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

I sit here and play till doomsday?” he asked himself in despair.

The bow ran on and on, and magically called forth one tune after another. Always it was something new, and it was so beautiful that the poor fiddler must have known how little his own skill was worth. And it was this that tortured him worse than the fatigue.

“He who plays upon my violin understands the art. But never in all my born days have I been anything but a bungler. Now for the first time I’m learning how music should sound.”

For a few seconds he became so transported by the music that he forgot his evil fate; then he felt how his arm ached from weariness and he was seized anew with despair.

“This violin I cannot lay down until I have played myself to death. I can understand that the Water-Sprite won’t be satisfied with less.”

He began to weep over himself, but all the while he kept on playing.

“It would have been better for me had I stayed at home in the little cabin with mother. What is all the glory worth if it is to end in this way?”

He sat there hour after hour. Morning came on, the sun rose, and the birds sang all around him; but he played and he played, without intermission.

As it was a Sunday that dawned, he had to sit there by the old mill all alone. No human beings tramped in this part of the forest. They went to church down in the dale, and to the villages along the big highway.

Forenoon came along, and the sun stepped higher and higher in the sky. The birds grew silent, and the wind began to murmur in the long pine needles.

Lars Larsson did not let the summer day’s heat deter him. He played and played. At last evening was ushered in, the sun sank, but his bow needed no rest, and his arm continued to move.

“It is absolutely certain that this will be the death of me!” said he. “And it is a righteous punishment for all my conceit.”

Far along in the evening a human being came wandering through the wood. It was a poor old woman with bent back and white hair, and a countenance that was furrowed by many sorrows.

“It seems strange,” thought the player, “but I think I recognize that old woman. Can it be possible that it is my mother? Can it be possible that mother has grown so old and gray?”

He called aloud and stopped her. “Mother, mother, come here to me!” he cried.

She paused, as if unwillingly. “I hear now with my own ears that you are the best musician in Värmland,” said she. “I can well understand that you do not care any more for a poor old woman like me!”

“Mother, mother, don’t pass me by!” cried Lars Larsson. “I’m no great performer⁠—only a poor wretch. Come here that I may speak with you!”

Then the mother came nearer and saw how he sat and played. His face was as pale as death, his hair dripped sweat, and blood oozed out from under the roots of his nails.

“Mother, I have fallen into misfortune because of my vanity, and now I must play myself to death. But tell me, before this happens, if you can forgive me, who left you alone and poor in your old age!”

His mother was seized with a great compassion for the son, and all the anger she had felt toward him was as if blown away. “Why, surely I forgive you!” said she. And as she saw his anguish and bewilderment and wanted him to understand that she meant what she said, she repeated it in the name of God.

“In the name of God our Redeemer, I forgive you!”

And when she said this, the bow stopped, the violin fell to the ground, and the musician arose saved and redeemed. For the enchantment was broken, because his old mother had felt such compassion for his distress that she had spoken God’s name over him.

The Legend of the Christmas Rose

Robber Mother, who lived in Robbers’ Cave up in Göinge forest, went down to the village one day on a begging tour. Robber Father, who was an outlawed man, did not dare to leave the forest, but had to content himself with lying in wait for the wayfarers who ventured within its borders. But at that time travellers were not very plentiful in Southern Skåne. If it so happened that the man had had a few weeks of ill luck with his hunt, his wife would take to the road. She took with her five youngsters, and each youngster wore a ragged leathern suit and birch-bark shoes and bore a sack on his back as long as himself. When Robber Mother stepped inside the door of a cabin, no one dared refuse to give her whatever she demanded; for she was not above coming back the following night and setting fire to the house if she had not been well received. Robber Mother and her brood were worse than a pack of wolves, and many a man felt like running a spear through them; but it was never done, because they all knew that the man stayed up in the forest, and he would have known how to wreak vengeance if anything had happened to the children or the old woman.

Now that Robber Mother went from house to house and begged, she came one day to Övid, which at that time was a cloister. She rang the bell of the cloister gate and asked for food. The watchman let down a small wicket in the gate and handed her six round bread cakes⁠—one for herself and one for each of the five children.

While the mother was standing quietly at the gate, her youngsters were running about. And now one of them came and pulled at her skirt, as a signal that he had discovered something which she ought to come and