Pelle the Conqueror, Vol 3 by Martin Anderson Nexo

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"It's going badly with him," thought Pelle, involuntarily keeping his
eyes on him. The results of strike-breaking had dealt hardly with him.

By St. Hans Street he turned the corner, winking at the policeman who
was about to follow him, and went down the street alone, looking neither
to right nor left, embarrassed, and with hanging head. Every time a
child cried aloud, he started. Then he stood as though riveted to the
ground, for in front of his door a heap of poverty-stricken household
goods lay in the gutter. A crowd of gaping children stood round the
heap, and in the midst of the group stood a youngish woman, with four
children, who were keeping tearful watch over the heap of trash. The man
pressed through the crowd and exchanged a few words with the woman, then
clenched his fists and shook them threateningly at the tenement house.

Pelle went up to him. "Things aren't going well with you, comrade," he
said, laying his hand on the other's shoulder. "And you are much too
good for what you are doing. You had better come with me and re-enter
the organization."

The man slowly turned his head. "Oh, it's you!" he said, shaking Pelle's
hand away with a jerk. "And you seem as cool and impudent as ever.
Poverty hasn't dealt hardly with you! It's not at all a bad business,
growing fat on the pence of the workers, eh?"

Pelle grew crimson with anger, but he controlled himself. "Your insults
don't hurt me," he said. "I have gone hungry for the Cause while you
have been playing the turncoat. But that will be forgotten if you'll
come with me."

The man laughed bitterly, pointing at the tenement-house. "You'd better
go and give them a medal. Three months now they've tormented me and made
hell hot for my wife and children, in order to drive us away. And as
that didn't answer, they went to the landlord and forced him to give me
notice. But Hansen is obstinate--he wouldn't be shown the door. So now
they've got the bailiffs to turn me out, see?" He gave a hollow laugh.
"But these few sticks, why, we can soon carry them up again, damn it
all! Shall we begin, mother?"

"I'll willingly speak to the landlord. Remember, you are an old
unionist."

"An old--yes, I was in it from the very beginning." The man drew himself
proudly erect. "But for all that I don't let my wife and children
starve. So you want to go begging favors for me, eh? You be gone--at
once, will you? Be off, to the devil, or I'll beat you to a jelly with
this!" He seized a table-leg; his eyes were quite blood-shot. His young
wife went up to him and took his hand. "Hansen!" she said quietly. He
let his weapon fall. Pelle felt the woman's pleading eyes upon him, and
went.

XXXI

When Pelle, tired to death, made his way homeward in the evening, he
had lost the feeling of invincibility and his thoughts turned to Ellen.

In the daytime he felt neither hesitation nor certainty. When he set to
work it was always with thousands behind him. He felt the great body of
workers at his back, whether he was fighting in the open or waiting with
close-buttoned coat to deal with the leaders of the opposing camp. But
when he went home to Ellen he had only himself to rely on for support.
And he could not get near her. Strongly as he was drawn by the life away
from home, she still held the secret of his life in her hands. She was
strong and would not be swept aside. He was forced to ponder over her
nature and to search for a solution.

Pelle had to deal with countless numbers of families, and what he saw
was not always edifying. Home was a conception which was only now
forcing its way downward from the middle classes. Even in periods of
normal employment the workers earned little enough when it came to
providing a decent family life, and the women knew nothing of making a
comfortable home. The man might be tidy and well-dressed when one met
him out of doors, but if you went to his home it was always the same
thing; a dark, grimy den and a worn-out wife, who moved about scolding
amidst a swarm of children. Wages were enough for one only to live in
comfort. The man represented the household out of doors. He must take
sandwiches to his work, and he must have something decent too when he
got home. The others managed with a little bread and coffee; it was of
no use to talk of regular family meals. And the man must have clothes;
he was the visible portion of the household, and he supported it. It was
of no use to look for anything further in the way of ideas from these
women; they saw nothing but unemployment and the want at home, and when
the husband showed himself they drove him out of the house with their
scolding ways. "You go out and meddle with everything you can think of
that doesn't concern us--politics and big talk--instead of doing your
work properly and leaving the fools to squabble among themselves!" The
result was that they did their work for the organization in the taverns.
Many of them held positions of confidence, and Pelle went to the taverns
to confer with them. They were dejected, when they arrived, and had
before all else to be thawed out.

