“It was superstition,” she said thoughtfully. “And yet, perhaps, the sight of the cross and the drinking of the water at least helped them to new thoughts of suffering and of life. Who knows, perhaps some of them went away able to glory in their infirmities?” He did not speak for some minutes, but stood lost in the train of thought suggested to him by her words. The sadness gradually died out of his face, and she quite understood that it was with no trace of superstition, but merely as a sign of gratitude for a thought which had helped him, that he took two little straight twigs, stooped to drink from St. Olafskilde, and then set up his cross among the others in the mossy wall. After that they clambered down over the bowlders into the sandy road once more, and climbed the steep hill leisurely, planning many things for the future—the rooms in Rowan Tree House, the little wooden cottage that they meant to build at Gödesund, three hours by water from Bergen, on a tiny island, which might be bought at a trifling cost; the bright holiday weeks that they would spend there; the work they might share; the efforts they might make together in their London life. But the sharp contrast between this pictured future and the actual past could hardly fail to strike one of Frithiof’s temperament; it was the thought of this which prompted him to speak as they paused to rest on the wooded heights above Hillestad. “I almost wonder,” he said, “that you have courage to marry such an ill-starred fellow as I have always proved to be. You are very brave to take the risk.” She answered him only with her eyes. “So,” he said with a smile, “you think, perhaps, after all the troubles there must be a good time coming?” “That may very well be,” she replied, “but now that we belong to each other outer things matter little.” “Do you remember the lines about Norway in the Princess?” he said. “Your love has made them true for me.” “Say them now,” she said; “I have forgotten,” And, looking out over the ruddy sky where, in this night hour, the glow of sunset mingled with the glow of dawn, he quoted the words: “I was one To whom the touch of all mischance but came As night to him that sitting on a hill Sees the midsummer, midnight, Norway sun Set into sunrise.”