Wanderers | Page 5

I'd do. I'd get myself some bricklayer's tools."
"So you're a bricklayer, too?"
"Well, not much of a one, and that's the truth. But when that well's dug, why, it'll need to be lined, that's clear...."
I sauntered about the island as usual, thinking of this and that. Peace, peace, a heavenly peace comes to me in a voice of silence from every tree in the wood. And now, look you, there are but few of the small birds left; only some crows flying mutely from place to place and settling. And the clusters from the rowans drop with a sullen thud and bury themselves in the moss.
Grindhusen is right, perhaps: tomorrow will surely look after itself, just as today. I have not seen a paper now these last two weeks, and, for all that, here I am, alive and well, making great progress in respect of inward calm; I sing, and square my shoulders, and stand bareheaded watching the stars at night.
For eighteen years past I have sat in caf��s, calling for the waiter if a fork was not clean: I never call for Gunhild in the matter of forks clean or not! There's Grindhusen, now, I say to myself; did you mark when he lit his pipe, how he used the match to the very last of it, and never burned his horny fingers? I saw a fly crawling over his hand, but he simply let it crawl; perhaps he never noticed it was there. That is the way a man should feel towards flies....
In the evening, Grindhusen takes the boat and rows off. I wander along the beach, singing to myself a little, throwing stones at the water, and hauling bits of driftwood ashore. The stars are out, and there is a moon. In a couple of hours Grindhusen comes back, with a good set of bricklayer's tools in the boat. Stolen them somewhere, I think to myself. We shoulder each our load, and hide away the tools among the trees.
Then it is night, and we go each our separate way.
Grindhusen finishes his painting the following afternoon, but agrees to go on cutting wood till six o'clock to make up a full day's work. I get out Gunhild's boat and go off fishing, so as not to be there when he leaves. I catch no fish, and it is cold sitting in the boat; I look at my watch again and again. At last, about seven o'clock: he must be gone by now, I say to myself, and I row home. Grindhusen has got over to the mainland, and calls across to me from there: _"Farvel!"_
Something thrilled me warmly at the word; it was like a calling from my youth, from Skreia, from days a generation gone.
I row across to him and ask:
"Can you dig that well all alone?"
"No. I'll have to take another man along."
"Take me," I said. "Wait for me here, while I go up and settle at the house."
Half-way up I heard Grindhusen calling again:
"I can't wait here all night. And I don't believe you meant it, anyway."
"Wait just a minute. I'll be down again directly."
And Grindhusen sets himself down on the beach to wait. He knows I've some of that first-rate _Br?ndevin_ still left.

IV
We came to the vicarage on a Saturday. After much doubting, Grindhusen had at last agreed to take me as his mate. I had bought provisions and some working clothes, and stood there now, in blouse and high boots, ready to start work. I was free and unknown; I learned to walk with a long, slouching stride, and for the look of a laboring man, I had that already both in face and hands. We were to put up at the vicarage itself, and cook our food in the brew-house across the yard.
And so we started on our digging.
I did my share of the work, and Grindhusen had no fault to find with me as a work-mate. "You'll turn out a first-rate hand at this, after all," he said.
Then after we'd been working a bit, the priest came out to look, and we took off our hats. He was an oldish man, quiet and gentle in his ways and speech; tiny wrinkles spread out fanwise from the corners of his eyes, like the traces of a thousand kindly smiles. He was sorry to interrupt, and hoped we wouldn't mind--but they'd so much trouble every year with the fowls slipping through into the garden. Could we leave the well just for a little, and come round and look at the garden wall? There was one place in particular....
Grindhusen answered: surely; we'd manage that for him all right.
So we went up and set the crumbling wall to rights. While we were busy there a young lady came out and stood looking on. We greeted her