There Pelle came to them, with his brilliant hopes. When they lamented
in their dejection, he promised great things of the future. "Our wives
will soon see that we are in the right. The day will soon come when we
shall be able to go home with a proper week's wages, that will be enough
for the whole family."

"And suppose it doesn't come off?" they would say.

"It will come off--if only we hold out!" he cried, smiting the table.

Yes, he might well see the bright side of things. He had a wife who came
from a long-established home, who kept things clean and tidy for him,
and knew how to make much do the work of little; the daughter of an old
unionist who had grown up in the midst of the movement--a wife who saw
her husband's doings with understanding eyes; yes, he might well smile!
As to the last, Pelle was silent.

In this particular she had accepted neither inheritance nor teaching;
she was as she was, and she would never be different, whatever might
pass over her head. Pelle was sacrificing wife and children to a fixed
idea, in order not to leave a few indifferent comrades in the lurch!
That, and the strike, and the severe condemnation of those who would not
keep step, was, and remained, for her, so much tavern nonsense. It was
something the workers had got into their heads as a result of talking
when they were not precisely sober.

That was what it was, and it filled her heart with pain and
mortification that she and hers should be set aside for people who were
nothing to them. And this pain made her beautiful, and justified her in
her own eyes.

She did not complain in words, and she was always careful to set before
Pelle whatever the house could provide. He always found everything in
order, and he understood what efforts it must cost her--considering the
smallness of the means which she had at her disposal. There was no weak
point in her defences; and this made the position still more oppressive;
he could not evoke an explosion, a ventilation of her grievances; it was
impossible to quarrel with her and make friends again.

Often he wished that Ellen would become neglectful, like so many others.
But she was always attentive; the more the circumstances enabled her to
condemn him, the more correctly did she behave.

If only he could have explained her lack of comprehension by supposing
that her mind was barren and self-seeking! But in his eyes she had
always been quite simple and single-minded, and yet her nature was to
him a continual enigma! It was true she was not excessively benevolent
or sympathetic where others were concerned; but on the other hand she
asked nothing for herself--her thoughts were all for him and the
children. He must admit that she had, without a thought, sacrificed
everything to him--her home, her whole world--and that she had a right
to ask something in return.

And she was still unchangeably the same. She was indifferent where she
herself was concerned, if only Pelle and the children had something she
was contented; she herself needed so little, yet she seemed to take
enough when he watched her eating. Pelle often wondered that she
retained her healthy appearance, although the food she ate was so
inferior. Perhaps she helped herself in secret--but he drove the thought
away, and was ashamed. She was always completely indifferent as to what
she ate; she did not notice what it was, but served him and the children
with the best of it--especially himself--yet she seemed to thrive. Yes,
even now she gave the best to him. It was as though she was fulfilling
some deep-rooted law of her nature, which was independent of their
relations to one another. In this nothing could alter her habits. She
might have been compared to a great beautiful bitch that lies
attentively marking the appetite of her young, although none can tell,
from her deliberate quiet, that her own bowels are twisted with hunger.
If they left anything, she noticed it. "I have eaten," she would say, so
quietly that she succeeded as a rule in deceiving them. Yes, it made him
feel desperate to think about it; the more he thought of it the more
unendurable it was. She was sacrificing herself for him, yet she must
condemn all his doings! She knew how to defy starvation far better than
he--and she did not understand why they must go hungry!

But from all these painful deliberations she emerged always more
prominently capable, incomprehensible, and beautiful in all her
strangeness! And he would hurry home, full of burning longing and
devotion, continually hoping that this time she would come to him
glowing with love, to hide her eyes, full of confusion, on his shoulder.
The disappointment only flung him yet more violently into the struggle;
the longing of his heart for a tender, careless hand made his own hard.

* * * * *

He was always exerting himself to find some means of making money. At
first, of course, there was no way, and he became so completely absorbed
in the conflict that finally the question no longer occupied his mind.
It lurked in his consciousness, like a voluptuous wish that merely
tinged his daily existence; it was as though something within his mind
had taken possession of his talent for design, and was always designing
beautiful paper money and displaying it to his imagination.

