"If only it mayn't come to worse later on," said he. Barbro asked easily: "What's there to worry about? Let it lie where it is." Ay, she smiled, and asked: "Are you afraid it'll come after you? Leave all that nonsense, and say no more about it." "Ay, well...." "Did I drown the child? I've told you it drowned itself in the water when I slipped in. I never heard such things as you get in your head. And, anyway, it would never be found out," said she. "'Twas found out all the same with Inger at Sellanraa," said Axel. Barbro thought for a moment. "Well, I don't care," said she. "The law's all different now, and if you read the papers you'd know. There's heaps that have done it, and don't get anything to speak of." Barbro sets out to explain it, to teach him, as it were--getting him to take a broad view of things. It was not for nothing she herself had been out in the world and seen and heard and learned so much; now she could sit here and be more than a match for him. She had three main arguments which she was continually advancing: In the first place, she had not done it. In the second, it was not such a terrible thing, after all, if she had done it. But in the third place, it would never be found out. "Everything gets found out, seems to me," he objected. "Not by a long way," she answered. And whether to astonish him or to encourage him, or perhaps from sheer vanity and as something to boast of, all of a sudden she threw a bombshell. Thus: "I've done something myself that never got found out." "You?" said he, all unbelieving. "What have you done?" "What have I done? Killed something." She had not meant, perhaps, to go so far, but she had to go on now; there he was, staring at her. Oh, and it was not grand, indomitable boldness even; it was mere bravado, vulgar showing off; she wanted to look big herself, and silence him. "You don't believe me?" she cried. "D'you remember that in the paper about the body of a child found in the harbour? 'Twas me that did it." "What?" said he. "Body of a child. You never remember anything. We read about it in the paper you brought up." After a moment he burst out: "You must be out of your senses!" But his confusion seemed to incite her more, to give her a sort of artificial strength; she could even give the details. "I had it in my box--it was dead then, of course--I did that as soon as it was born. And when we got out into the harbour, I threw it overboard."