The children were playing up in the big attic at Selambshof. The rain pattered against the tiles of the roof and rushed down the spouts. But inside it was dry and dusty and mysterious in the twilight among the roof-timbers and the chimney pipes. And there were heaps of things that the grown-ups had thrown aside, but which for that very reason were so tempting: old, worn-out things which had reached their second childhood, and just for that reason suited the children’s games so well. It was only with great difficulty that Stellan could open the lock of the iron-bound oak chest. Triumphant, he pulled out a torn black skirt and spread it over the pram in which Hedvig lay on her back, pale and with her legs hanging over the edge. He called to Peter, who was the hearse-horse, and the melancholy procession was just about to start, when Hedvig began to sneeze because the skirt was full of red pepper.
“Can’t you pretend to be dead, you silly girl,” shouted Stellan impatiently.
And Laura bent down and giggled in the midst of the procession. Besides these two, the mourners were Herman Hermansson from Ekbacken and little Tord. But Tord did not want to take part in the game any longer, so he crept into a corner and sulked. The outlook was not very promising.
Creakily the pram began to move. They were playing “Mamma’s funeral” for the hundredth time.
11The procession stopped before the church, which was the triangle under the staircase up to the ceiling. Herman, with an air of deadly earnest on his open face, stood and chimed a nail on a stove ring. But Stellan drew the black skirt over his shoulders and climbed up on a wooden box and pretended to be the clergyman. He threw his head back and laying his hands on his chest began to hold forth: “From the earth you come, and wipe your feet, and honour your father and mother and sister and brother, and don’t hang on to people’s skirts, and don’t balance yourself on your chair because you will fall, fallevall, appala, mesala, mesinka, meso, sebedi, sebede, and get away now you silly, for now you are dead.”
This long rigmarole was uttered with the utmost solemnity and did not fail to impress the listeners. Hedvig grew frightened of shamming death. She was so frightened that she felt cold shivers down her back. But she did not climb out of the coffin, she remained as quiet as a mouse, for she knew that if she gave up the place of honour Laura would seize it at once. And Hedvig did not want that on any account.
Suddenly the rain stopped pattering on the roof. Silently the shadows crept on in the dust under the heavy beams. It was as if the silence and the emptiness of the big gloomy house had stealthily crept up among these mourners. They really felt the emptiness after their mother’s death, after her dainties and her scolding—perhaps most after her scolding. Yes, formerly when Mamma was in the kitchen scolding, they heard it up in the attic. But with old Kristin it was different. She kept on worrying them the whole time—and they got tired of it—
And then there was something funny about father. Since Mamma died he was always in town, and when sometimes he came home he looked so dull-eyed and shabby, almost as if he was drunk. And then they felt still lonelier. Stellan had overheard Kristin say to the gardener that the 12master was drinking himself to death—but Stellan could not understand how that could happen. Surely one did not die from being drunk?
Alas, how gloomy and empty it was up there in the big attic! Herman began to long for his home at Ekbacken where it was not at all strange as it was here.
But the Selambshof children felt they must fight against the silence with shouts and noise and quarrelling.
“Let us play drunkards,” shouted Peter and began to slouch and reel and push the others about in his clumsy way.
But Stellan knew better. Both Peter and Herman were stronger than Stellan, but all the same it was usually he who was leader. If a lot of dogs play about on a lawn you will in nine cases out of ten find that there is a small one taking the lead in the game.
“No, let us get out on the roof and play robbers,” he shouted.
With the help of Peter and Herman he managed to open the big trap door and they tumbled out on the roof, which sloped gently and had strong iron bars between the battlements. Selambshof was an old manor house which had been rebuilt, during a period of bad taste, in the gloomy style of a fortress castle, with narrow windows, towers, gables and battlements.
They were on forbidden ground. Hedvig stopped half inside and half outside the trap—she was like that. “Take care you people on the roof,” she whimpered repeatedly to the others, but they took no notice of her.
It was awfully cold up there. And it gave you a queer feeling in the pit of the stomach to be so high over the wet glistening tops of the trees in the park. And she had never seen such a big black cloud as the one which was just passing over the town. Beneath was the black smoke and through the smoke the windows flashed like a shot. But opposite the sky was as green as ice, except in the furthest 13distance over the dark and ragged edge of the forest, where it was yellow. And the lake looked like a piece of mirror of the sky which had fallen down among the trees. It was quite unbroken except between Kolsn?s and Stonehill, where the steamer was passing and shattered it.
Stellan was the first to reach the railing. Oh, how cold he felt about the forehead. But giddiness changed to recklessness—wild shouting recklessness. How small everything down there looked! Just look at Anders at the corner of the stable! Wasn’t he a mere spot. And Kristin—what did he care about Kristin? No, now they would have some fun!
“Selambshof is a robbers’ stronghold!” he shouted—quite pale with excitement. “We are wild highwaymen! We care for nothing—we just kill and take what we want.”
This seemed to appeal to Peter. He took aim at Ekbacken and pulled the trigger—that is to say he levelled his finger and said: “Bang, I shot Ekbacken! Ekbacken is mine.”
Herman protested: “No—Ekbacken belongs to my father.”