One day when he reached home he found Widow Rasmussen tending the
children and working on a pair of canvas shoes. Drunken Valde had left
her again--had flown out into the spring! Ellen had gone out to work. A
sudden pain shot through him. Her way of doing this, without saying a
word to him, was like a blow in the face, and at first he was angry. But
disloyalty was foreign to his nature. He had to admit that she was
within her rights; and with that his anger evaporated, leaving him
bewildered; something within him seemed tottering; surely this was a
topsy-turvy world! "I might as well stay at home and look after the
children," he thought bitterly.

"I'll stay with the children now, Madam Rasmussen!" he said. The woman
put her work together.

"Yes, they've got a lot to go through," she said, standing in the
doorway. "I don't myself understand what it's all about, but one must
always do something! That's my motto. For things can't be worse than
they are. 'Widow'! Pooh! They won't let us behave ourselves! A man can
scarcely look after himself, let alone a family, in this accursed world
--and one needn't call one's self Madam to get children! Here have I been
knocking about all my life, ruining my health and happiness, and have I
earned as much from all my blackguards as would pay for the rags I've
worn? No; I've had to beg them nicely of the fine folks for whom I do
washing! Yes, they are ready to skin one alive--Madam Rasmussen has
proved that. So I say, one must always try something! To-day the boy
comes home and says, 'Mother, they've put up the price of firewood
again--an ore the two dozen!' 'What does that matter to us, boy? Can we
buy two dozen at once?' I say. 'Yes, mother, but then the one dozen will
cost an ore more.' And eggs, they cost one krone twenty a score where
the rich folks buy them--but here! 'No, my dear madam, if you take two
eggs you must pay fifteen ore!' That makes eight ore for an egg, for if
one takes the smallest quantity the profits aren't in proportion. It's
hard to be poor. If it's never going to be better, may the devil take
him that's made it all! That was a fine swear!"

Pelle sat playing with Young Lasse. Madam Rasmussen's words had aroused
something in him. That was the eternal complaint, the old, old cry!
Whenever he heard it, the world of the poor man became even more plainly
visible for what it was--and he ought to know it! It was a frightful
abyss that he looked down into; it was bottomless; and it seemed forever
to reveal fresh depths. And he was right--he was right.

He sat carelessly drawing something for the child on a scrap of paper,
thinking of things quite different; but involuntarily the drawing took
shape from within his hand. "That's money, that's money!" cried Young
Lasse, clapping his hands. Pelle waked up and examined his drawing; sure
enough, there was a rough sketch of a ten-kroner note! It flattered his
father's heart that the child had recognized it; and he was seized by
the desire to see how like it was. But where in all the world was he to
get a "blue"? Pelle, who at this time superintended the collection and
distributing of millions, did not possess ten kroner! The pipe! The
pipe! That was what the boy got his idea from! His old Christmas
present, queerly enough, had a ten-kroner note on the bowl--and that
gave him an idea! He got it out and compared it; it was a long time
since he had smoked the pipe--he couldn't afford it. He began eagerly to
fill in the drawing while Young Lasse stood by, amusing himself by
watching the rapid movements of the pencil. "Father is clever--Father
draw!" he said, and wanted to wake his sister so that she could take
part in the game.

No, the result was not good! The design would have to be cut in wood and
printed in color for the appearance really to be similar. But then Ellen
came home, and he hid it away. "Won't you give up going out to work?"
he said. "I'll provide what is absolutely necessary."

"Why?" she retorted resolutely. "I'm not too good to do anything!" There
was no tone in her voice from which he could elicit anything; so he got
ready to go to the meeting.

Now, when Ellen went out to work, he ran home as often as he had time in
order to look after the children. He had obtained a piece of hard wood
and a ten-kroner note. With great care he transferred the design onto
the wood, and began to engrave it while he sat there chattering to the
children. This task occupied unused faculties; it engrossed him as an
artistic exercise, which lingered at the back of his mind and
automatically continued to carry itself out, even when he was away from
home. This work filled his mind with a peculiar beauty so long as he was
engaged on it. A warm, blissful world was evoked by the sight of this
ten-kroner note, which shone ever more plainly out of the darkness and
swept all privations aside. When Pelle sat at this work his mind soared
above all oppression as though intoxicated; unhappy things no longer
existed for him. He became an optimist and mentally made Ellen all sorts
of costly presents.

It was all fundamentally so simple--it was only a misunderstanding--
nothing more! He must speak to her, and she would see at once what a
happy life they were going to live--if only they held out. Silence had
filled her with resentment. Fortune! Fortune! It was nearer than ever
now, greater and more splendid than on that other occasion when it had
knocked at their door! Why, he did not know--that did not seem very
clear!

But when he heard her step on the stairs his dream was shattered. He was
awake. He concealed his work, ashamed to think that she should come home
from work and find him at play.

At times he was oppressed by a feeling of the unattainable in his
relations with Ellen. Even to himself he could not explain the
contradiction between the constant longing for more ample and stable
conditions, for triumph and victory, and his impotency at home, where
his fortunes were declining. He wearied himself in trying to puzzle it
out, and he was seized by a desire that he might become indifferent to
the whole matter. He felt no inclination to drink, but none the less
something was working convulsively within him; a certain indifference as
to his own welfare, causing him to run risks, not caring whether he
might not commit some stupidity that would do him harm. And at such
times a voice cried loudly within him, especially when he was confronted
by the bitter utterances of want. "That is my old complaint," he
thought, and he became observant. In his childhood it had been a sort of
seizure; now it had become a voice.

XXXII

Early one morning Pelle wandered into the city. He had risen before
Ellen, in order to avoid the painfulness of sitting down to breakfast
with her. Ellen tried all sorts of ruses in order to give him a proper
breakfast, and it was not difficult to persuade his stomach; but
afterward he felt ashamed that he should have been cared for at the cost
of others; and cunning though he was too, he could not get the better of
her save by slipping away while she was still asleep.

His fasting condition endowed the city, and the whole of life, with a
curiously unsubstantial aspect. Before him lay a long day full of
terrific labors, and behind him was the fresh triumph of the day before.

As matters now stood, the employers in the iron industry had conceived
the cunning idea of founding a blackleg Union for smiths and mechanics,
and of giving it a name closely resembling that of the genuine Union.
Then they sent circulars to the men, stating that work would be resumed
on the following day. Many of the men were not accustomed to read, and
regarded the circular as an order from their own Union, while others
were enticed by the high wages offered by the new society. There was
great confusion among the workers of these trades. As soon as the trick
was exposed every respectable man drew back; but there was a great deal
of disappointment, and they felt horribly ashamed before their comrades.

Pelle was furious at this trick, which affected him more especially, as
the leader in open battle; he had suffered a defeat, and he meditated
revenge. In spite of all the efforts of the pickets, it was not possible
to procure a full list of the strikebreakers; his chagrin on this
account burned in his heart, like a shameful sense of impotency;
hitherto he had been noted for getting to the bottom of anything he
undertook! He resolved then and there to meet ruse with ruse. He set a
trap for his opponents, so that they themselves should deliver the
strikebreakers into his hands. One morning he published his list in
_The Working Man_ with the proud remark, "Look, the enemy has no
more!" Did the employers really fall into the trap, or was the fate of
the strike-breakers really indifferent to them? Next morning their organ
protested, and gave the number of the black-legs and their names into
the bargain!

This was a smack! A good one this; it brought a light to the thin,
impassive faces. There was an answer to the trick of the other day! This
Pelle was a deuce of a fellow! Three cheers for "Lightning Pelle!" Hip,
hip, hurrah!

Pelle was the deuce of a fellow as he strode along ruddy and full of
pugnacity, with the echoes from the side-streets and the tenement-houses
mingled with his own vigorous footsteps. Streets and houses were white
with the night's hoar frost, and overhead the air was full of a peculiar
glow that came from the city--a light flowing from hidden sources. He
had left all his cares at home; on every hand working-folk were greeting
him, and his greeting in return was like an inspiriting song. He did not
know them, but they knew him! The feeling that his work--however deep
the scars it might leave--was arousing gratitude, had an uplifting
effect upon him.

