One of Lifes Slaves | Page 7

under discipline and correction.
When Nikolai and Silla wandered as usual up and down the pavement
outside the cellar, the people of the house might often in passing give
the little girl a friendly nod. To give Nikolai any encouragement in that
way would have been a mistake.
Maren, the cook, who had come to the floor above last hiring-day[1],
had naturally no conception of Mrs. Holman's strict, conscientious
character, and was therefore to be excused in what now took place.
[Footnote 1: The days for changing servants in Norway are in the
spring and autumn. In Christiania they are the second Friday after
Easter, and the second Friday after Michaelmas.]

She went down into the cellar with the lantern one evening to fetch coal
and wood, panting and puffing down the stairs as she used to do; she
had a bend in both hips from rheumatism, and rocked from one side to
the other like a boat's mast in rough weather.
From the wood-cellar she all at once heard a sound as of wailing in the
darkness within. It was as though some one were crying, and now and
again sobbing convulsively for some time without being able to
produce a distinct sound.
The voice sounded so utterly broken-hearted that Maren stopped
putting the wood into her apron and stood by the chopping-block
listening. It seemed to come from one of the coal cellars up the dark
passage. At last she seized the lantern and groped her way in; she must
come to the bottom of this.
"Is any one here?" she cried at the door whence the sobbing came.
There was a sudden complete silence.
She knocked hard with a bit of wood, but then from within there came
a terrified scream, which made Maren drop the wood from her apron
and pull open the hasp of the door which was fastened with a piece of
wood.
"But who has put the poor little boy in here--in the pitch black
darkness?"
By the light of the lantern she saw Nikolai staring at her in wild terror.
"I thought it was the devil, I did. Yes, for he does knock on the wall."
"Oh, you'd frighten any one out of their senses, boy, with those ugly
words!"
"Mrs. Holman says so;" and with a quick, inquiring glance up at Maren
he added, "but do you think she only says it so that I shan't touch her
sugar?"

"Is that what you are here for?"
"I haven't taken anything from her, but I will, if she says it whether I do
or not! It was only that Monday when I put my tongue down into the
bag and licked when I'd gone for half a pound. But now I'll crunch it so
that she'll only have the empty bag left! I'll take! I'll steal!" he added
and ground his teeth. "Don't--don't go!" he sobbed, catching hold of her
dress, "for when it's dark again, he'll come and take me!"
What was Maren to do? She stood hesitating and considering; she dare
not let the boy out.
She might try and beg him off from Mrs. Holman.
"Only get me another beating for that, too!" was the answer.
There was nothing else for it; she could not let the poor little frightened
thing stay there in the coal-hole. So, with eyes closed to the
consequences of her own determination, she exclaimed: "Then you
must come up into the kitchen with me, and sleep on the bench there
to-night."
This time, Nikolai did not weigh the probabilities of what Mrs. Holman
would say or do; he only took hold of her skirt with both hands. And
with the boy close in her wake, Maren sailed up the kitchen stairs
again.
While she was looking out some of her old shawls and skirts to put
under him, taking some of the clothes from her own bed, and making it
as comfortable and warm as she could for him on the bench, Nikolai
seemed to have forgotten all his troubles.
There was so much that was new up here. There were such a number of
shining tin things hanging all over the wall, and then the cat was an old
friend. He had seen it many a time down in the yard, and now he had to
squeeze himself together to get hold of it, it had crept so far under the
bed.

There! He had knocked down the tin kettle with his back!
He fled in terror to the door. But Maren picked it up quite quietly; there
was not a word of scolding, a thing he wondered more at than either the
tin things or the cat.
Maren had at last fallen asleep after all the aching and pain of the
rheumatism in her weary