When now the time of year came for the cattle to be sent into the wood, Arne wished to go to tend them. But the father opposed him: indeed, he had never gone before, though he was now in his fifteenth year. But he pleaded so well, that his wish was at last complied with; and so during the spring, summer, and autumn, he passed the whole day alone in the wood, and only came home to sleep.

He took his books up there, and read, carved letters in the bark of the trees, thought, longed, and sang. But when in the evening he came home and found the father often drunk and beating the mother, cursing her and the whole parish, and saying how once he might have gone far away, then a longing for travelling arose in the lad's mind. There was no comfort for him at home; and his books made his thoughts travel; nay, it seemed sometimes as if the very breeze bore them on its wings far away.

Then, about midsummer, he met with Christian, the Captain's eldest son, who one day came to the wood with the servant boy, to catch the horses, and to ride them home. He was a few years older than Arne, light-hearted and jolly, restless in mind, but nevertheless strong in purpose; he spoke fast and abruptly, and generally about two things at once; shot birds in their flight; rode bare-backed horses; went fly-fishing; and altogether seemed to Arne the paragon of perfection. He, too, had set his mind upon travelling, and he talked to Arne about foreign countries till they shone like fairy-lands. He found out Arne's love for reading, and he carried up to him all the books he had read himself; on Sundays he taught him geography from maps: and during the whole of that summer Arne read till he became pale and thin.

Even when the winter came, he was permitted to read at home; partly because he was going to be confirmed the next year, and partly because he always knew how to manage with his father. He also began to go to school; but while there it seemed to him he never got on so well as when he shut his eyes and thought over the things in his books at home: and he no longer had any companions among the boys of the parish.

The father's bodily infirmity, as well as his passion for drinking, increased with his years; and he treated his wife worse and worse. And while Arne sat at home trying to amuse him, and often, merely to keep peace for the mother, telling things which he now despised, a hatred of his father grew up in his heart. But there he kept it secretly, just as he kept his love for his mother. Even when he happened to meet Christian, he said nothing to him about home affairs; but all their talk ran upon their books and their intended travels. But often when, after those wide roaming conversations, he was returning home alone, thinking of what he perhaps would have to see when he arrived there, he wept and prayed that God would take care he might soon be allowed to go away.

In the summer he and Christian were confirmed: and soon afterwards the latter carried out his purpose of travelling. At last, he prevailed upon his father to let him be a sailor; and he went far away; first giving Arne his books, and promising to write often to him. Then Arne was left alone.

About this time a wish to make songs awoke again in his mind; and now he no longer patched old songs, but made new ones for himself, and said in them whatever most pained him.

But soon his heart became too heavy to let him make songs any more. He lay sleepless whole nights, feeling that he could not bear to stay at home any longer, and that he must go far away, find out Christian, and—not say a word about it to any one. But when he thought of the mother, and what would become of her, he could scarcely look her in the face; and his love made him linger still.

One evening when it was growing late, Arne sat reading: indeed, when he felt more sad than usual he always took refuge in his books; little understanding that they only increased his burden. The father had gone to a wedding party, but was expected home that evening; the mother, weary and afraid of him, had gone to bed. Then Arne was startled by the sound of a heavy fall in the passage, and of something hard pushing against the door. It was the father, just coming home.

"Is it you, my clever boy?" he muttered; "come and help your father to get up." Arne helped him up, and brought him to the bench; then carried in the violin-case after him, and shut the door. "Well, look at me, you clever boy; I don't look very handsome now; Nils, the tailor's no longer the man he used to be. One thing I—tell—you—you shall never drink spirits; they're—the devil, the world, and the flesh.... 'God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace to the humble.' ... Oh dear! oh dear!—How far gone I am!"

He sat silent for a while, and then sang in a tearful voice,

"'Lord, I am not worthy that Thou shouldest come under my roof; but speak the word only....'" He threw himself forward, hid his face in his hands, and sobbed violently. Then, after lying thus a long while, he said, word for word out of the Scriptures, just as he had learned it more than twenty years ago, "'But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Then came she and worshipped him, saying, Lord, help me. But he answered and said, It is not meet to take the children's bread, and to cast it to dogs. And she said, Truth, Lord: yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their master's table.'"

Then he was silent, and his weeping became subdued and calm.

The mother had been long awake, without looking up; but now when she heard him weeping thus like one who is saved, she raised herself on her elbows, and gazed earnestly at him.

But scarcely did Nils perceive her before he called out, "Are you looking up, you ugly vixen! I suppose you would like to see what a state you have brought me to. Well, so I look, just so!" ... He rose; and she hid herself under the fur coverlet. "Nay, don't hide, I'm sure to find you," he said, stretching out his right hand and fumbling with his forefinger on the bed-clothes, "Tickle, tickle," he said, turning aside the fur coverlet, and putting his forefinger on her throat.

"Father!" cried Arne.

