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And now all she thought of was making money out of her shame! He cautiously withdrew into the stable, so as not to be an eye-witness to anything, and peered out from there. The Sow went up and down in front of the windows, and called in a thick voice, over which she had not full command: "Kongstrup, Kongstrup! Come out and let me speak to you.
"Oh, very well! But then we can't do anything about it either." "I may just as well tell you," Lasse interrupted. "He called me Madam Olsen's concubine from the Bible story, I suppose." Kongstrup tried to suppress a chuckle, as if some one had whispered a coarse joke in his ear, and he could not help it. The mistress herself was serious enough.
They winked at one another. "Are you really a farmer chap?" "Yes, truly," replied Pelle, perplexed; they had spoken the word in a tone which he now remarked. They all burst out laughing: "He confesses it himself. And he comes from the biggest farm in the country. Then he's the biggest farmer in the country!" "No, the farmer was called Kongstrup," said Pelle emphatically. "I was only the herd-boy."
It was useless nonsense, and the farmer would probably be angry if he came into the stable and happened to see them. Lasse had every now and then to throw cow-dung over the most conspicuous drawings, so that they should not catch the eye of people for whom they were not intended. Up at the house, Kongstrup was just going in, leaning on his wife's arm. He looked pale but by no means thin.
He quite filled the stable doorway. Lasse put down his fork and hastened in in case he was wanted. "Well, how are you getting on, old man?" asked the farmer kindly. "Can you manage the work?" "Oh, yes, I get through it," answered Lasse; "but that's about all. It's a lot of animals for one man." Kongstrup stood feeling the hind quarters of a cow. "You've got the boy to help you, Lasse.
Otherwise the days passed as usual, and Fru Kongstrup was continually giving herself up to little drinking-bouts and to grief. At such times she would weep over her wasted life; and if he were at home would follow him with her accusations from room to room, until he would order the carriage and take flight, even in the middle of the night.
So he went about boasting that I'd run away from home for his sake, and the other thing that was a lie; so they all thought they could do what they liked with me. Kongstrup was just married then, but he was no better than the others. I'd got the place quite by chance, because the other housemaid had had to go away somewhere to lie in; so I was awfully careful.
"Go you across, Mons, and get the girls to make a mustard- plaster that we can stick on the pit of his stomach; that's where the pain is." When Mons came back with the plaster, they went up in a procession to put it on, the farmer himself leading. Kongstrup was well aware of the bailiff's angry looks, which plainly said, "Another waste of work for the sake of a foolish prank!"
Pelle went up hesitatingly. He was not sure of her and all the men were out in the fields. Fru Kongstrup lay upon the sofa in her husband's study, which she always occupied, day or night, when her husband was out. She had a wet towel over her forehead, and her whole face was red with weeping. "Come here!" she said, in a low voice. "You aren't afraid of me, are you?"
There was a tempting development of power in the thought. But the uprightness in him triumphed. He had always kept to the one, as the Scriptures commanded, and he would continue to do so. The other thing was only for the great Abraham, of whom Pelle had begun to tell him, and Kongstrup.
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