” said Maren. “I’ll never forget how kind you and your husband were.”
“You were with us in the good years! We didn’t have children then. I never saw the student. Well, I saw him, but he didn’t see me. He came home for his mother’s funeral, and I saw him standing by the grave. He was chalk- white and so sad, but it was for his mother’s sake. Later when his father died, he was abroad and didn’t come home, and hasn’t been back since. I know that he never got married. I guess he was a lawyer. He didn’t remember me, and if he had seen me, I’m sure he wouldn’t have recognized me since I’ve become so ugly. So that’s for the best.”
And she talked about the difficult days, how misfortune seemed to overwhelm them. They had five hundred dollars, and since there was a house for sale in their street for two hundred, they though it would pay to buy it and tear it down to build a new one. The house was bought. The masons and carpenters estimated that it would cost a thousand and twenty dollars more. Erik the glove maker had credit, and he got the money on loan from Copenhagen, but the captain who was bringing the money was lost in a shipwreck and the money with him.
“That’s when I had my wonderful boy, who’s sleeping here. His father fell ill with a terrible long-lasting illness. For nine months I had to dress and undress him. Things went from bad to worse for us. We borrowed and borrowed. We lost all our things, and then my husband died! I have toiled and worked, struggled and slaved for the sake of my child. I’ve washed floors, done laundry both fine and coarse. It’s God’s will that I don’t do better, but he will surely let me go soon and then provide for my boy.”
And then she slept.
Later in the morning she felt stronger and strong enough, she thought, to go back to work. She had just gone into the cold water when she was overcome by a shaking, a faint. Convulsively she reached out with her hand, took a step, and fell. Her head was lying on dry land, but her feet were in the river. Her wooden shoes that she had worn in the river—there was a bundle of straw in each of them—floated in the current. She was found by Maren, who came with coffee.
There had been a message from the mayor that she had to meet with him right away. He had something to tell her, but it was too late. A barber was fetched for blood-letting, but the washerwoman was dead.
“She drank herself to death!” said the mayor.
The letter that brought the news of his brother’s death also contained the contents of the will. There was a bequest of six hundred dollars to the glove maker’s widow, who had once served his parents. The money should be paid out to the woman and her child in larger or smaller amounts according to what was best.
“There were some dealings between my brother and her,” said the mayor. “It’s a good thing she’s out of the way. The boy will get it all, and I’ll place him with some good people. He could become a good tradesman.” And God’s blessing fell on those words.
The mayor summoned the boy and promised to provide for him, and told him what a good thing it was that his mother was dead. She was no good!
She was carried to the grave-yard, to the poor people’s cemetery. Maren planted a little rose bush by the grave, and the boy stood beside it.
“My sweet mother!” he said and tears streamed down his face. “Is it true that she was no good?”
“No, she was good!” said the old maid and looked up towards heaven. “I know that from many years’ experience and from her last night. I tell you, she
THE ANTHROPOMORPHIZING OF ANIMALS AND NATURE
THE UGLY DUCKLING
IT WAS SO LOVELY out in the country. It was summer. The wheat was yellow. The oats were green. The hay was up on haystacks down in the green meadows, and the stork walked there on his long red legs speaking Egyptian, a language he had learned from his mother. Around the fields and meadows there were big forests, and in the middle of the forests, deep lakes. Oh yes, it was really lovely there in the country. There was an old estate lying there in the bright sunshine. It had deep canals around it, and from the walls and down to the water big dock plants were growing, so tall that small children could stand upright under the largest of them. It was as overgrown in there as in the densest forest, and there was a duck there sitting on her nest. She was going to hatch her little ducklings, but she was getting tired of it because it took so long, and she rarely had company. The other ducks would rather swim in the canals than run up and sit under a dock leaf to yak and quack with her.
Finally one egg after another cracked. “Peep! Peep!” they said. All the egg yolks had become living and stuck their heads out.
