shop. There he served behind the counter with his mother; for his father, who had gradually become the color of the groats he had so long been weighing, was forced to take to his bed in the back chamber. Even from there he wanted to have part in everything going on; must know what each one had sold, but would pretend not to hear until he got his wife or son near enough to pinch them. And when the wick had become quite dry in this small lamp, one night it went out. The wife wept, she knew not precisely why; but the son could not press out a tear, As they had money enough to live on, they wound up the business, removed every trace of it, and turned the shop into a sitting-room. There the mother sat by the window knitting stockings; Pedro established himself in the room on the other side of the passage, and devoted his time to flute-playing. No sooner had summer come, however, than he bought a little light sailing-boat, crossed over to the rocky island, and stopped where Gunlaug was wont to anchor.
And one day, as he lay reposing in the heather, he saw a boat steering straight toward him; it came alongside his own, and Gunlaug stepped out. She was wholly unchanged, although she was now fully grown and taller
