It was strange to observe Caesar’s behaviour during this conversation. He had been wide awake the whole time before, but now, when Jarro turned to him, he yawned, put his long nose on his front paws and was sound asleep within a moment.
The cat looked down at Caesar with a knowing smile. ‘I think that Caesar does not care to answer you,’ she said to Jarro. ‘He is just like all other dogs; they never want to admit that humans can do anything unjust. But you can count on my word in any event. I will tell you why they want to drain the lake right now. As long as you mallards still have possession of Tåkern they did not want to empty it, because they still had some benefit from you. But now divers and coots and other inedible birds have encroached on just about all the clumps of reeds, and the humans don’t think they need to maintain the lake for their sake.’
Jarro did not bother to answer Klorina, but he raised his head and shouted in Caesar’s ear, ‘Caesar! You know that on Tåkern there are still so many ducks that they fill the air like clouds. Say it isn’t true that the humans intend to make all of them homeless!’
With this, Caesar got up and made such a violent attack on Klorina that she had to escape up to a shelf. ‘I’ll teach you to keep quiet when I want to sleep!’ Caesar roared. ‘Of course, I know that there is talk about draining the water out of the lake this year. But this has been talked about many times before, without anything coming of it. And this draining is a thing I don’t like. For what would happen to the hunting if Tåkern is drained? You are an ass to be happy about such a thing. What are you and I going to amuse ourselves with when there are no longer any birds on Tåkern?’
THE DECOY
Sunday, 17 April
A few days later Jarro was so healthy that he could fly through the whole cottage. Then he was petted a lot by the mistress, and the little boy ran out on the yard and picked for him the first blades of grass that had come up. When the mistress petted him, Jarro thought that although he was now so strong that he could fly down to Tåkern at any time, he did not want to be separated from the humans. He had nothing against staying with them for his whole life.
But early one morning the mistress placed a halter or trap over Jarro that prevented him from using his wings, and then turned him over to the same farmhand who had found him out in the yard. The farmhand stuck him under his arm and went to Tåkern with him.
The ice had melted away while Jarro had been sick. Last year’s old, dry reeds were still standing along the shores and islands, but the water plants had started to put out shoots down in the depths, and the green tops had reached up to the surface of the water. And now almost all of the migratory birds had come home. The crooked beaks of the curlews peeked out of the reeds. The grebes glided around with a new feather collar around their necks and the snipes were busy gathering straw for their nests.
The farmhand went down in a rowboat, set Jarro inside it and started punting along out on the lake. Jarro, who had now become accustomed to expect only good from humans, said to Caesar, who was also with them, that he was very grateful to the farmhand, because he was taking him out on the lake. But the farmhand did not need to keep him so tightly imprisoned, because he did not intend to fly away. Caesar did not respond to that. He was very taciturn this morning.
The only thing that seemed a trifle strange to Jarro was that the farmhand had brought his shotgun along. He could not believe that any of the good folks at the farm would want to shoot birds. Besides, Caesar had told him that the humans did not hunt at this time of year. ‘It’s closed season,’ he said, ‘although, of course, that doesn’t apply to me.’
The farmhand, however, rowed out to one of the small, reed-encircled mud islets. There he got out of the boat, dragged old reeds together into a large pile and sat down behind it. Jarro, with the halter over his wings and tethered to the boat, could wander around on the bank.
Suddenly Jarro caught sight of some of the young drakes in whose company he had shuttled back and forth across the lake before. They were far away, but Jarro called them to him with a couple of loud shouts. They answered them and a large, beautiful flock approached. Even before they reached him, Jarro started to tell them about his marvellous rescue and about the goodness of the humans. At that moment two shots went off behind him. Three ducks sank dead down into the reeds and Caesar splashed out and picked them up.
Then Jarro understood. The humans had rescued him to be able to use him as a decoy. And they had succeeded too. Three ducks had died for his sake. He thought he wanted to die of shame. He thought that even his friend Caesar looked at him contemptuously, and when they came home to the cottage he did not dare lie down to sleep beside the dog.
The next morning Jarro was once again carried out on the shallows. This time, too, he caught sight of some ducks. But when he noticed that they were flying towards him, he shouted to them, ‘Away, away! Watch out! Go a different direction! There’s a hunter hidden behind the pile of reeds! I’m just a decoy!’ And he managed to prevent them from coming within firing range.
Jarro hardly had time to taste a blade of grass, he was so occupied by keeping watch. He called out his warning as soon as a bird approached. He even warned the grebes, although he despised them because they force the ducks out from their best hiding places. But he did not want any bird to meet with misfortune for his sake. And thanks to Jarro’s watchfulness the farmhand had to go home without having fired a single shot.
This notwithstanding, Caesar looked less dissatisfied than the day before, and when evening came he took Jarro in his mouth, carried him over to the stove and let him sleep between his front paws.
