[Subsection]

Per ran about in the woods after the sheep. He was so bored he could have screamed, but in the evening when the sheep took the permitted, direct route home again, his heart was soothed.

At home life continued unwaveringly as usual. Mother prepared their days and their clothes and their food.

Per learned to swim in a creek of the river while he was herding the sheep that year. He read the newspaper that was wrapped around his food to the last letter of the alphabet.   [p. 102]   The driest matters, which would never have been noticed otherwise, were read with enthusiasm when you were a herdsman sitting on a stone.

Next year he would be confirmed. And Olav would be confirmed, and Åsne.

Father came and said he must help him weed out stones while the sheep were fenced in during the middle of the day. He was choked with anger, for it was unfair. The herdsman was supposed to be free then. He gave Father some dirty looks and threw the stones onto the heap so that they bounced.

Unfair!

He would tell Father to his face that this was none of his business. This was his free time.

Father was digging stones out too, turning over and piling up the biggest. He straightened up and looked at Per with a sneer.

"Quite right, Per," he said, when Per sent a stone into the heap with a clatter. "It's good for the stone to feel it; that's only right and proper."

And he laughed coldly. His laughter felt like a ducking in cold water. This was not work for a sissy, and nobody asked what the herdsman's rights were.

Father merely attacked another heavy stone with the crowbar. The words that Per had thought of hurling at him were never spoken. Per saw that they would roll like bilberries off that homespun back and those square shoulders and that tanned neck.

Father had scorned him. He felt as if he had been beaten. There was another feeling too: it was like having your mouth full of earth. He wished Father would turn around and look in his direction.

No. Father kept his back turned to him, clearly on purpose. It stung.

The midday sun was baking hot, and the ground had a different smell, sending gusts of warmth back again. Per was standing in the middle of the patch of red, barren, newly-   [p. 103]   cleared land. A short way off lay the pieces which Father had cleared in previous years. Some of it was thick meadow now. On last year's patches wheat or oats were growing sparsely. Father had sweated over every foot of it.

Turn around, Father, and look at me just once.

No. Only that back and those square shoulders and those elbows showing through the holes worn in his shirt.

"Home!" called Mother from the doorstep.

It sounded reassuring. Of course, everything was all right. Mother and her call home were part of it and were always there when it was time. Mother never forgot the routine.

They straightened up, answered yes! to the call, washed their hands in the stream, and went in to dinner.

Per looked down at the table that day as he ate. Åsmund refused his food, was spoken to sharply, and sat pouting.

"Eat," said Father. "It's good food."

"No," said Åsmund.

"Then leave the table and go to bed," said Father curtly. Åsmund left, red with the sulks. He went and lay down on his bed, with a sidelong glance at Father.

A thundercloud lay over the table. Per sat and chewed, knowing whose fault it was; it was his fault that Father was irritable and that Åsmund had been sent to bed.

No, it was Father, who was hard as rock. Father will destroy me. . . .

A strong gust of earth came from Father's soil-spattered clothes. Father takes the earth with him all over the place; he's impossible; he'll kill me soon; he's. . . .

Per chewed.

Father chewed slowly.

Mother and Aunt Anne chewed.

Åsmund lay staring through the wall.