Selma might like to see. They had a bird of paradise there.
"What is that?" asked the child, all interest now.
"It is a bird from Paradise," Fru Strömberg told her.
"Selma has heard her grandmother talk about Paradise," Back-Kaisa put in.
Yes, of course. She remembered that Granny had told her about Paradise, and that she (Selma) had pictured it as a place that looked like the little rose-garden on the west side of the house at Mårbacka. At the same time it was clear to her that Paradise had something to do with God. And now she somehow got the impression that the one who guarded Fru Strömberg's husband so that he was as safe at sea as on land was the bird of paradise.
She wanted so much to meet that bird. It might be able to help her. Everyone felt so sorry for her mamma and papa because she was not getting well. And to think that they had made this expensive trip only on her account.
She would have liked to ask Back-Kaisa and Fru Strömberg whether they thought the bird of paradise would do something for her, but she was too shy. They might laugh at her, she feared. But she did not forget what Fru Strömberg had told her. Every day she wished the Jacob would come, so that the bird of paradise could fly ashore.
Then one day she heard, to her great joy, that the Jacob had arrived. But she did not speak of this to