"How shrivelled and thin you've become already, there's no depth of flesh here!" She writhed beneath his touch, and seized his hand with both hers, but could not free herself.

"Father!" repeated Arne.

"Well at last you're roused. How she wriggles, the ugly thing! Can't you scream to make believe I am beating you? Tickle, tickle! I only want to take away your breath."

"Father!" Arne said once more, running to the corner of the room, and snatching up an axe which stood there.

"Is it only out of perverseness, you don't scream? you had better beware; for I've taken such a strange fancy into my head. Tickle, tickle! Now I think I shall soon get rid of that screaming of yours."

"Father!" Arne shouted, rushing towards him with the axe uplifted.

But before Arne could reach him, he started up with a piercing cry, laid his hand upon his heart, and fell heavily down. "Jesus Christ!" he muttered, and then lay quite still.

Arne stood as if rooted in the ground, and gradually lowered the axe. He grew dizzy and bewildered, and scarcely knew where he was. Then the mother began to move to and fro in the bed, and to breathe heavily, as if oppressed by some great weight lying upon her. Arne saw that she needed help; but yet he felt unable to render it. At last she raised herself a little, and saw the father lying stretched on the floor, and Arne standing beside him with the axe.

"Merciful Lord, what have you done?" she cried, springing out of the bed, putting on her skirt and coming nearer.

"He fell down himself," said Arne, at last regaining power to speak. "Arne, Arne, I don't believe you," said the mother in a stern reproachful voice: "now Jesus help you!" And she threw herself upon the dead man with loud wailing.

But the boy awoke from his stupor, dropped the axe and fell down on his knees: "As true as I hope for mercy from God, I've not done it. I almost thought of doing it; I was so bewildered; but then he fell down himself; and here I've been standing ever since."

The mother looked at him, and believed him. "Then our Lord has been here Himself," she said quietly, sitting down on the floor and gazing before her.

Nils lay quite stiff, with open eyes and mouth, and hands drawn near together, as though he had at the last moment tried to fold them, but had been unable to do so. The first thing the mother now did was to fold them. "Let us look closer at him," she said then, going over to the fireplace, where the fire was almost out. Arne followed her, for he felt afraid of standing alone. She gave him a lighted fir-splinter to hold; then she once more went over to the dead body and stood by one side of it, while the son stood at the other, letting the light fall upon it.

"Yes, he's quite gone," she said; and then, after a little while, she continued, "and gone in an evil hour, I'm afraid."

Arne's hands trembled so much that the burning ashes of the splinter fell upon the father's clothes and set them on fire; but the boy did not perceive it, neither did the mother at first, for she was weeping. But soon she became aware of it through the bad smell, and she cried out in fear. When now the boy looked, it seemed to him as though the father himself was burning, and he dropped the splinter upon him, sinking down in a swoon. Up and down, and round and round, the room moved with him; the table moved, the bed moved; the axe hewed; the father rose and came to him; and then all of them came rolling upon him. Then he felt as if a soft cooling breeze passed over his face; and he cried out and awoke. The first thing he did was to look at the father, to assure himself that he still lay quietly.

And a feeling of inexpressible happiness came over the boy's mind when he saw that the father was dead—really dead; and he rose as though he were entering upon a new life.

The mother had extinguished the burning clothes, and began to lay out the body. She made the bed, and then said to Arne, "Take hold of your father, you're so strong, and help me to lay him nicely." They laid him on the bed, and Margit shut his eyes and mouth, stretched his limbs, and folded his hands once more.

Then they both stood looking at him. It was only a little past midnight, and they had to stay there with him till morning. Arne made a good fire, and the mother sat down by it. While sitting there, she looked back upon the many miserable days she had passed with Nils, and she thanked God for taking him away. "But still I had some happy days with him, too," she said after a while.

Arne took a seat opposite her; and, turning to him, she went on, "And to think that he should have such an end as this! even if he has not lived as he ought, truly he has suffered for it." She wept, looked over to the dead man, and continued, "But now God grant I may be repaid for all I have gone through with him. Arne, you must remember it was for your sake I suffered it all." The boy began to weep too. "Therefore, you must never leave me," she sobbed; "you are now my only comfort." "I never will leave you; that I promise before God," the boy said, as earnestly as if he had thought of saying it for years. He felt a longing to go over to her; yet he could not.

She grew calmer, and, looking kindly over at the dead man, she said, "After all, there was a great deal of good in him; but the world dealt hardly by him.... But now he's gone to our Lord, and He'll be kinder to him, I'm sure." Then, as if she had been following out this thought within herself, she added, "We must pray for him. If I could, I would sing over him; but you, Arne, have such a fine voice, you must go and sing to your father."

Arne fetched the hymn-book and lighted a fir-splinter; and, holding it in one hand and the book in the other, he went to the head of the bed and sang in a clear voice Kingo's 127th hymn: