The Wonderful Music
The long train from the north rolled on unceasingly from station to station. Those in the compartment where Lotta Hedman sat gradually got out: first the peasant and his wife, then the kindly woman who had got her to speak at first of who and what she was. Then there entered a man, who, by the look of him, might have been a lay preacher of some sort, and sat down in the comfortable corner. He had been in another part of the train before, and came now to find a better seat.
The newcomer at once entered into conversation with Lotta. He asked her whether any revelations had come to her before the time of the war, or if it was only since its beginning that she had been aware of her gift. He spoke in low tones, with a soft, gentle, and very winning voice, exhibiting the warmest interest, without either expressing doubt or faith. To others, his manner of speaking might seem irritating in its extreme humility, but Lotta Hedman was pleased to be addressed with some measure of respect, now that she had for the first time shown herself among strangers and revealed her calling.
“I should be glad indeed if you would tell me something about your visions,” said the man. “It is too much to ask, perhaps, seeing that I am a stranger to you, but be sure I should feel it a great honour.”
The young woman could not resist such an appeal, and began at once to tell about the first time she had noticed anything strange. But she spoke now with far greater calm than before. True, she raised her voice, and found also more listeners than the one directly addressed, but the man before her seemed unwittingly to exert a calming influence, and her eagerness was restrained.
“I was only fourteen at the time,” she said, “and was just recovering from a serious illness that had been sent by my persecutor Death; I was very weak, and all my body felt as if it were withering and falling to nothing. But I did not live alone then, as I do now; I lived at home with my father and mother. And they were only poor peasant folk, but they cared for me in my weakness, and let me stay at home, instead of sending me out to service among strangers. And Mother asked no more of me than that I should help her with light work and errands, and read aloud a chapter of the Bible every day.
“There was no sawmill at Stenbroträsk in those days, and no box factory, and no workmen’s dwellings, nor even the beginning of a settlement. All our side of the river there were no houses beyond a couple of small farmsteads. The church and the Deanery and the big farms were all over on the other side, just as they are now.
“Then, one Sunday evening, Mother told me to row over with some milk to the Deanery, for it was summer time, and everyone there had their cows out at a distance for months together, and they could not get milk nearer than from us.
“I got into the boat, and started to row across, and it was all so easy and light of a sudden. As if the heavy boat was turned to the lightest little thing, and the water changed to smooth, fine oil, and the oars to delicate wings. And everything was very quiet and still. The oars did not creak in the rowlocks, nor splash in the water, and there was no sound from either shore. Not so much as a cow-bell anywhere. No men and girls sitting talking on the banks, and all the swallows that always used to build in the high banks and were always fluttering and flying about outside their holes, they seemed to be gone all at once, and never a sign of them.
“And when I had rowed across, and taken the milk and started up to walk to the Deanery, it wasn’t hard walking at all, though it was uphill all the way, and I had the sun right in my face. The sun didn’t seem hot in the least, and the milk wasn’t heavy at all.
“And I thought to myself they must be waiting eagerly for me, and it must mean something good for me somehow; for I had never found it so easy to get over there before.
“And then when I came into the kitchen, it was all quiet there too, and not a soul to be seen that I could give the milk to, so I had to stay waiting at the door.
“And then, almost as soon as I came in, I heard someone playing in one of the rooms above, and I could hear it so clearly I almost fancied it must be in the same room where I stood. And it was so beautiful, I was glad the housekeeper and the maid were not there, so I could stay quietly and listen. I was in no hurry to go now—I could have stood there the whole night and not wanted to go.
“At that time I’d never heard any sort of music but a harmonica and the old church organ at Stenbroträsk, and I wondered so much what fine instrument it could be that was playing now. And it wasn’t any sort of tune I knew. Just long-drawn tones like a strong soughing of the wind, and full of sound, and so clear, it felt as if they stroked my cheek so gently, passing by.
“And I had such lovely, splendid thoughts as I listened. I felt as if I were freed from earth, and half-way up to God’s heaven.
“Then someone came into the kitchen, and suddenly the wonderful music stopped.
“When the housekeeper had poured off the milk, she set out something to eat for me on the table, and told me to sit down. They had had a funeral that day, she said; it was the old lady that was dead, the Dean’s mother, and they had had guests to dinner. And I was to have a little of the good things, she said.
“And because she was so kind and nice, I took courage, and asked who it could be that had played so beautifully up above.
“But the housekeeper, she was so astonished, she could hardly speak.
“‘What’s that you’re saying, child? You can’t have heard anybody playing up above. The piano’s at the other end of the house, and we can’t hear it out in the kitchen. And you can think for yourself there’s no one likely to be playing music here the day old mistress is laid to rest!’
“Then nobody said anything for a time. I knew, of course, that I had heard what I had heard, but I didn’t like to contradict.
“And the housekeeper, she sort of thought it over to herself a little, and then she began again trying to put me right.
“‘It’s old mistress’s room that’s here above the kitchen,’ she said, ‘and the last place in the world any one would ever think of playing music this day.’
“The tears came into my eyes then, for I knew she thought I had been telling untruth. And I felt like running away at once, only it would look so strange to run off before I’d finished what she’d given me.
“And then, what do you think? Just as I was sitting there wishing myself a hundred miles off, the door opens, and the Dean himself looks in and asks hadn’t they heard the bell for evening prayers?
“And they were abashed at that and made excuses.
“‘It’s Lotta Hedman there; she frightened us so we forgot everything else. She says she came into the kitchen a little while back, when there was nobody here, and hears someone playing music up above. And we can’t make it out, for we know surely enough there’s no one here would play a note the day of the funeral.’
“And I, poor thing, being pointed out like that, I didn’t know what to do with myself. I set down my knife and fork and pushed away my plate, and was just getting ready to run out of the door.
“‘Music?’ says the Dean. ‘Now let us all give thanks to God. This is a wonderful act of grace indeed. I knew well that my dear mother would send a greeting if it were in her power. She would not leave me for all eternity without a sign to be a guidance to me living on in darkness and uncertainty.’
“And he came up to me and laid his hand on my head.
“‘So you are one of the chosen,’ he said. ‘One of those appointed to bring tidings from the dead to the living. Well, well, it may be that God Himself will speak one day through you on earth.’
“And he said no more, only turned my face upward and looked deep into my eyes, and sighed, and went away.
“But when I rowed back across the water, I sat thinking of all that had happened that day. And I felt that in some strange way I was changed now, and could never be the same again.
“And that was the first time anything wonderful ever happened to me; the first time I found that I was appointed to see and hear things that are hidden from the wise and learned.
“And already I believed I was to be one of the prophets of the Lord, such as I had read of in Holy Writ. I believed I should one day utter forth words that should endure as long at heaven and earth. I believed I was to be exalted among mankind, and never dreamed that I should come to be only a poor working girl in a factory.”