"He—he asked me to marry him!" she at last burst out, and threw herself against the back of a chair, sobbing bitterly.
Her mother clasped her hands in dismay, and for a long time could not speak.
"That can never be true, Hansine," she said at last, almost in a whisper, as if it had been the confession of a crime.
As her daughter did not answer, but went on sobbing mutely, she continued—pale, and almost ready to cry herself: "Who ever heard tell of such an affair, Hansine!—If I could on'y make out how it had come about! Whoever would ha' thought that we should have such a bad job as that!—What will folks say about it! It's just fearful, Hansine!"
Just then Anders Jörgen clattered in from the yard with two tin pails, to fetch milk for the calves.
"What's up here, good folks?" he called out in his hearty morning voice, holding his pails away from him with stiffened arms.
When at last he made out, from Else's stammering tale, what was the matter, he pulled a long face, too. The fact was, that he had once for all got into the habit of adopting his wife's views, but at bottom he was not quite clear what there was to cry about here. He would sooner have been inclined to look upon the affair as a happy dispensation of Providence, but he took good care not to express any opinion which had
