Absaloms Hair | Page 6

"Shall we
soon have a new story from you?"--she answered, "A new story? Here
it is!"
But, notwithstanding the unalloyed happiness which she displayed here,
it could no longer be concealed that more often than not she was absent
from home, and that she never mentioned her husband's name. If any
one spoke of him to her, she changed the subject. By the time that the
boy was a year old, it had become evident that she contemplated
leaving Hellebergene entirely. She had been in Christiania for some
time and had gone home to make arrangements, saying that she should
come back in a few days.
But she never did so.
The day after her return home, while the numerous servants at
Hellebergene, as well as the labourers with their wives and children,
were all assembled at the potato digging, Harald Kaas appeared,
carrying his wife under his left arm like a sack. He held her round the
waist, feet first, her face downwards and hidden by her hair, her hands
convulsively clutching his left thigh, her legs sometimes hanging down,
sometimes straight out. He walked composedly out with her, holding in
his right hand a bunch of long fresh birch twigs. A little way from the
gallery he paused, and laying her across his left knee, he tore off some
of her clothes, and beat her until the blood flowed. She never uttered a
sound. When he put her from him, she tremblingly rearranged--first her
hair, thus displaying her face just as the blood flowed back from it,
leaving it deadly white. Tears of pain and shame rolled down her
cheeks; but still not a sound. She tried to rearrange her dress, but her
tattered garments trailed behind her as she went back to the house. She
shut the door after her, but had to open it again; her torn clothes had
caught fast in it.
The women stood aghast; some of the children screamed with fright:
this infected the rest, and there was a chorus of sobs. The men, most of
whom had been sitting smoking their pipes, but who had sprung to their
feet again, stood filled with shame and indignation.

It had not been without a pang that Harald Kaas had done this, his face
and manner had shown it for a long time and still did so; but he had
expected that a roar of laughter would greet his extraordinary vagary.
This was evident from the composure with which he had carried his
wife out; and still more from the glance of gratified revenge with which
he looked round him afterwards. But there was only dead stillness,
succeeded by weeping, sobbing, and indignation. He stood there for a
moment, quite overcome, then went indoors again, a defeated, utterly
broken man.
In every encounter with this delicate creature the giant had been
worsted.
After this, however, she never went beyond the grounds. For the first
few years she was only seen by the people about the estate, and by
them but seldom. Sometimes she would take her boy out in his little
carriage, or, as time went on, would lead him by the hand, sometimes
she was alone. She was generally wrapped in a big shawl, a different
one for each dress she wore, and which she always held tightly round
her. This was so characteristic of her that to this day I hear people from
the neighbourhood talk about it as though she were never seen
otherwise.
What then did she do? She studied; she had given up writing: for more
than one reason it had become distasteful to her. She had changed roles
with her husband, giving herself up to mathematics, chemistry, and
physics, she made calculations and analyses-- sending for books and
materials for these objects. The people on the estate saw nothing
extraordinary in all this. From the first they had admired her delicacy
and beauty. Every one admired her; it was only the manner and degree
that varied.
Little by little she came to be regarded as one whose life and thoughts
were beyond their comprehension.
She sought no one, but to those who came to her she never refused
help--more or less. She made herself well acquainted with the facts of
each case; no one could ever deceive her. Whether she gave much or

little, she imposed no conditions, she never lectured them. Her opinion
was expressed by the amount that she gave.
Her husband's behaviour towards her was such that, had she not been
very popular, she could not have remained at Hellebergene; that is to
say, he opposed and thwarted her in every way he could; but every one
took her part.
The boy! Could not he have been a bond of union? On the contrary,
there were those who