CHAPTER V
THE LECTURE
One spring afternoon in the beginning of May, fourteen years later, a great number of people took their way up the avenue to "The Estate."
_Real-Kandidat_ Tomas Rendalen was to give a lecture at the opening of the new gymnasium which had been built in the courtyard there; using the opportunity to explain the plan on which he intended to conduct the school; he proposed to take it over the following August. It was known that this had been his intention, even before he became a student at Christiania; that he had no other object in life, either then or later; that after he had passed his examinations, he had taught in different boys' and girls' schools, and during several years had made himself familiar with both, in Germany, Switzerland, France, England, and last of all in America; he said that it was in the last-named country that he had especially found what he wanted.
He had declared that the development of his whole life might be found in the lecture which he would deliver that day, and this seemed strange to every one; all became curious.
During the four or five months that he had been at home he had had the gymnasium built, having turned the Knight's Hall into a place where chemistry and physics could be studied; people did not clearly understand what these were, but they hoped to find out some day. The tower was turned into a little observatory.
There had been, for some time past, a continual delivery and unpacking of what Rendalen called school apparatus; the most wonderful specimens were shown to the children. These purchases and his endless journeys had cost no small sum. How had the money been provided? Quite by chance Fru Rendalen had discovered that the woods had been sold from "The Estate" on different terms; some before, and some after, the farms to which they belonged had been disposed of. Some of these woods had been merely sold for clearing, and the land itself thus still belonged to "The Estate." But as it had lain long unused, the fact had been forgotten, and the woods had been by degrees absorbed into the surrounding properties. Fru Rendalen lost several lawsuits over this, but she gained others, and it was therefore good Norse timber which had paid for Karl's and Tomas's studies.
Tomas had taken up science, Karl theology; both of them going abroad.
Karl had come home again after two years' absence. Tomas had travelled.
During the few months that he had been at home he had given lectures to the girls in the senior classes, especially on Natural Science. For example, he explained to them the very newest discoveries in regard to the activity of the brain, showing them large diagrams. When the children repeated to their parents how these discoveries were made, they began to wish to hear about them as well. And it was not rare to see elder sisters, mothers, or sometimes even fathers, sitting squeezed in among the children in the class-room, listening to him. It can thus be easily understood why the gathering on the present occasion was so large.
Tomas was an ugly, red-haired, freckled fellow, with a somewhat broad nose, and grey screwed-up eyes, with no eyebrows, or at all events no visible ones, and with a thin-lipped mouth like his father's. Yet it was said that the whole school was crazy about him! People wanted to see and hear what on earth it was all about; three ladies to one gentleman assembled up at "The Estate."
A path had been made to the right from the great steps, past the front of the house, and further round the wing, to the courtyard at the back, which was the usual school road. The new gymnasium was in the courtyard as well. There was a man stationed at its entrance to-day, and a crowd of people stood before it who had been refused admittance, and who protested loudly against this treatment.
It was Andreas Berg who was on the watch that only "parents" came in.
This had been clearly stated in the invitation, but it had been overlooked or misunderstood, or else people thought they might as well try all the same, and they were now making a disturbance over it.
They were, of course, mostly young.
There was great merriment when some elder person, who was not recognised as a parent, was refused admission. Anton Dosen, called also "French Dosen" because he had lived several years in France, and who now had a shop for French fancy goods, almost exactly opposite the Frokener Jensens at Bommem, presented himself as a "father," and wished to enter--he had never been married, this same French Dosen. Immense amusement!
The solemn, unmoved Andreas Berg turned him back, and French Dosen asked what the deuce was wanted before he could get in! Must he go to the town, and get the clergyman's attestation that he was a father?
French Dosen had always had the privilege of trumpeting forth his peccadilloes. It amused people to hear of them. His shop was much frequented, notwithstanding his light morals and talk. His competition with the two crooked Frokener Jensens, as regarded millinery, was not hazardous. But see, there actually are the Frokener Jensens, and they have got in! Enormous delight in the assembled company. For there could be no doubt that neither Froken Jensen had had a child. Heavens forfend!
Andreas Berg explained that that was because they had a niece at school. The reason they had no children? No! that they were admitted.