But Jarro was no longer content in the cottage; on the contrary, he was very unhappy. His heart suffered from the thought that the humans had never loved him. When the mistress or the little boy came up to pet him, he stuck his beak in under his wing and pretended to be asleep.
For several days Jarro continued his miserable guard duty, and he was already known all over Tåkern. Then it happened one morning, while as usual he was calling, ‘Be on your guard, birds! Don’t come near me! I’m just a decoy!’ that a grebe nest came floating along towards the shallows where he stood tied up. This was not particularly remarkable. It was a nest from last year, and because the grebe nests are built so that they can float on the water like boats, it often happens that they drift along the lake. But Jarro still stood there looking at the nest, because it was coming so directly towards the islet that it appeared as if someone were guiding its journey across the water.
When the nest came closer, Jarro saw that a little human, the smallest he had ever seen, was sitting in the nest, rowing it ahead with a couple of pegs. And this little human called to him, ‘Get as close to the water as you can, Jarro, and get ready to fly! You will soon be free!’
A few moments later the grebe nest was on the land, but the little rower did not leave it. Instead he sat quietly, curled up between the twigs and straw. Jarro also kept himself almost motionless. He was completely paralysed by anxiety that his liberator would be discovered.
The next thing that happened was a flock of wild geese came flying. Jarro then became alert and warned them with loud cries, but despite this they flew back and forth over the shallows several times. They stayed high enough up that they were out of firing range, but the farmhand let himself be enticed into firing off a couple of shots at them anyway. These shots were scarcely fired when the little imp jumped on to land, pulled a little knife out of its sheath and hacked Jarro’s halter apart with a few quick cuts. ‘Fly away now, Jarro, before the fellow has time to reload!’ he called, as he himself leaped down into the grebe nest and pushed off from the land.
The hunter had his gaze directed a
t the geese and had not noticed that Jarro had been freed, but Caesar had followed what happened better, and just as Jarro raised his wings, he rushed forwards and seized him by the neck.
Jarro screamed pitifully, but the imp who had released him said very calmly to Caesar, ‘If you are as honourable as you appear, you can’t very well want to force a good bird to sit here and lure others into misfortune.’
When Caesar heard these words, he sneered nastily with his upper lip, but in a moment he released Jarro. ‘Fly, Jarro!’ he said. ‘You are truly too good to be a decoy. That wasn’t why I wanted to keep you back, but because it will be empty in the cottage without you.’
DRAINING THE LAKE
Wednesday, 20 April
It was truly very empty in the farm cottage without Jarro. The dog and the cat found the days long when they did not have him to argue about, and the mistress missed the happy quacking that he made every time she came into the cottage. But the one who missed Jarro the most was the little boy, Per Ola. He was just three and an only child, and in his entire life he had never had a playmate like Jarro. When he heard that Jarro had returned to Tåkern and the ducks, he refused to accept it, and thought constantly about how he could get him back.
Per Ola had talked a lot with Jarro while the duck lay quietly in his basket, and he was sure that the duck understood him. He asked his mother to take him down to the lake, because he wanted to see Jarro and convince him to come back to them. Mother did not listen, but the little one did not abandon his plan just because of that.
The day after Jarro disappeared, Per Ola ran out on to the farmyard. He played alone as usual, but Caesar was lying on the steps, and when Mother let the boy out, she said, ‘Keep an eye on Per Ola, Caesar!’
If now everything had been as usual, Caesar also would have obeyed this order, and the boy would have been so well guarded that he would not have been in the slightest danger. But Caesar was not himself these days. He knew that the farmers who lived along Tåkern had frequent discussions about lowering the lake level and that they had pretty much decided on it. The ducks would be gone and Caesar would never again have an honourable hunt. He was so preoccupied by thinking about this misfortune that he forgot to watch over Per Ola.
And the little one was hardly left alone in the yard before he realized that now the right moment had come to go down to Tåkern and speak with Jarro. He opened a gate and wandered down towards the lake on the narrow path that ran across the marshy meadows. As long as he could be seen from home, he walked slowly, but then he picked up speed. He was very afraid that Mother or someone else would call to him and tell him that he was not allowed to go. He did not want to do anything bad, just convince Jarro to come back, but he sensed that those at home would not have approved of the enterprise.
When Per Ola came down to the lakeshore, he called several times for Jarro. After that he stood for a long time waiting, but no Jarro appeared. He saw several birds that resembled the mallard, but they flew past and paid him no notice, and so he realized that none of them was the right one.
When Jarro did not come to him, the little boy thought that he would surely find him more easily if he went out on the lake. There were several good boats by the shore, but they were tied up. The only one that was not tied up was an old, leaky rowboat that was in such poor shape that no one thought about using it. But Per Ola wriggled up into it without caring that there was standing water in the bottom. He was unable to use the oars, but instead he sat down to rock and bob in the rowboat. Surely no big person would have succeeded in guiding a rowboat out on Tåkern in that way, but when the water level is high and misfortune is at hand, small children have a strange capacity to put out to sea. Per Ola was soon drifting on Tåkern and calling to Jarro.
