The maiden did not raise her eyes nor make the slightest movement, but she asked again to be taken into service. She desired neither board nor wages, she said, only to have a task to perform.
"No," said the hostess, "if my own daughter were as you are, I should refuse her this. I wish you a better lot than to be servant here."
The young maid went quietly up the steps, and the hostess stood watching her. She looked so small and helpless that the woman took pity on her.
She called her back and said to her: "Maybe you run greater risks if you wander alone about the streets and alleys than if you come to me. You may stay with me today and wash the cups and dishes, and then I shall see what you are fit for."
The hostess took her to a little closet she had contrived beyond the hall of the tavern. It was no bigger than a cupboard and had neither window nor loophole, but was only lighted by a hatch in the wall of the public room.
"Stand here today," said the hostess to the maid, "and wash me all the cups and dishes I pa.s.s you through this hatch, then I shall see whether I can keep you in my service."
The maiden went into the closet, and she moved so silently that the hostess thought it was like a dead woman slipping into her grave.
She stood the whole day and spoke to none, nor ever leaned her head through the hatch to look at the folk who came and went in the tavern. And she did not touch the food that was set before her. n.o.body heard her make a clatter as she washed, but whenever the hostess held out her hand to the hatch, she pa.s.sed out clean cups and dishes without a speck on them.
But when the hostess took them to set them out on the table, they were so cold that she thought they would sear the skin off her fingers. And she shuddered and said: "It is as though I took them from the cold hands of Death himself."
II
One day there had been no fish to clean on the quays, so that Elsalill had stayed at home. She sat at the spinning-wheel and was alone in the cottage. A good fire was burning on the hearth, and it was light enough in the room.
In the midst of her work she felt a light breath, as though a cold breeze had swept over her forehead. She looked up and saw her dead foster sister standing beside her.
Elsalill laid her hand on the wheel to stop it, and sat still, looking at her foster sister. At first she was afraid, but she thought to herself: "It is unworthy of me to be afraid of my foster sister. Whether she be dead or alive, I am still glad to see her."
"Dear sister," she said to the dead girl, "is there aught you would have me do?"
The other said to her in a voice that had neither strength nor tone: "My sister Elsalill, I am in service at the tavern, and the hostess has made me stand and wash cups and dishes all day. Now the evening is come and I am so tired that I can hold out no longer. I have come hither to ask if you will not give me your help."
When Elsalill heard this it was as though a veil was drawn over her mind. She could no longer think nor wonder nor feel any fear.
She only knew joy at seeing her foster sister again, and she answered: "Yes, dear sister, I will come straight and help you."
Then the dead girl went to the door, and Elsalill followed her.
But as they stood on the threshold her foster sister paused and said to Elsalill: "You must put on your cloak. There is a strong wind outside." And as she said this her voice sounded clearer and less m.u.f.fled than before.
Elsalill then took her cloak from the wall and wrapped it around her. She thought to herself: "My foster sister loves me still. She wishes me no evil. I am only happy that I may go with her wherever she may take me."
And then she followed the dead girl through many streets, all the way from Torarin"s cabin, which stood on a rocky slope, down to the level streets about the harbour and the market place.
The dead girl always walked two paces in front of Elsalill. A heavy gale was blowing that evening, howling through the streets, and Elsalill noticed that when a violent gust would have flung her against the wall, the dead girl placed herself between her and the wind and screened her as well as she could with her slender body.
When at last they came to the town hall the dead girl went down the cellar steps and beckoned Elsalill to follow her. But as they were going down the wind blew out the light in the lantern that hung in the lobby and they were in darkness. Then Elsalill did not know where to turn her steps and the dead girl had to put her hand on hers to lead her. But the dead girl"s hand was so cold that Elsalill started and began to quake with fear. Then the dead girl drew her hand away and wound it in a corner of Elsalill"s cloak before she led her on again. But Elsalill felt the icy chill through fur and lining.
Now the dead girl led Elsalill through a long corridor and opened a door for her. They came into a little dark closet where a feeble light fell through a hatch in the wall. Elsalill saw that they were in a room where the scullery wench stood and scoured cups and dishes for the hostess to set out on the tables for her customers.
Elsalill could just see that a pail of water stood upon a stool, and in the hatch were many cups and goblets that wanted rinsing.
