My Traveling Companion by Pietari Päivärinta

It was the last of March. The weather was fair and here and there one / could see signs of approaching Spring. Birds were beginning to twitter / in the branches. Sleighing, if not completely broken up, was bad; the / roads were rough and muddy, and in several places the bare ground / showed through. Brooks and rivers were filled with floating snow and / ice and dirt, and only the sharp freezing at night kept them from / overflowing their banks. In favored places many a little brook had / burst through to freedom and was joyfully leaping down the declivities, / and rushing noisily away to the breast of its mother -- the ancient sea.

Such was the season and condition of traveling, when business forced me / to take a journey outside my own parish.

Early that morning I came across a man, who like myself was forced to / travel on business. He had one emaciated old horse and a heavy sleigh; / indeed he went on foot and pushed the sleigh. When I overtook him I / jumped out and trudged along beside him.

"Good morning, old man," I began, as I reached his side.

"Good morning," was the reply, without looking in my direction.

I had now opportunity to observe my companion at close range. His / horse was really little more than a skeleton, and the load was two / barrels of tar. In the sleigh I saw reeds and swamp-grass, evidently / the horse's food, and very likely for the same purpose was a sack / filled with straw, which was placed on top of the tar barrels and stuck / out over the front. In addition, in the sleigh, there was a small / birch-bark basket which probably held food for the man. He wore an old / and ragged coat, which was held tight at the hips by a worn leather / strap. The coat had no buttons, and it was not provided with any means / of fastening at the top. The strap about his hips had no effect upon / holding the old coat together at the neck, so the man's chest was bare.

His shoes were likewise old and they had been mended time and again. / Now they were torn and wisps of straw which he had used to try to stuff / the holes, stuck through. On his hands he wore tattered, often mended / mittens, and on his head an ancient sheep skin cap.

As I said, the old man was trudging along behind the sleigh. He did not / seem to have planned upon riding, because the two barrels of tar and / the food for the old mare filled it completely.

When he came to a place in the road where the snow was gone, the old / man pushed the sleigh with all his strength, in attempt to help the / feeble horse. Holes in the road, and furrows cut by sleighs, were / filled with water, and this ice water went in through the holes in the / old man's shoes.

"Where are you going? " I inquired, in order to begin a conversation, / after making the above observations.

"To the city! " was the curt and melancholy reply.

"You have chosen a bad time for your journey, because now sleighing is / uncertain."

He answered: "True; the road is bad but I couldn't wait for a better / one."

"What could force you to make the journey now when it is so difficult / to get along?"

"Threat of execution for debt. That doesn't wait for weather," said / the old man sadly, looking up at me for the first time, with shy, / grief-shadowed eyes.

This was my first glimpse of his face. It was wrinkled, and eaten out / by misfortune, and made old before years had done so. Both his body and / his manner indicated fewer years than his face.

"Who is such a cruel creditor as to drive you to the city in weather / like this?"

"The parson! " said the old man sharply.

"The parson? You owe him so much then? " I inquired in astonishment.

"Only last year's interest."