CHRISTMAS MORN
Christmas morning Jan took the little girl along with him to church; she was then just one year and four months old.
Katrina thought the girl rather young to attend church and feared she would set up a howl, as she had done at the vaccination bee; but inasmuch as it was the custom to take the little ones along to Christmas Matins, Jan had his own way.
So at five o'clock on Christmas Morn they all set out. It was pitch dark and cloudy, but not cold; in fact the air was almost balmy, and quite still, as it usually is toward the end of December.
Before coming to an open highway, they had to walk along a narrow winding path, through fields and groves in the Ashdales, then take the steep winter-road across Snipa Ridge.
The big farmhouse at Falla, with lighted candles at every window, stood out as a beacon to the Ruffluck folk, so that they were able to find their way to Börje's hut; there they met some of their neighbours, bearing torches they had prepared on Christmas Eve. Each torch-bearer led a small group of people most of whom followed in silence; but all were happy; they felt that they, too, like the Wise Men of old, were following a star, in quest of the new-born King.
When they came to the forest heights they had to pass by a huge stone which had been hurled at Svartsjö Church, by a giant down in Frykerud, but which, luckily, had gone over the steeple and dropped here on Snipa Ridge. When the church-goers came along, the stone lay, as usual, on the ground. But they knew, they did, that in the night it had been raised upon twelve golden pillars and that the trolls had danced and feasted under it.
It was not so very pleasant to have to walk past a stone like that! Jan looked over at Katrina to see whether she was holding the little girl securely. Katrina, calm and unconcerned, walked along, chatting with one of their neighbours. She was quite oblivious, apparently, to the terrors of the place.
The spruce trees up there were old and gnarled, and their branches were dotted with clumps of snow. As seen in the glow of the torch light, one could not but think that some of the trees were really trolls, with gleaming eyes beneath snow hats, and long sharp claws protruding from thick snow mittens.
It was all very well so long as they held themselves still. But what if one of them should suddenly stretch forth a hand and seize somebody? There was no special danger for grown-ups and old people; but Jan had always heard that the trolls had a great fondness for small children—the smaller the better. It seemed to him that Katrina was holding the little girl very carelessly. It would be no trick at all for the huge clawlike troll hands to snatch the child from her. Of course he could not take the baby out of her arms in a dangerous spot like this, for that might cause the trolls to act.
Murmurs and whispers now passed from tree-troll to tree-troll; the branches creaked as if they were about to bestir themselves.
Jan did not dare ask the others if they saw or heard what he did. A question of that sort might be the very thing to rouse the trolls. In this agony of suspense he knew of but one thing to do: he struck up a psalm-tune. He had a poor singing-voice and had never before sung so any one could hear him. He was so weak at carrying a tune that he was afraid to sing out even in church; but now he had to sing, no matter how it went. He observed that the neighbours were a little surprised. Those who walked ahead of him nudged each other and looked round; but that did not stop him; he had to continue.
Immediately one of the womenfolk whispered to him: "Wait a bit,
Jan, and I'll help you."
She took up the Christmas carol in the correct melody and the correct key. It sounded beautiful, this singing in the night among the trees, and soon everybody joined in.
"Hail Blessed Morn, by prophets' holy words foretold," rang out on the air. A murmur of anguish came from the tree-trolls; they bowed their heads so that their wicked eyes were no longer visible, and drew in their claws under spruce needles and snow. When the last measure of the first stanza died away, no one could have told that there was anything besides ordinary old spruce trees on the forest heights.
The torches that had lighted the Ashdales folk through the woods were burned out when they came to the highroad; but here they went on, guided by the lights from peasant huts. When one house was out of sight, they glimpsed another in the distance, and every house along the road had candles burning at all the windows, to guide the poor wanderers on their way to church.
At last they came to a hillock, from which the church could be seen. There stood the House of God, like acme gigantic lantern, light streaming out through all Its windows. When the foot-farers saw this, they held their breath. After all the little, low-windowed huts they had passed along the way, the church looked marvellously big and marvellously bright.
At sight of the sacred edifice Jan fell to thinking about some poor folk in Palestine, who had wandered in the night from Bethlehem to Jerusalem with a child, their only comfort and joy, who was to be circumcised in the Temple of the Holy City. These parents had to grope their way in the darkness of night, for there were many who sought the life of their child.
The people from the Ashdales had left home at an surly hour, so as to reach the church ahead of those who drove thither. But when they were quite near the church grounds, sleighs, with foaming horses and jingling bells, went flying past, forcing the poor foot-farers to fake to the snow banks, at the edge of the road.
Jan now carried the child. He was continually dodging vehicles, for the tramp along the road had become very difficult. But before them lay the shining temple; if they could only get to it they would be sheltered, and safe from harm.
Suddenly, from behind, there came a deafening noise of clanging bells and clamping hoofs. A huge sledge, drawn by two horses, was coming. On the front seat sat a young gentleman, in a fur coat and a high fur cap, and his young wife. The gentleman was driving; behind him stood his coachman, holding a burning torch so high that the draft blew the flame backward, leaving in its wake a long trail of smoke and flying sparks.
Jan, with the child in his arms, stood at the edge of the snowbank. All at once his foot sank deep in the snow, and he came near falling. Quickly the gentleman in the sledge drew rein and shouted to the peasant, whom he had forced from the road:
"Hand over the child and it shall ride to the church with us. It's risky carrying a little baby when there are so many teams out."
"Much obliged to you," said Jan Anderson, "but I can get along all right."
"We'll put the little girl between us, Jan," said the young wife.
"Thanks," he returned, "but you needn't trouble yourselves!"
"So you're afraid to trust us with the child?" laughed the man in the sledge, and drove on.
The foot-farers trudged along under ever-increasing difficulties. Sledge followed sledge. Every horse in the parish was in harness that Christmas morning.
"You might have let him take the girl," said Katrina. "I'm afraid you'll fall with her!"
"What, I let him have my child? What are you thinking of, woman! Didn't you see who he was?"
"What harm would there have been in letting her ride with the superintendent of the ironworks?"
Jan
