Mårbacka/Postscript
It was the Seventeenth of August, year 1919.
I had had a wreath bound, the prettiest that could be made up at Mårbacka, and with this before me in the victoria, I drove to the church. I was in holiday attire, the victoria shone with a new coat of varnish, and the horses were in their best harness.
It was a perfect day. The earth lay bathed in sunshine, the air was mild, and across the pale blue sky floated a few white wisps of cloud. Not the slightest breeze blew from any direction. It was a Sunday, and I saw little children in holiday dress playing in the yards, and grown folk in their Sunday best setting off for church. No cows or sheep or chickens were seen in the road, as on weekdays, when the victoria passed through the village of Äs.
The crop that year was so abundant, it seemed as if the good old times were back with us again. The haylofts along the way were so full, shutters and doors could not be closed; the rye fields were decked with close rows of shooks; the apple trees in the front yards hung heavy with reddening fruit, and the fallow fields, newly sown, showed a tender crop just turning green.
I sat thinking that here was something Lieutenant Lagerlöf—whose centenary it was that day—would have liked to see. Here was prosperity. It was not as in 1918 and 1917 and 1915 and 1914 and 1911—those dreadful years of drouth! How he would have rejoiced at this! He would have nodded to himself, and averred that nowhere in all Värmland could they raise such crops as in his parish.
During the whole long drive to the church, my father was in my thoughts. On this very road he had driven many and many a time. I pictured with what keen interest he would have noted all the changes. Every house which had been repainted, every new window, every roof where tiling had replaced the old shingles, he would have pointed out and commented upon. The cottage Där Fram at Äs, which had remained unaltered, would have delighted him; but he would have been sorry to find Jan Larsson's old house—the finest in the parish in his time—torn down.
Certainly he had never been opposed to changes and improvements, though there were some time-honoured things he had wished to leave undisturbed. Were he here now, he would think us a shiftless lot to have in this day and age the old crooked, sagging fences that were here in his time. He would be shocked to find the road ditches still choked with weeds, the bridges weak and full of holes, and the dung-yards still lying at the edge of the road.
When I came to the crossing where the village road runs into the great highway, how I wished I might have pointed out to him the fine health resort among the hills, and told him that Äs Springs were now visited every year by hundreds of people. It would have gladdened him to know that his idea—that this would some day be a popular watering-place—had not been so far afield. I could have wished he were beside me in the carriage as I drove across the Ämtan Bridge! It would have been a joy to show him that the river had at last been dredged, and now ran in a straight course, no longer overflowing its banks.
As I drove by the Ostenby school, I seemed to see him standing on the playground scattering handfuls of pennies—happy and content as always, when he had a crowd of children about him. I had heard him say, time and time again, that popular education was a calamity, and would bring us to ruin. But all the same, on every examination day, he would drive down to the school to sit for hours while his good friend Melanoz quizzed the children in catechism and history, and let them show how clever they were at arithmetic and composition. I doubt whether there was any one more pleased than he when the youngsters gave correct answers and got good marks and prizes. I had often wondered at this; but now I understand that where children were concerned, all prejudice was thrown to the winds.
I remembered how it had been in the old days when we drove into the church grove. We were hailed with cheery salutations as folk sprang aside to let our carriage pass, and father sat smiling and raising his hand to the brim of his hat. But when I drove in on the same ground, the place looked so empty and deserted.
I was alone in the carriage, and among all who had come to the church only I remembered that this was my father's birthday. I stepped out and went over to the churchyard to place the wreath. My sad heart wept over my loved ones who lay sleeping there. Father and Mother, Grandmother, Aunt Lovisa, and the old housekeeper—I had seen them all laid away.
I longed for them, I wished they might come back and dwell in that Mårbacka which their labours had built up.
But still, silent, inaccessible, they slept on. They seemed not to hear me. Yet, perhaps they did. Perhaps these recollections, which have hovered round me the last few years, were sent forth by them. I do not know, but I love to think so.
The End