The city was in its morning mood. The lock-out lay like a paralyzing
hand upon everything; business was slack, and the middle classes were
complaining, but there was no prospect of peace; both sides were
irreconcilable. The workers had lost nothing through the rash cessation
of the masons. Sympathy for the lower classes had become a political
principle; and contributions were still pouring in from the country.
Considerable sums came from abroad. The campaign was now costing the
workers half a million kroner a week; and the help from outside was like
a drop in the ocean. But it had the effect of a moral support, and it
stimulated the self-taxation to which all were subject. The hundred
thousand households of the poor parted with their last possessions in
order to continue the struggle; they meant to force a decision that
should affect their whole future. The employers tried to hinder the
great National Federation by calling the attention of the authorities
to an ancient statute concerning mendicancy; but that merely aroused
merriment. A little laughter over such expedients was permissible.

The workers had become accustomed to starvation. They went no more into
the forest, but strolled thoughtfully through the streets like people
who have too much time on their hands, so that the city's face wore a
peculiar stamp of meditative poverty. Their loitering steps aroused no
echo, and in the houses the quietness gave one food for reflection. The
noisy, ever-hungry children were scattered over the face of the country
--they at least had plenty to eat. But the place was empty for the lack
of them!

Pelle met several squads of workers; they were on the way to the various
roll-calls. They raised their heads as he passed; his footsteps echoed
loudly enough for all! It was the hope and the will of forty thousand
men that passed there--Pelle was the expression of them all. They stared
at his indomitable figure, and drew themselves up. "A devil of a chap!"
they told one another joyfully; "he looks as if he could trample 'em all
underfoot! Look at him--he scarcely makes way for that great loaded
wagon! Long live Pelle, boys!"

The tavern-keepers stood on their cellar stairs gaping up at the morning
sky--this was a time of famine for them! In the tavern windows hung
cards with the inscription: "Contributions received here for the locked-
out workers!"

On the Queen Luise Bridge Pelle encountered a pale, fat little man in a
shabby coat. He had flabby features and a great red nose. "Good morning,
General!" cried Pelle gaily; the man made a condescending movement with
his hand. This was _The Working Man's_ man of straw; a sometime
capitalist, who for a small weekly wage was, as far as the public was
concerned, the responsible editor of the paper. He served various terms
of imprisonment for the paper, and for a further payment of five kroner
a week he also worked out in prison the fines inflicted on the paper.
When he was not in jail he kept himself alive by drinking. He suffered
from megalomania, and considered that he led the whole labor movement;
for which reason he could not bear Pelle.

In the great court-yard of _The Working Man_ building the dockers
were assembled to answer the roll. The president of their Union met
Pelle in the doorway; he was the very man whom Pelle and Howling Peter
had rescued down by the harbor--now he was working for the new ideas!

"Well, how goes it?" asked Pelle, shaking his hand.

"Splendid! A thousand men all but seven!"

"But where's the joyful Jacob? Is he ill?"

"He's in jail," replied the other gloomily. "He couldn't bear to see his
old folks starving--so he broke into a grocery, he and his brother--and
now they're both in prison."

For a moment the lines on Pelle's forehead were terribly deep and
gloomy; he stood gazing blindly into space; the radiant expression left
his countenance, which was filled with a pitying gravity. The docker
stared at him--was he going to sleep on his feet? But then he pulled
himself together.

"Well, comrades, are you finding the days too long?" he cried gaily.

"Ach, as for that! It's the first time one's had the time to get to know
one's own wife and children properly!" they replied. "But for all that
it would be fine to get busy again!"

It was obvious that idleness was at last beginning to depress them;
there was a peculiar pondering expression on their impassive features,
and their eyes turned to him with a persistent questioning. They asked
that this undertaking of his should be settled one way or the other.
They were not weakening; they always voted for the continuance of the
campaign, for that which they sought depended thereon; but they gazed
into his face for a look that might promise success.

He had to answer many singular questions; privation engendered in the
most fantastic ideas, which revealed the fact that their quiet,
controlled bearing was the product of the observation and the energy of
the many.

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