question: Why does she shun me? What is there in me to repulse her?… It seemed to him, more and more, that the answer to this contained an omen for his whole future; in this state of uncertainty he was in no condition to open battle. He stopped.
He must have certainty this very night. He remembered having seen Hansine go along the shore with her friend. She must therefore come back. She would hardly take the short cut to the village, across the bogs and the water courses. She would consequently come back to the meeting place. He would still be able to meet her there, and talk to her without being disturbed; make her tell him what she had against him, why she avoided him, what he had done to her.…
He turned and retraced his steps. Fearful of being too late, he hurried on stumbling over every stone in the dim light, and in a few minutes found himself in the "church" again.
All at once he stopped and his heart ceased to beat—there she was, coming towards him, not a hundred paces off, curiously big in the dusk, melting away like a shadow into the misty Fiord. She was walking close to the water, quite slowly—like one who had longed for solitude—singing softly and gazing out over the Fiord.
Suddenly she stopped and pressed her hands to her heart—she had seen him.
He approached quite slowly, so as to give her
