but they remembered that they were alwayshaving funerals at home. One after another they lost their brothers andsisters. At last it was very still and sad in the cabin.
The mother kept up some measure of courage, but the father was not a bitlike himself. He could no longer work nor jest, but sat from morningtill night, his head buried in his hands, and only brooded.
Once--that was after the third burial--the father had broken out intowild talk, which frightened the children. He said that he could notunderstand why such misfortunes should come upon them. They had done akindly thing in helping the sick woman. Could it be true, then, that theevil in this world was more powerful than the good?
The mother tried to reason with him, but she was unable to soothe him.
A few days later the eldest was stricken. She had always been thefather's favourite, so when he realized that she, too, must go, he fledfrom all the misery. The mother never said anything, but she thought itwas best for him to be away, as she feared that he might lose hisreason. He had brooded too long over this one idea: that God had alloweda wicked person to bring about so much evil.
After the father went away they became very poor. For awhile he sentthem money, but afterward things must have gone badly with him, for nomore came.
The day of the eldest daughter's burial the mother closed the cabin andleft home with the two remaining children, Osa and Mats. She went downto Skane to work in the beet fields, and found a place at the Jordbergasugar refinery. She was a good worker and had a cheerful and generousnature. Everybody liked her. Many were astonished because she could beso calm after all that she had passed through, but the mother was verystrong and patient. When any one spoke to her of her two sturdychildren, she only said: "I shall soon lose them also," without a quaverin her voice or a tear in her eye. She had accustomed herself to expectnothing else.
But it did not turn out as she feared. Instead, the sickness came uponherself. She had gone to Skane in the beginning of summer; before autumnshe was gone, and the children were left alone.
While their mother was ill she had often said to the children they mustremember that she never regretted having let the sick woman stop withthem. It was not hard to die when one had done right, she said, for thenone could go with a clear conscience.
Before the mother passed away, she tried to make some provision for herchildren. She asked the people with whom she lived to let them remain inthe room which she had occupied. If the children only had a shelter theywould not become a burden to any one. She knew that they could take careof themselves.
Osa and Mats were allowed to keep the room on condition that they wouldtend the geese, as it was always hard to find children willing to dothat work. It turned out as the mother expected: they did maintainthemselves. The girl made candy, and the boy carved wooden toys, whichthey sold at the farm houses. They had a talent for trading and soonbegan buying eggs and butter from the farmers, which they sold to theworkers at the sugar refinery. Osa was the older, and, by the time shewas thirteen, she was as responsible as a grown woman. She was quiet andserious, while Mats was lively and talkative. His sister used to say tohim that he could outcackle the geese.
When the children had been at Jordberga for two years, there was alecture given one evening at the schoolhouse. Evidently it was meant forgrown-ups, but the two Smaland children were in the audience. They didnot regard themselves as children, and few persons thought of them assuch. The lecturer talked about the dread disease called the WhitePlague, which every year carried off so many people in Sweden. He spokevery plainly and the children understood every word.
After the lecture they waited outside the schoolhouse. When the lecturercame out they took hold of hands and walked gravely up to him, asking ifthey might speak to him.
The stranger must have wondered at the two rosy, baby-faced childrenstanding there talking with an earnestness more in keeping with peoplethrice their age; but he listened graciously to them. They related whathad happened in their home, and asked the lecturer if he thought theirmother and their sisters and brothers had died of the sickness he haddescribed.
"Very likely," he answered. "It could hardly have been any otherdisease."
If only the mother and father had known what the children learned thatevening, they might have protected themselves. If they had burned theclothing of the vagabond woman; if they had scoured and aired the cabinand had not used the old bedding, all whom the children mourned mighthave been living yet. The lecturer said he could not say positively, buthe believed that none of their dear ones would have been sick had theyunderstood how to guard against the infection.
Osa and Mats waited awhile before putting the next question, for thatwas the most important of all. It was not true then that the gipsy womanhad sent the sickness because they had befriended the one with whom shewas angry. It was not something special that had stricken only them. Thelecturer assured them that no person had the power to bring sicknessupon another in that way.
Thereupon the children thanked him and went to their room. They talkeduntil late that night.
The next day they gave notice that they could not tend geese anotheryear, but must go elsewhere. Where were they going? Why, to try to findtheir father. They must tell him that their mother and the otherchildren had died of a common ailment and not something special broughtupon them by an angry person. They were very glad that they had foundout about this. Now it was their duty to tell their father of it, forprobably he was still trying to solve the mystery.
Osa and Mats set out for their old home on the heath. When they arrivedthey were shocked to find the little cabin in flames. They went to theparsonage and there they learned that a railroad workman had seen theirfather at Malmberget, far up in Lapland. He had been working in a mineand possibly was still there. When the clergyman heard that the childrenwanted to go in search of their father he brought forth a map and showedthem how far it was to Malmberget and tried to dissuade them from makingthe journey, but the children insisted that they must find their father.He had left home believing something that was not true. They must findhim and tell him that it was all a mistake.
They did not want to spend their little savings buying railway tickets,therefore they decided to go all the way on foot, which they neverregretted, as it proved to be a remarkably beautiful journey.
Before they were out of Smaland, they stopped at a farm house to buyfood. The housewife was a kind, motherly soul who took an interest inthe children. She asked them who they were and where they came from, andthey told her their story. "Dear, dear! Dear, dear!" she interpolatedtime and again when they were speaking. Later she petted the childrenand stuffed them with all kinds of goodies, for which she would notaccept a penny. When they rose to thank her and go, the woman asked themto stop at her brother's farm in the next township. Of course thechildren were delighted.
"Give him my greetings and tell him what has happened to you," said thepeasant woman.
This the children did and were well treated. From every farm after thatit was always: "If you happen to go in such and such a direction, stopthere or there and tell them what has happened to you."
In every farm house to which they were sent there was always aconsumptive. So Osa and Mats went through the country unconsciouslyteaching the people how to combat that dreadful disease.
Long, long ago, when the black plague was ravaging the country, 'twassaid that a boy and a girl were seen wandering from house to house. Theboy carried a rake, and if he stopped and raked in front of a house, itmeant that there many should die, but not all; for the rake has coarseteeth and does not take everything with it. The girl carried a broom,and if she came along and swept before a door, it meant that all wholived within must die; for the broom is an implement that makes a cleansweep.
It seems quite remarkable that in our time two children should wanderthrough the land because of a cruel sickness. But these children did notfrighten people with the rake and the broom. They said rather: "We willnot content ourselves with merely raking the
yard and sweeping thefloors, we will use mop and brush, water and soap. We will keep cleaninside and outside of the door and we ourselves will be clean in bothmind and body. In this way we will conquer the sickness."
One day, while still in Lapland, Akka took the boy to Malmberget, wherethey discovered little Mats lying unconscious at the mouth of the pit.He and Osa had arrived there a short time before. That morning he hadbeen roaming about, hoping to come across his father. He had venturedtoo near the shaft and been hurt by flying rocks after the setting offof a blast.
Thumbietot ran to the edge of the shaft and called down to the minersthat a little boy was injured.
Immediately a number of labourers came rushing up to little Mats. Two ofthem carried him to the hut where he and Osa were staying. They did allthey could to save him, but it was too late.
Thumbietot felt so sorry for poor Osa. He wanted to help and comforther; but he knew that if he were to go to her now, he would onlyfrighten
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