As the old rowboat bobbed out on to the lake like that, its cracks opened up all the wider, and the water really streamed into it. Per Ola did not question this in the least. He sat on the little bench in the stem, calling to every bird he saw and wondering that Jarro did not appear.
At last Jarro really did catch sight of Per Ola. He heard that someone was calling to him by the name he had among the humans, and he understood that the boy had gone out on Tåkern to search for him. Jarro became unspeakably happy to find that one of the humans truly loved him. He shot down towards Per Ola like an arrow, sat down beside him and let him pet him. They were both very happy to see each other again.
But suddenly Jarro noticed what was going on with the boat. It was half full of water and very close to sinking. Jarro tried to tell Per Ola that he, who could neither fly nor swim, must try to get on land, but Per Ola did not understand him. Then Jarro did not hesitate a moment, but instead hurried away to get help.
Jarro came back in a little while, carrying on his back a little imp who was much smaller than Per Ola. If the imp had not been able to both talk and move, the boy would have believed it was a doll. And the little imp ordered Per Ola to immediately pick up a long, narrow pole that was at the bottom of the boat and try to punt it along towards one of the small reed islands. Per Ola obeyed him, and he and the imp helped each other drive the boat along. With a couple of strokes they were up by a little reed-encircled island and now Per Ola was told that he should go on land. And just as Per Ola set foot on land, the boat was filled with water and sank to the bottom.
When the boy saw this, he sensed that Father and Mother would be very angry at him. He would have started crying, if he had not immediately had something else to think about. You see, a flock of large, grey birds came and landed on the island, and the little imp took him up to them and told him what their names were, and what they said. And this was so funny that Per Ola forgot everything else.
However, the people on the farm noticed that the boy was missing, and had started searching for him. They searched through the outbuildings, looked in the well and peered around in the cellar. Then they went out on roads and paths, walking to the neighbouring farm to hear if he had gone astray there and also looked for him down by Tåkern. But however much they searched, they could not find him.
Caesar, the dog, understood very well that the farm folk were searching for Per Ola, but he did not do anything to lead them on the right trail. Instead he lay quietly, as if the whole thing did not concern him.
Later in the day Per Ola’s footprints were discovered down by the boat landing. And then they happened to think that the old rotten rowboat was no longer on the shore. Then they started to understand how it all happened.
The farmer and his hands immediately pushed out boats and went to search for the boy. They rowed around on Tåkern until late in the evening without seeing the slightest trace of him. They could only believe that the old boat had sunk and the little boy lay dead on the lakebed.
In the evening Per Ola’s mother went around on the shore. All the others were convinced that the boy had drowned, but she could not bring herself to believe it, so she was still searching for him. She looked among reeds and rushes, walked and walked on the marshy shore without thinking about how deep her foot was sinking and how wet she was getting. She was unspeakably desperate. Her heart ached in her chest. She was not crying, but she twisted her hands and called for her child in a high, plaintive voice.
All around her she heard the shrieking of swans and ducks and curlews. She thought that they were following her and that they, too, were complaining and wailing. ‘They must be in sorrow, because they are wailing so,’ she thought. But then she came to her senses. It was just birds she heard complaining. They probably had no worries.
It was strange that they did not fall silent after sundown. But she heard all the innumerable bands of birds that were around Tåkern letting out shriek after shriek.
Several of them followed her wherever she went, others came sweeping past on rapid wings. The whole air was full of complaint and wailing.
But the anxiety that she felt opened her heart. She did not think she was so far removed from all other living creatures, as humans otherwise do. She understood much better than ever before what it was like for the birds. They had their constant worries about home and children, just like her. There was probably not such a great difference between them and herself as she had previously thought.
Then she happened to think that it was as good as decided that all these thousands of swans and ducks and divers would lose their homes here by Tåkern. ‘It will probably be a great worry for them,’ she thought. ‘Where will they raise their young then?’
She stood and pondered this. It seemed to be a good and agreeable labour to transform a lake into fields and meadows, but there must be a lake other than Tåkern, another lake that was not home to so many thousands of animals.
She thought it was tomorrow that the decision about draining the lake would be made, and she wondered whether it was for that reason that her little boy had got lost today. Was it God’s intention that sorrow should come and open her heart to mercy, before it was too late to avert the cruel action?
She quickly went up to the farm and started talking with her husband about all of this. She talked about the lake and about the birds and told him that she thought Per Ola’s death was God’s punishment for them both. And she soon noticed that he was of the same opinion as her.
The Wonderful Adventure of Nils Holgersson Page 22
