get rid of, if we only knew someone who would have it. You are the only one that knows of anybody. You know a poor boy who would dance for joy if he got some beer-soup. You know hundreds. But you won't tell us their names or where they live."
"Why, what do you mean?"
"And you yourself sit quite calmly eating two whole helpings, though you know quite well that you're going to have an omelette to follow. That's really very naughty of you, Aunt Anna."
Aunt Anna chokes with annoyance. My little boy locks his teeth with a snap and looks with every mark of disgust at that wicked old woman.
And I turn with calm earnestness to his mother and say:
"After this, it would be most improper for us ever to have beer-soup here again. We don't care for it and there are hundreds of little boys who love it. If it must be made, then Aunt Anna must come every Saturday and fetch it. She knows where the boys live."
The omelette is eaten in silence, after which Aunt Anna shakes the dust from her shoes. She won't have any coffee today.
While she is standing in the hall and putting on her endless wraps, a last doubt arises in my little boy's soul. He opens his green eyes wide before her face and whispers:
"Aunt Anna, where do the boys live?"
Aunt Anna pinches him and is shocked and goes off, having suffered a greater defeat than she can ever repair.
V
My little boy comes into my room and tells me, with a very long face, that Jean is dead. And we put all nonsense on one side and hurry away to the Klampenborg train, to go where Jean is.
For Jean is the biggest dog that has lived for some time.
He once bit a boy so hard that the boy still walks lame. He once bit his own master. He could give such a look out of his eyes and open such a mouth that there was no more horrible sight in the world. And then he would be the mildest of the mild: my little boy could put his hand in his mouth and ride on his back and pull his tail.
When we get there, we hear that Jean is already buried.
We look at each other in dismay, to think how quickly that happens! And we go to the grave, which is in the grounds of the factory, where the tall chimneys stand.
We sit down and can't understand it.
We tell each other all the stories that we know of Jean's wonderful size and strength. The one remembers this, the other that. And, as each story is told, the whole thing becomes only more awful and obscure.
At last we go home by train.
Besides ourselves, there is a kind old gentleman in the compartment, who would like to make friends with my little boy. But the boy has nothing to talk about to the kind old gentleman. He stands at the window, which comes just under his chin, and stares out.
His eyes light upon some tall chimneys:
"That's where Jean is buried," he says.
"Yes."
The landscape flies past. He can think only of that and see only that and, when some more chimneys appear, he says again:
"That's where Jean is buried."
"No, my little friend," says the kind old gentleman. "That was over there."
The boy looks at him with surprise. I hasten to reassure him:
"Those are Jean's chimneys," I say.
And, while he is looking out again, I take the old gentleman to the further corner of the compartment and tell him the state of the case.
I tell him that, if I live, I hope, in years to come, to explain to the boy the difference between Petersen's and Hansen's factories and, should I die, I will confidently leave that part of his education to others. Yes, even if he should never learn this difference, I would still be resigned. Today it is a question of other and more important matters. The strongest, the most living thing he knew is dead..
"Really?" says the old gentleman, sympathetically. "A relation, perhaps?"
"Yes," I say. "Jean is dead, a dog.."
"A dog?"
"It is not because of the dog– don't you understand? – but of death, which he sees for the first time: death, with all its might, its mystery.."
"Father," says my little boy and turns his head towards us. "When do we die?"
"When we grow old," says the kind old gentleman.
"No," says the boy. "Einar has a brother, at home, in the courtyard, and he is dead. And he was only a little boy."
"Then Einar's brother was so good and learnt such a lot that he was already fit to go to Heaven," says the old gentleman.
"Mind you don't become too good," I say and laugh and tap my little boy in the stomach.
And my little boy laughs too and goes back to his window, where new chimneys rise over Jean's grave.
But I take the old gentleman by the shoulders and forbid him most strictly to talk to my little boy again. I give up trying to make him understand me. I just shake him. He eyes the communication-cord and, when we reach the station, hurries away.
I go with my little boy, holding his hand, through the streets full of live people. In the evening, I sit on the edge of his bed and talk with him about that incomprehensible thing: Jean, who is dead; Jean, who was so much alive, so strong, so big..
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