"Will you help me with this work tonight, Elsalill?" said the dead girl.
"Yes, dear sister," said Elsalill, "you know I will help you with whatsoever you wish."
Elsalill then took off her cloak, rolled up her sleeves and began the work.
"Will you be very quiet and silent in here, Elsalill, so that the hostess may not know that I have found help?"
"Yes, dear sister," said Elsalill; "you may be sure I will."
"Then farewell, Elsalill," said the dead girl. "I have only one more thing to ask of you. And it is that you be not too angry with me for this thing."
"Wherefore do you bid me farewell?" said Elsalill. "I will gladly come every evening and help you."
"No, there is no need for you to come after this evening," said the dead girl. "I have good hope that tonight you will give me such help that my mission will now be ended."
As they spoke thus Elsalill was already leaning over her work. All was still for a while, but then she felt a light breath on her forehead, as when the dead girl had come to her in Torarin"s cabin. She looked up and saw that she was alone. Then she knew what it was that had felt like a faint breeze upon her face, and said to herself: "My dead foster sister has kissed my forehead before she parted from me."
Elsalill now turned to her work and finished it. She rinsed out all the bowls and tankards and dried them. Then she looked in the hatch whether any more had been set in there, and finding none she stood at the hatch and looked out into the tavern.
It was an hour of the day when there was usually little custom in the cellars. The hostess was absent from her bar and none of her tapsters was to be seen in the room. The place was empty, save for three men, who sat at the end of a long table. They were guests, but they seemed well at their ease, for one of them, who had emptied his tankard, went to the bar, filled it from one of the great tuns of ale and wine that stood there, and sat down again to drink.
Elsalill felt as though she had come here from a strange world.
Her thoughts were with her dead foster sister, and she could not clearly take in what she saw. It was a long while before she was aware that the three men at the table were well known and dear to her. For they who sat there were none other than Sir Archie and his two friends Sir Reginald and Sir Philip.
For some days past Sir Archie had not visited Elsalill, and she was glad to see him. She was on the point of calling to him that she was there at hand; but then the thought came to her, how strange it was that he had ceased to visit her, and she kept silence. "Maybe his fancy has turned to another," thought Elsalill. "Maybe it is of her he is thinking."
For Sir Archie sat a little apart from the others. He was silent and gazed steadily before him, without touching his drink. He took no part in the talk, and when his friends addressed a word to him, he was seldom at the pains to make them an answer.
Elsalill could hear that the others were trying to put life into him. They asked him why he had left drinking, and even sought to persuade him that he should go and talk with Elsalill and so recover his good humour.
"You are to pay no heed to me," said Sir Archie. "There is another that fills my thoughts. Still do I see her before me, and still do I hear the sound of her voice in my ears."
And then Elsalill saw that Sir Archie was gazing at one of the ma.s.sive pillars that upheld the cellar roof. She saw, too, what till then she had not marked, that her foster sister stood beside that pillar and looked upon Sir Archie. She stood there quite motionless in her gray habit, and it was not easy to discover her, as she stood so close against the pillar.
Elsalill stood quite still looking into the room. She noted that her foster sister kept her eyes raised when she looked upon Sir Archie. During the whole time she was with Elsalill she had walked with her eyes upon the ground.
Now her eyes were the only thing about her that was ghastly.
Elsalill saw that they were dim and filmed. They had no glance, and the light was not mirrored in them any more.
After a while Sir Archie began again to lament. "I see her every hour. She follows me wherever I go," he said.
He sat with his face toward the pillar where the dead girl stood, and stared at her. But Elsalill was sure that he did not see her.
It was not of her he spoke, but of one who was ever in his thoughts.
Elsalill never left the hatch and followed with her eyes all that took place, thinking that most of all she wished to find out who it was that filled Sir Archie"s thoughts.
Suddenly she was aware that the dead girl had taken her place on the bench beside Sir Archie and was whispering in his ear.
But still Sir Archie knew nothing of her being so close to him or of her whispering in his ear. He was only aware of her presence in the mortal dread that came over him.
Elsalill saw that when the dead girl had sat for a few moments whispering to Sir Archie, he hid his face in his hands and wept.
"Alas, would I had never found the maid!" he said. "I regret nothing else but that I did not let the maiden go when she begged me."