The convicted man's daughter and her sweetheart will never see each other again, and the prime witness of what is in fact a miscarriage of justice works abroad and doesn't know anything about what has happened. The real murderer dies peacefully of old age, but is the cause of more deaths many years after his crime. For when the case is unravelled, two people are unable to bear it:the two who at the time didn't have the slightest idea that they had just been useful idiots in the nasty plan of a cynical man.
Creeping uneasiness
Steen Steensen Blicher's old crime story The Pastor of Vejlbye has not lost its thriller qualities thanks to both his narrative style and his insight into the human psyche. Even if he uses strong words such as 'terror' and 'abhorrence', the short story is completely devoid of words designed to whip up the already heavy atmosphere of terror and abhorrence to new dramatic heights. This creates the creepy uneasiness of the story with Steen Steensen Blicher striking the reader's emotional chords.
We all know the fear
The thought of losing the one we love because of a misunderstanding or being convicted on circumstantial evidence for something we didn't do is enough to send shivers down our spines. Blicher taps even further into the reader's fears by playing on the terror of what is hidden deep down in our own hearts. What if we really are guilty of the crime we thought was just a horrible nightmare? Or if we confess to a murder we didn't commit just because earlier we did something crazy under pressure and then repressed it?
Dorthe Sondrup Andersen is a Master of Arts of Comparative Literature and an author and writer on cultural affairs. Her books include "The Golden Age without the Gilt" ("Guldalder uden forgyldning") (People's Press, 2004).
The Pastor of Vejlbye, 1960. Foto: DR.