He was severely snubbed: “Blockhead! are we robbers or are we not?”
And then Stellan mercilessly shot to pieces Kolsn?s, the white walls of which peeped out behind the trees on the other side of the lake. Peter reloaded and took aim and shot at Trefvinge, which was the finest place within sight, a real big castle with four copper towers far away beyond the edge of the forest. Things were now getting exciting, for Peter and Stellan and Herman were all aiming at the town itself with all its church towers and chimneys! Bang, Bang, Bang, the shots were fired almost simultaneously.
“The town is mine” cried Herman. “I shot first.”
“No, I shot first,” lied Peter confidently.
14“No, mine was the only one that hit,” cried Stellan stamping on the roof. “Now both Kolsn?s and the town are mine.”
“That’s not fair,” insisted Herman, “I ought to have something, and I shot first.”
“That’s a lie,” insisted Peter quietly, but menacingly.
Stellan was already furious: “Whose idea was it that we should play robbers—eh? I am the chief of the robbers. And now I have taken the town and am king of the castle.”
But Herman would not give way, as he knew that his was the first shot.
“It’s not fair. It’s beastly unfair. I won’t play robbers with you if you are unfair.”
It looked like a fight.
Laura had been watching with her teeth chattering and trying to hide her little fat fingers in the sleeves of her frock. Now she jumped excitedly down towards the infuriated robbers. Unobserved, even Hedvig left her spy hole in the trap.
Stellan and Herman had already come to grips and scratched and tore at each other in the artless way of children. At last they began to wrestle and Stellan, who was the shorter of the two, was underneath.
“You see that I did shoot first,” panted Herman.
Then Peter with his cool cheek intervened. He rolled round this human knot and extricated Stellan, who, rather shamefaced at his defeat, withdrew with feigned contempt from the robber band. Then Peter sat down astride of Herman.
“Now say that the town is mine.”
“No.”
He began to jump on Herman. This hurt Herman, because he was lying athwart the ridge of the roof.
“Say that it is mine!”
15“No.”
Peter jumped on him more than ever.
“Is it mine, what?”
Herman did not cry out. But he hit out wildly, and at last, maddened by pain, he bit Peter’s hand. Peter at once uttered a wild scream. Then Herman let go. But Peter was wise and screamed after the pain was gone.
“Take care, you who bite,” piped Hedvig in her thin voice.
Herman suddenly became horrified at his wicked deed. “Dear Peter, please forgive me,” he begged.
“Was it I who took the town then?” hissed Peter.
“Yes, I suppose it was.”
Peter felt better at once, but it suddenly struck him that his victory was not worth much and so he began to moan and cry again: “Oh, Oh, Oh.”
Herman was again alarmed and stricken with remorse: “Dear Peter, don’t cry, please forgive me, Peter, dear.”
“Will you give me your glass marble then?” whimpered Peter pitifully.
Herman pulled the glass marble out of his bag with a sigh and gave it to Peter. So at last Peter had gained something real from his robber’s career. He stood smiling to himself and weighed the five heavy marbles in his right hand but did not trouble to wipe off the blood from his left hand. It might always be useful to leave it there.
During this scene little Tord had also clambered out on to the roof. But he took no notice of the cries and noise of the others. He sat apart and leant over an old green box where nasturtiums had once grown, but which was now half-filled with rain water. Something moved in the depths. Strange little creatures with only heads and tails teemed in it. And they rose to the surface with little jerks and then disappeared again in the black, brown depths. Oh! how wonderfully mysterious it all was! He 16drew himself up silently. He cast anxious side-glances at the fight which was going on. Soon they would probably come and kick over the whole of his wonderful find. He hated his big brothers and sisters, who never let him enjoy anything in peace.
A voice was heard from the stairs and he crept behind the chimney.
It was Kristin. She emerged from the trap door like an old witch ready for a ride on her broom. She shook her fist, which was covered with gouty lumps, but nevertheless still had an iron grip.
“Were there ever such heathen children. You will break your necks and be good for nothing—that’s what will happen to you. Come down at once from the roof.”
The children slouched back to the trap door. Each one of them felt Kristin’s fingers in his hair. Peter approached cautiously and hunched up, holding his wounded hand like a shield in front of him. Kristin caught sight of it.
“What have you been doing, you naughty boy?”
Peter did not tell any tales himself but he looked beseechingly at Hedvig. He knew that she could not resist.
“It was Herman,” she panted. “He bit Peter until the blood ran. I only went out on the roof to see who was crying.”
In this way both Peter and Hedvig escaped a hair pulling and that was exactly what they had hoped for.
But Herman got a double dose and went home with bitterness in his heart.
Not until the other children were in their beds was Tord missed. It was not at all unusual for him to be lost like that. They looked for him in the usual places: the empty dog kennel, the wood shed, the hollow oak by the stable. But without success. At last Hedvig remembered that he had been with them on the roof and there they found him huddled up on the cold tiles, leaning against the box with 17the wonderful mosquito larv?, and wet with dew. He was sleeping with his dirty little thumb in his mouth.
Soon everything was silent in the big house. And one of the frosty “iron” nights of June fell with its devastation upon the neglected garden and fields of Selambshof.