第14章 THE WOMAN OF THE SAETER.(3)

"Forgive me if I am telling you what you know,but a 'saeter'is the name given to the upland pastures to which,during the summer,are sent the cattle,generally under the charge of one or more of the maids.Here for three months these girls will live in their lonely huts,entirely shut off from the world.Customs change little in this land.Two or three such stations are within climbing distance of this house,at this day,looked after by the farmers'daughters,as in the days of Hund,'maker of runes.'

"Every night,by devious mountain paths,the woman would come and tap lightly at Hund's door.Hund had built himself two cabins,one behind the other (these are now,as I think I have explained to you,connected by a passage);the smaller one was the homestead;in the other he carved and wrote,so that while the young wife slept the 'maker of runes'and the saeter woman sat whispering.

"One night,however,the wife learnt all things,but said no word.

Then,as now,the ravine in front of the enclosure was crossed by a slight bridge of planks,and over this bridge the woman of the saeter passed and repassed each night.On a day when Hund had gone down to fish in the fiord,the wife took an axe,and hacked and hewed at the bridge,yet it still looked firm and solid;and that night,as Hund sat waiting in his workshop,there struck upon his ears a piercing cry,and a crashing of logs and rolling rock,and then again the dull roaring of the torrent far below.

"But the woman did not die unavenged;for that winter a man,skating far down the fiord,noticed a curious object embedded in the ice;and when,stooping,he looked closer,he saw two corpses,one gripping the other by the throat,and the bodies were the bodies of Hund and his young wife.

"Since then,they say,the woman of the saeter haunts Hund's house,and if she sees a light within she taps upon the door,and no man may keep her out.Many,at different times,have tried to occupy the house,but strange tales are told of them.'Men do not live at Hund's saeter,'said my old grey-haired friend,concluding his tale,--'they die there.'

"I have persuaded some of the braver of the villagers to bring what provisions and other necessaries we require up to a plateau about a mile from the house and leave them there.That is the most I have been able to do.It comes somewhat as a shock to one to find men and women--fairly educated and intelligent as many of them are--slaves to fears that one would expect a child to laugh at.But there is no reasoning with superstition."Extract from the same letter,but from a part seemingly written a day or two later:

"At home I should have forgotten such a tale an hour after I had heard it,but these mountain fastnesses seem strangely fit to be the last stronghold of the supernatural.The woman haunts me already.

At night instead of working,I find myself listening for her tapping at the door;and yesterday an incident occurred that makes me fear for my own common sense.I had gone out for a long walk alone,and the twilight was thickening into darkness as I neared home.Suddenly looking up from my reverie,I saw,standing on a knoll the other side of the ravine,the figure of a woman.She held a cloak about her head,and I could not see her face.I took off my cap,and called out a good-night to her,but she never moved or spoke.Then--God knows why,for my brain was full of other thoughts at the time--a clammy chill crept over me,and my tongue grew dry and parched.Istood rooted to the spot,staring at her across the yawning gorge that divided us;and slowly she moved away,and passed into the gloom,and I continued my way.I have said nothing to Muriel,and shall not.The effect the story has had upon myself warns me not to do so."From a letter dated eleven days later:

"She has come.I have known she would,since that evening I saw her on the mountain;and last night she came,and we have sat and looked into each other's eyes.You will say,of course,that I am mad--that I have not recovered from my fever--that I have been working too hard--that I have heard a foolish tale,and that it has filled my overstrung brain with foolish fancies:I have told myself all that.

But the thing came,nevertheless--a creature of flesh and blood?a creature of air?a creature of my own imagination?--what matter?it was real to me.

"It came last night,as I sat working,alone.Each night I have waited for it,listened for it--longed for it,I know now.I heard the passing of its feet upon the bridge,the tapping of its hand upon the door,three times--tap,tap,tap.I felt my loins grow cold,and a pricking pain about my head;and I gripped my chair with both hands,and waited,and again there came the tapping--tap,tap,tap.

I rose and slipped the bolt of the door leading to the other room,and again I waited,and again there came the tapping--tap,tap,tap.

Then I opened the heavy outer door,and the wind rushed past me,scattering my papers,and the woman entered in,and I closed the door behind her.She threw her hood back from her head,and unwound a kerchief from about her neck,and laid it on the table.Then she crossed and sat before the fire,and I noticed her bare feet were damp with the night dew.

"I stood over against her and gazed at her,and she smiled at me--a strange,wicked smile,but I could have laid my soul at her feet.

She never spoke or moved,and neither did I feel the need of spoken words,for I understood the meaning of those upon the Mount when they said,'Let us make here tabernacles:it is good for us to be here.'

"How long a time passed thus I do not know,but suddenly the woman held her hand up,listening,and there came a faint sound from the other room.Then swiftly she drew her hood about her face and passed out,closing the door softly behind her;and I drew back the bolt of the inner door and waited,and hearing nothing more,sat down,and must have fallen asleep in my chair.