They stood in the place of parents.
"But," observed Dosen, "it must be more to be a father, than to stand in a father's place." Great applause! Beside, did he not stand in the place of a father to all those to whom he gave food and wages? Did he not now? Andreas Berg would admit nothing.
At this moment arrived the town bailiff and his wife. Berg would not allow them to pass, any more than the others, for they were not parents, nor had they any adopted children at school. Dosen cried "Bravo," and clapped his hands, and a number of others with him.
There was a storm of laughter, for the town bailiff was well known and little liked. So they looked forward to some fun.
He was so furious for the moment that he could not speak, but stuttered and gesticulated. He was a tall thin fellow, with spectacles, and a smile--not of good-humour or anything of that kind--no, there was a sourness about it which was impressed on his whole countenance.
At last he found his tongue, and asked Andreas Berg if he were mad. And his wife, who dearly loved on such occasions to push herself forward, remarked that no meeting in the town could be closed to the town bailiff.
This did not make the very smallest impression on Andreas Berg. He busied himself in opening to some others who came up, and who really were parents, and shut the door again.
Dosen now took up the town bailiff's cause. Andreas Berg ought to understand that if the town bailiff had no children, that was not his fault, nor his wife's either. Terrific applause! "The paradise of parents could not be closed against the bailiff on that account, as long as ...;" he could go no further. For the bailiff asked if he were mad. "Yes, in your cause, sir," answered Dosen. What peals of laughter!
At the same moment shoemaker Nils Hansen came up with his little wife.
Hundreds of times in his life the bailiff had asked him if he were mad, so Nils Hansen laughed as soon as he heard the words.
"Who is mad now?" he asked.
"Andreas Berg," answered the town bailiff.
"No, I," shouted Dosen.
"It's the town bailiff himself," cried out several in the crowd.
"Imagine," said the bailiff to Nils Hansen, "Andreas Berg has had the impudence to--to--to--prevent my wife and me from--from--going in----"
One saw that Nils Hansen found this amusing, but Laura, on the other hand, was astonished, and questioned Berg, "Dear me, how is this?"
But if she thought she would induce Berg to answer, she was very much mistaken. He opened the door for them. "_Vaers'go_," he said, and they felt obliged to go in, but they heard Dosen call after them: "The bailiff and his wife may not go in, because they have no children."
This was also heard inside the hall; a sound of laughter from a hundred voices came rippling out; and another wave of boisterous mirth rolled towards the door as it was closed after Nils Hansen. While conversation went on in the hall, a new excitement arose outside. The sheriff had come. His wife had brought a lady, a stranger, with her, whom Berg would not admit; only "parents" were invited, he repeated firmly. He knew this lady was called "_Froken_[2] Krieger"; she had bought some flowers from him.
The sheriff, often nicknamed "the ladies' man," a fair-haired man with a sharp waggish face, looked up at the two dismayed ladies; they were both standing at the top of the steps, very red in the face. His wife had always supposed that any lady _she_ brought would of course not be refused admittance, and yet this had occurred; they were fairly "caught out," both she and her friend--a butt for the laughter of Dosen and his companions, and stared at pityingly by a number of people whom she did not know, for she was but newly come to the town. She was a handsome woman, with an intellectual face, tall and slender, but she looked quite terrified now; her eyes wandered helplessly from one to another, and at last they fixed themselves imploringly upon her husband, who stood down below with the others and laughed at them. "Is it so _dangerous_ for Froken Krieger to come in?" she asked. Roars of laughter. Apparently this annoyed Berg, he came up without warning and pushed the lady gently to one side in order to open the door for some more people. A number of ladies, all married and with children at school, now came up and passed in; the unlucky wife of the sheriff tripped down the steps, her friend following her, looking rather embarrassed; there was a short exchange of words which ended in the departure of the friend; she would go alone, and ran off when the gallant sheriff offered to accompany her; the sheriff himself being nearly run over by a carriage with two large Danish horses, driven by a coachman in grey livery.
It was Consul Engel and his wife who were arriving. They drove right up into the courtyard because Fru Engel was delicate. Nothing could have been more careful, more tender, more charming than the manner in which the consul helped his wife from the phaeton; he almost carried her in.
