Produced by Tim Lindell, Barry Abrahamsen, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries)
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SVEND FLEURON Grim, The Story of a Pike Kittens
LAURIDS BRUUN Van Zanten’s Happy Days The Promised Isle
GUNNAR GUNNARSSON The Sworn Brothers Guest the One-Eyed
JOHANNES BUCHHOLTZ Egholm and his God The Miracles of Clara Van Haag
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TORONTO: THE MACMILLAN COMPANY OF CANADA, LTD., AT ST. MARTIN’S HOUSE 1923
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XII PETER CASTS OUT MAJÄNGEN AND BRINGS HOME 164 EKBACKEN
I LAURA ENTERTAINS 201 II PETER THE BOSS IN LOVE 222 III THE ANGEL OF DEATH 242 IV THE COLD MOMENT 266 V WASTE 293 VI THE GREAT DINNER 317 VII SHADOW PLAY 345 VIII TORD SAILS OUT TO SEA 371 IX PETER’S TOMBSTONE 389
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To tell the story of a child as you would tell the story of a grown-up would be to commit forgery, for once you are wide awake it costs you a great effort to describe a dream exactly as it occurred.
The tide of events flows remote from the child. Only occasionally do its eddies touch upon the consciousness of the child, and then the latter is unaware of their significance. It is precisely this inability to understand the connection between events which makes the realities of children so dream-like.
In the long dream of childhood there reigns a capricious, mysterious and yet irresistible Fate, beneficent like the fairy with its wand beside the princess’s cradle, or cruel like the wolf in Red Riding Hood. The shadow of that Fate still casts itself over our riper years. It haunts us, ghostlike, even when we have begun consciously to order our lives. Only a few chosen spirits are able to cast off the spell of these fairies and trolls.
This is a tale of people whose childhood was passed in the shadow of the wolf—and who never could escape from their childhood.