Short Fiction Selma Lagerlöf (best book club books of all time .txt) 📖

door, her best friend, a young peasant girl, came and whispered something to her. “There is someone below who wants to speak with you.”

“Is it Gudmund?” asked Hildur, and a spark of life came into her eyes.

“No, but it may be a messenger from him. She wouldn’t divulge the nature of her errand to anyone but yourself, she declared.”

Hildur had been sitting thinking all day that someone must come who could put an end to her misery. She couldn’t comprehend that such a dreadful misfortune should come to her. She felt that something ought to happen that she might again don her crown and wreath, so they could proceed with the wedding. When she heard now of a messenger from Gudmund, she was interested and immediately went out to the kitchen hall and looked for her.

Hildur probably wondered why Gudmund had sent Helga to her, but she thought that perhaps he couldn’t find any other messenger on a holiday, and greeted her pleasantly. She motioned to Helga to come with her into the dairy across the yard. “I know no other place where we can be alone,” she said. “The house is still full of guests.”

As soon as they were inside, Helga went close up to Hildur and looked her square in the face. “Before I say anything more, I must know if you love Gudmund.”

Hildur winced. It was painful for her to be obliged to exchange a single word with Helga, and she had no desire to make a confidant of her. But now it was a case of necessity, and she forced herself to answer, “Why else do you suppose I wished to marry him?”

“I mean, do you still love him?”

Hildur was like stone, but she could not lie under the other woman’s searching glance. “Perhaps I have never loved him so much as today,” she said, but she said this so feebly that one might think it hurt her to speak out.

“Then come with me at once!” said Helga. “I have a wagon down the road. Go in after a cloak or something to wrap around you; then we’ll drive to Närlunda.”

“What good would it do for me to go there?” asked Hildur.

“You must go there and say you want to be Gudmund’s, no matter what he may have done, and that you will wait faithfully for him while he is in prison.”

“Why should I say this?”

“So all will be well between you.”

“But that is impossible. I don’t want to marry anyone who has been in prison!”

Helga staggered back, as though she had bumped against a wall, but she quickly regained her courage. She could understand that one who was rich and powerful, like Hildur, must think thus. “I should not come and ask you to go to Närlunda did I not know that Gudmund was innocent,” said she.

Now it was Hildur who came a step or two towards Helga. “Do you know this for certain, or is it only something which you imagine?”

“It will be better for us to get into the cart immediately; then I can talk on the way.”

“No, you must first explain what you mean; I must know what I’m doing.”

Helga was in such a fever of excitement that she could hardly stand still; nevertheless she had to make up her mind to tell Hildur how she happened to know that Gudmund was not the murderer.

“Didn’t you tell Gudmund of this at once?”

“No, I’m telling it now to Hildur. No one else knows of it.”

“And why do you come to me with this?”

“That all may be well between you two. He will soon learn that he has done no wrong; but I want you to go to him as if of your own accord, and make it up.”

“Shan’t I say that I know he is innocent?”

“You must come entirely of your own accord and must never let him know I have spoken to you; otherwise he will never forgive you for what you said to him this morning.”

Hildur listened quietly. There was something in this which she had never met with in her life before, and she was striving to make it clear to herself. “Do you know that it was I who wanted you to leave Närlunda?”

“I know, of course, that it was not the folk at Närlunda who wished me away.”

“I can’t comprehend that you should come to me today with the desire to help me.”

“Only come along now, Hildur, so all will be well!”

Hildur stared at Helga, trying all the while to reason it out. “Perhaps Gudmund loves you?” she blurted out.

And now Helga’s patience was exhausted. “What could I be to him?” she said sharply. “You know, Hildur, that I am only a poor croft girl, and that’s not the worst about me!”

The two young women stole unobserved from the homestead and were soon seated in the cart. Helga held the reins, and she did not spare the horse, but drove at full speed. Both girls were silent. Hildur sat gazing at Helga. She marvelled at her and was thinking more of her than of anything else.

As they were nearing the Erlandsson farm, Helga gave the reins to Hildur. “Now you must go alone to the house and talk with Gudmund. I’ll follow a little later and tell that about the knife. But you mustn’t say a word to Gudmund about my having brought you here.”

Gudmund sat in the living-room at Närlunda beside his mother and talked with her. His father was sitting a little way from them, smoking. He looked pleased and said not a word. It was apparent that he thought everything was going now as it should and that it was not necessary for him to interfere.

“I wonder, mother, what you would have said if you had got Helga for a daughter-in-law?” ventured Gudmund.

Mother Ingeborg raised her head and said in a firm voice, “I will with pleasure welcome any daughter-in-law if I only know that she loves you as a wife should love her husband.”

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