He was a handsome man, with a noble face; his well-known smile was more friendly than ever as he passed through the crowd with his gentle burden. She was handsome too, the expression of her eyes wise and painful, or rather perhaps painfully wise; the same expression lay in the lines of the mouth and in the thin cheeks. Through the whole of her slow progress from the carriage to the steps, and her toilsome ascent to the door, she was followed by the startled, bird-like eyes of the sheriff's wife. They hovered over the invalid till they seemed to fill the air with interrogation. From her they passed on to the consul, from his eyes back again to those of his wife.
What in the world did they want? They filled with tears, she wiped them hurriedly with a shy glance round. At the same moment the sheriff came up to take her in. She was startled, coloured, smiled--nay, laughed.
Lord knows what at.
Fru Emmy Wingaard, young and blooming, passed at the moment. The sheriff whispered something to her which made her laugh. He asked if they should not all sit together. Fru Emmy Wingaard's maiden name had been Furst; she had curly fair hair and lively eyes; she gave several glances across to Dosen, the special friend of her brother, the naval lieutenant. Dosen made a despairing face and hung his head. She understood that he could not come in, and crossed her well-gloved fingers mockingly at him; she passed on. How pretty and merry she was; she was so like her brother Niels Furst, the lion of this and all the neighbouring coast towns. If any one doubted that Niels Furst was the lion of the neighbourhood, let them ask the lady who followed Fru Emmy; let them ask Kaja Grondal, the wife of the engineer who is never at home. Ask her whether Niels Furst, who is very often at home, is not the favourite cavalier in all the towns round, and the vigorous lady will look at you without a blush and ask again if any one doubted it?
The gallant sheriff let all the ladies pass in first, saying a few friendly words to Andreas Berg, who made no reply. At the same moment Berg saw Fru Rendalen, escorted by her son, but behind them were the town bailiff and his wife; they all four came out from the pupils'
entrance in the principal building--the one through the tower. So the town bailiff must have forced himself in to Fru Rendalen to complain!
Would Berg perhaps be put in the wrong before all these ill-behaved young people because he had strictly obeyed orders?
They came straight towards the principal entrance, instead of going to the other door, which led into the ante-room where the pupils'
gymnastic dresses hung. It could be for no other reason than to obtain admittance for the town bailiff that they came this way.
Fru Rendalen and her son were saluted by those who were nearest; Berg opened the door, she mounted the steps, but then stood back and actually did let the town bailiff and his wife pass in, her son following them. She remained standing. She was a large woman now, the hair under her cap iron-grey, her face brown and stern, the eyes behind her spectacles brightening its expression. She had done some good work, and was convinced that she ought to be shown respect.
"All of you who do not belong here will be so kind as to go; we must have perfect quiet here now."
She had hardly spoken before one or two began to move; when the farthest away had disappeared round the corner, the others followed their example; there was a little tittering, a few whispered witticisms, but they went. Andreas Berg was the only one who was inclined to grumble; it had been hard about the town bailiff. "No more will come now, you can go in too, Berg; many thanks!" and it was all settled.
She went in herself, those nearest rose and bowed, for they were for the most part her former pupils, and this was the old custom. But when they did so the whole assemblage rose, too, by degrees. She bowed right and left, and then took her seat by the side of the tribune which stood on the platform. She looked across at the audience. Every place was occupied; some few men were standing in the gangway; these now had chairs given to them; they were brought in by an old woman.
Tomas Rendalen was standing by the window talking to Dr. Holmsen. This gentleman was somewhat fat and florid. His large prominent eyes had a mixed expression of sarcasm and slyness; he stood there, half smiling, half embarrassed, with one hand playing with his brown, slightly grizzled beard as he listened to Rendalen.
Tomas Rendalen was his complete opposite--decided, fiery, eloquent.
The school children had been eager to tell that he used scent, and truly--it wafted from him as from some fine lady. There was something precise, too, about his linen, and about the way in which his grey coat, of the most enviably new cut, fitted him. He was well-built and very elastic in all his movements. While he whispered to the doctor he had a nervous, impressive manner, as though every moment were of the greatest importance.