"The son beat him, seized hold of him and dragged him to the door. 'I will have peace in the house!' But when they came to the door, the father raised himself up. 'Not farther than to the door,' said he, 'for so far I dragged my own father.' The son paid no heed to this, but dragged his head across the threshold. 'Not farther than to the door, I say!' Here the old man flung his son down at his feet, and chastised him, just as though he were a child." "That was badly done," said several. "Did not strike his father, though," Arne thought some one said; but he was not sure of it. "Now I shall tell _you_ something," said Arne, rising up, as pale as death, not knowing what he was going to say. He only saw the words floating about him like great snow-flakes. "I will make a grasp at them hap-hazard!" and he began. "A troll met a boy who was walking along a road crying. 'Of whom are you most afraid?' said the troll, 'of yourself, or of others?' But the boy was crying, because he had dreamed in the night that he had been forced to kill his wicked father, and so he answered, 'I am most afraid of myself.' 'Then be at peace with yourself, and never cry any more; for hereafter you shall only be at war with others.' And the troll went his way. But the first person the boy met laughed at him, and so the boy had to laugh back again. The next person he met struck him; the boy had to defend himself, and struck back. The third person he met tried to kill him, and so the boy had to take his life. Then everybody said hard things about him, and therefore he knew only hard things to say of everybody. They locked their cupboards and doors against him, so he had to steal his way to what he needed; he even had to steal his night's rest. Since they would not let him do anything good, he had to do something bad. Then the parish said, 'We must get rid of this boy; he is so bad'; and one fine day they put him out of the way. But the boy had not the least idea that he had done anything wicked, and so after death he came strolling right into the presence of the Lord. There on a bench sat the father he had not slain, and right opposite, on another bench, sat all those who had forced him to do wrong. "'Which bench are you afraid of?' asked the Lord, and the boy pointed to the long one. "'Sit down there, beside your father,' said the Lord, and the boy turned to do so. "Then the father fell from the bench, with a great gash in his neck. In his place there came one in the likeness of the boy, with repentant countenance and ghastly features; then another with drunken face and drooping form; still another with the face of a madman, with tattered clothes and with hideous laughter. "'Thus it might have been with you,' said the Lord. "'Can that really be?' replied the boy, touching the hem of the Lord's garment. "Then both benches fell down from heaven, and the boy stood beside the Lord again and laughed.