Growth of the Soil (World's Classics Series). Knut Hamsun

of Uncle Sivert, and Isak and his doings somehow drop out of sight; no one asks any more about his building now, so at last he says:

      "Well, if you want to know, 'tis a bit of a barn with a threshing-floor I'm trying to get set up."

      "Just as I thought," says Oline. "Folk with real sound sense in their heads, they do that way. Fore-thought and back-thought and all as it should be. There's not a pot nor pitcher in the place you haven't thought of. A threshing-floor, you said?"

      Isak is a child. Oline's flattering words go to his head, and he answers something foolishly with fine words: "As to that new house of mine, there must be a threshing-floor in the same, necessarily. 'Tis my intention so."

      "A threshing-floor?" says Oline, wagging her head.

      "And where's the sense of growing corn on the place if we've nowhere to thresh it?"

      "Ay, 'tis as I say, not a thing as could be but you have it all there in your head."

      Inger is suddenly out of humour again. The talk between the other two somehow displeases her, and she breaks in:

      "Cream custard indeed! And where's the cream to come from? Fish it up in the river, maybe?"

      Oline hastens to make peace. "Inger, Lord bless you, child, don't speak of such a thing. Not a word of cream nor custard either—an old creature like me that does but idle about from house to neighbour…!"

      Isak sits for a while, then up, and saying suddenly: "Here am I doing nothing middle of the day, and stones to fetch and carry for that wall of mine!"

      "Ay, a wall like that'll need a mighty lot of stone, to be sure."

      "Stone?" says Isak. "Tis like as if there'd never be enough."

      When Isak is gone, the two womenfolk get on nicely together for a while; they sit for hours talking of this and that. In the evening, Oline must go out and see how their live stock has grown: cows, a bull, two calves, and a swarm of sheep and goats. "I don't know where it'll ever end," says Oline, with her eyes turned heavenwards.

      And Oline stays the night.

      Next morning she goes off again. Once more she has a bundle of something with her. Isak is working in the quarry, and she goes another way round, so that he shall not see.

      Two hours later, Oline comes back again, steps into the house, and asks at once: "Where is Isak?"

      Inger is washing up. Oline should have passed by the quarry where Isak was at work, and the children with him; Inger at once guesses something wrong.

      "Isak? What d'you want with him?"

      "Want with him?—why, nothing. Only I didn't see him to say good-bye."

      Silence. Oline sits down on a bench without being asked, drops down as if her legs refuse to carry her. Her manner is intended to show that something serious is the matter; she is overcome.

      Inger can control herself no longer. Her face is all terror and fury as she says:

      "I saw what you sent me by Os-Anders. Ay, 'twas a nice thing to send!"

      "Why … what…?"

      "That hare."

      "What do you mean?" asks Oline in a strangely gentle voice.

      "Ah, don't deny it!" cries Inger, her eyes wild. "I'll break your face in with this ladle here—see that!"

      Struck her? Ay, she did so. Oline took the first blow without falling, and only cried out: "Mind what you're doing, woman! I know what I know about you and your doings!" Inger strikes again, gets Oline down to the floor, falls on her there, and thrusts her knees into her.

      "D'you mean to murder me?" asks Oline. The terrible woman with the hare-lip was kneeling on her, a great strong creature armed with a huge wooden ladle, heavy as a club. Oline was bruised already, and bleeding, but still sullenly refusing to cry out. "So you're trying to murder me too!"

      "Ay, kill you," says Inger, striking again. "There! I'll see you dead before I've done with you." She was certain of it now. Oline knew her secret; nothing mattered now. "I'll spoil your beastly face."

      "Beastly face?" gasps Oline. "Huh! Look to your own. With the Lord His mark on it!"

      Oline is hard, and will not give in; Inger is forced to give over the blows that are exhausting her own strength. But she threatens still—glares into the other's eyes and swears she has not finished with her yet. "There's more to come, ay, more, more. Wait till I get a knife. I'll show you!"

      She gets on her feet again, and moves as if to look for a knife, a table knife. But now her fury is past its worst, and she falls back on curses and abuse. Oline heaves herself up to the bench again, her face all blue and yellow, swollen and bleeding; she wipes the hair from her forehead, straightens her kerchief, and spits; her mouth too is bruised and swollen.

      "You devil!" she says.

      "You've been nosing about in the woods!" cries Inger. "That's what you've been doing. You've found that little bit of a grave there. Better if you'd dug one for yourself the same time."

      "Ay, you wait," says Oline, her eyes glowing revengefully. "I'll say no more—but you wait—there'll be no fine two-roomed house for you, with musical clocks and all."

      "You can't take it from me, anyway!"

      "Ay, you wait. You'll see what Oline can do."

      And so they keep on. Oline does not curse, and hardly raises her voice; there is something almost gentle in her cold cruelty, but she is bitterly dangerous. "Where's that bundle? I left it in the woods. But you shall have it back—I'll not own your wool."

      "Ho, you think I've stolen it, maybe."

      "Ah, you know best what you've done."

      So back and forth again about the wool. Inger offers to show the very sheep it was cut from. Oline asks quietly, smoothly: "Ay, but who knows where you got the first sheep to start with?"

      Inger names the place and people where her first sheep were out to keep with their lambs. "And you mind and care and look to what you're saying," says she threateningly. "Guard your mouth, or you'll be sorry."

      "Ha ha ha!" laughs Oline softly. Oline is never at a loss, never to be silenced. "My mouth, eh? And what of your own, my dear?" She points to Inger's hare-lip, calling her a ghastly sight for God and man.

      Inger answers furiously, and Oline being fat, she calls her a lump of blubber—"a lump of dog's blubber like you. You sent me a hare—I'll pay you for that."

      "Hare again?" says Oline. "If I'd no more guilt in anything than I have about that hare. What was it like?"

      "What was it like? Why, what's a hare always like?"

      "Like you. The very image."

      "Out with you—get out!" shrieks Inger.

      "'Twas you sent Os-Anders with that hare. I'll have you punished; I'll have you put in prison for that."

      "Prison—was it prison you said?"

      "Oh, you're jealous and envious of all you see; you hate me for all the good things I've got," says Inger again. "You've lain awake with envy since I got Isak and all that's here. Heavens, woman, what have I ever done to you? Is it my fault that your children never got on in the world, and turned out badly, every one of them? You can't bear the sight of mine, because they're fine and strong, and better named than yours. Is it my fault they're prettier flesh and blood than yours ever were?"

      If there was one thing could drive Oline to fury it was this. She had been a mother many times, and all she had was her children, such as they were; she made much of them, and boasted of them, told of great things they had never really done, and hid their faults.

      "What's that you're saying?" answered Oline. "Oh that you don't sink in your grave for shame! My children! They were a bright host of angels compared with yours. You dare to speak of my children? Seven blessed gifts of God they were from