2

Everything happened outside Bufast, and much happened within the boundaries of the farm as well. The sun shone and the rain fell. And people worked. And the river murmured. All night long, continually and evenly it murmured.

On the nearest farms there were only big children, so they did not come to Bufast to play with Per. He had heard of a little girl called Åsne, who was said to be the same age as himself. But she lived many farms away, and Mother and Father never went there. They never went to the other farms; they stayed at Bufast or went to the storekeeper. Per often thought about Åsne, who would have been just right for playing with, but he never asked to be allowed to look for her.

Surely she couldn't be as good to be with as Auntie?

He longed for Åsne all the same, longed for her intensely.

They always stayed in the same place.

  [p. 16]  

Up along the road hurried the strangers, summer and winter, but mostly in summer. They came and hurried away again. Tramps called at Bufast to beg; then they went away. On some of the farms townspeople lived for a few weeks during the summer; then they went away again. Carriages drawn by tired post-horses rattled past. Per was given plenty to think about as he sat in the yard at Bufast and watched all this coming and going.

Mother and Aunt Anne and Father never travelled. It was strange how some people travelled about and some stayed in the same place.

The little bull-calf had been dead for a long time. He had lived a bare two weeks. Now his hide was hanging stretched out on the wall of the barn, and the titmice came and pecked at it now and then. Per had been shut indoors when they killed the calf. It was dreadful to be shut indoors and know about something you were not allowed to see.

The spring plowing and all that goes with it had come and gone. Father had not dug new fields then, but had driven manure to the old ones, and plowed and harrowed and sowed. He drove with Brownie. Father had no hired help until the haying. Auntie was out in the fields too, but not Mother. Mother had to nurse the baby and look after Botolv and cook---but Auntie was in the fields, and Per was there too. The earth steamed, and Father's Brownie steamed sometimes too when the work period lasted a long time. Brownie often stood in the furrow, resting, when he was drawing the plow, and then Father would stretch himself out full-length on the field beside him. Per felt lighthearted then, for Father's eyes were gentle and happy. But he was no more talkative than usual.

"Look at your father again," said Auntie.

Per looked. Father was lying, tall and streaked with soil, alongside the plow in Brownie's shadow.

Auntie said, "Your father loves earth more than anything else in the world."

"No, he doesn't!" said Per.

  [p. 17]  

"Oh, yes, he does; he's crazy about earth. He's impossible to be with."

Per's eyes widened, and Auntie hastened to improve on what she had said.

"Oh, you know he is, but---" she said, and then she snatched up the hoe and began working again. She was digging up couch grass. Couch grass was a weed and the most difficult to get rid of, so they said. Per was helping pick up the couch grass that the plow and the harrow tore up. Auntie was sweating; the sun was warm. Her arms were tanned already. By autumn they would be dark brown, Per remembered. Per watched her and kept close to her; it was safe and right to be there. There was a kind of fragrance about her warm body. Aunt Anne was terribly strict about washing herself---and about ordering Per to wash too.

Was Father impossible to be with?

He watched Father for weeks after that, throughout the spring plowing and while Father was at work on the cleared land after the plowing was over. Of course he was possible to be with. Mother showed that he was; she could sit so curiously still beside Father. Sometimes when Per woke up at night he could hear Father's voice in the bedroom like a low, comforting growl. He would call, "Ingjerd." That was all, but the sound had been comforting.

It was possible to be with Father, it was just that Auntie didn't understand him.

But Father sat silent, it was true, silent and still more silent. He came in, bringing the earth smell with him to the table, ate, and kept silent. He left earth on the chairs he sat in, so that someone had to go over them with a cloth when he had gone.

Per went over to the cleared land and burst out with this thing that was torturing him all day long: "Father, are you crazy?"

Father was digging around a stone that he was going to raise. He made four strokes with the mattock before he straightened his back and looked at Per. It had a calming effect,   [p. 18]   but Per cut in yet again: "Are you going to dig till you're crazy?"

"What are you talking about?" Father's voice seemed mixed with earth.

"Does the earth make you crazy?" insisted Per. Now that the question was finally off the hook, he seemed unable to stop.

Father shot out an arm. An incredibly long arm. Per was seized in a tremendous grip. Everything smelled of soil, but not only soil. Father was wearing a thin shirt, and Per felt how alive his muscles were inside the cloth, how hard and warm they were. And then Father turned his face towards him as he was caught in this iron-hard grip---and the eyes in this face met his own eyes and penetrated them. Per started to tremble, on the brink of tears, for something was going to happen now, he felt certain. And he didn't want anything to happen!

He screamed in terror, "Let me go!"

But no, he had it coming to him; he knew it would come. Father's grip, and his face, told him that something important was coming. Father said slowly, without letting him go:

"You too will love earth, Per. It's all that matters."

Per was trembling. He did not understand what Father was saying, but the words sank in. He would always remember them and the voice that spoke them: a voice full of dregs and rust because it was used so seldom.

"You will love earth too, Per. When you're grown-up."

"Let me go!"

But those eyes were on his; he could not avoid them. Father said:

"You will stay at Bufast to the end of your days."

"Let me go!"

"All right, now you can go. You can go to those who say I'm crazy."

The grip had loosened, but he stood paralyzed for a moment, unable to run as he had intended. Suddenly he had to defend Mother.

  [p. 19]  

"Mother never said so!"

Then his feet came alive again, and his body, and he was able to run. But he did not run home; he ran downhill through the copse. It was summer, and tinder dry. The birch trees were thick with leaves. He came down to the river. It was small now and moved sluggishly. He went uphill again. Father's words and face pursued him. He would belong to Bufast to the end of his days.

At home Mother was sitting with the baby on her lap. The baby was called Åsmund, but his name was never used. Botolv was sitting on a stool beside Mother.

Per was trembling again. Mother was quick to notice that something was wrong.

"Well, what is it?"

"Father isn't crazy, the way you said."

"What are you talking about?"

Per stood there, overwrought and blinking his eyes.

"Did I say---?"

"Yes, you did! You said so to Auntie. And Auntie says so too. But it's not true."

"No, it's not true," said Mother.

"Why did you say so, then?"

"Oh---your tongue runs away with you sometimes. Be a good boy and don't think about it any more."

How odd they were. Don't think about it any more, they said.

"I shall stay at Bufast to the end of my days," he told her, in fear.

"Yes, what of it?"

He did not know what to reply. Mother looked as if she thought it was right.

"Now you and Botolv can go and run outdoors for a while," she said. "You're too small to know what you want to be yet."

He dragged Botolv outdoors. Father's face and voice and words pursued him.

Be a good boy and don't think about it any more. How could they bring themselves to say it?