Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - Christmas Eve
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Ekeby. She could lift a sack of rye on her broad
shoulders. She accompanied the transport of ore
all the way from the mines at Bergslägen to Ekeby.
She could sleep like a carter on the floor of the
granary with a sack for her pillow. In the winter
she sometimes watched the charcoal burning; in
the summer she would follow a timber raft down
the Löfven. A capable woman was she. She swore
like a trooper, and reigned like a king over her
seven foundries and her neighbors’ estates, reigned
over her own parish and the neighboring
parishes—yea, over all the beautiful Värmland. But
to the homeless cavaliers she had been like a mother,
and they had therefore closed their ears to the
whispers that told them she was in league with the
devil.
So, with great astonishment, they asked him what
contract she had made with him.
And their horned guest answered that he gave the
Major’s wife her seven foundries on condition that
she sent him a man’s soul every year.
Oh, what horror clutched at the hearts of the
cavaliers! They knew it, of course, but they had
never realized it. At Ekeby each year one of the
cavaliers died—one of the joyous, careless, ever
youthful men. Well, what did it matter? Cavaliers
may not grow old. If their shaking hands could not
lift a glass, or their failing eyes distinguish the cards,
what could life hold for them? What good were they
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