A Story from the Sand Dunes

The pulpit was carved. The sun shone brightly into the church, lighting up the polished brass chandelier and the little vessel that hung down from the roof. Jörgen was overwhelmed by the same pure, childlike feeling of devotion that had thrilled his soul when, a boy, he had stood in the rich Spanish cathedral. But here the feeling was different, for in this place he felt that he was one of the congregation.

After the sermon came the Communion, and when Jörgen knelt with the others to receive the consecrated bread and wine, he found that he was kneeling next to Miss Clara. But his thoughts were so raised to God and the Holy Sacrament that not until they rose did he realize that she had been his neighbor. Then he saw the salt tears rolling down her cheeks.

Two days later she sailed for Norway, and Jörgen went out to help on the farm and with the fishing; there were more fish to be caught there in those days than there are now. Shoals of mackerel shone brightly in the darkness of the night, thus betraying the course they were following. The sea robins snarled, and the crabs gave pitiful cries when they were caught; fish are not as voiceless as people say. Jörgen was more quiet than they; he kept his secret - and yet some day it would perhaps burst forth.

Every Sunday when he sat in church and his eyes rested on the picture of the Virgin Mother, they also paused a moment on the spot where Miss Clara had knelt beside him, and he thought of her and her kindness to him.

The autumn brought its rain and sleet. The water rose up in the town of Skagen, for the sand could not absorb it all; people had to wade through it, and sometimes even sail through the streets in boats. Snowstorms and sandstorms followed; ship after ship was wrecked on those fatal reefs; the sand whirled about and buried the houses until the occupants had to creep out through the chimneys. But that was not an unusual occurrence there. Indoors were comfort and warmth; the blazing and crackling fires were fed with peat or with dried wood from the wrecks, and Merchant Brönne read aloud from an old chronicle.