"But to go back. I sat or rather lay in an arm-chair at the window, and watched the water and the ships. It was getting dusk, the luminous dusk of the north, as if a soft transparent purple veil is being dropped gently over the world. The fjord was full of lights from the different crafts at anchor, and the heaven full of stars; and the longer one looked up there, the more one saw myriads of flimmering eyes of light, until one's brain seemed full of their brightness, and one forgot one's body in gazing. Long silvery streaks glistened through the heaving water like the flash of feeding trout, and lads and lassies in boats rowed to and fro, and human vibration seemed to thrill from them, filling the atmosphere with man and woman. And the silken air caressed my face as the touch of cool, soft fingers. I had a feeling of perfect well-being; one does not get many such moments in one's life, does one? I think I just was happy, rehearsing the hours that flew too quickly, recalling every look, tone, gesture, and smile. The _jomfru_ came in to lay the table; she knew me from a previous visit and began to talk; but I wanted to be alone with my thoughts; so I went upstairs, washed my hands and puffed them with sweet smelling powder, and then when I went down again and sat and waited I clasped them up over my head to make them white. He came back, flung his hat on the sofa out of sheer boyish delight at being back, came over and stood and looked down at me, and I laughed up to him. If I were to talk until Doomsday, I could not make you understand what I cannot yet understand myself. "After supper, at which I sipped my tea and watched him, we sat at the window and looked out at the purple world. I had told him he might smoke. Well? Well, we talked, and we talked when we were both silent; and he, I mean his thinking self, came to me; and I--well, I believe from the moment he came into the room, all the best of me went straight to him. The lights out in the harbor twinkled, a star fell, and I wished--well, wishes are foolish. I think he must have been watching my face, for when our eyes met, he smiled as if he understood. Sometimes he jumped up and stood rocking a chair backward and forward. He was sorry I was going away! Yes? Oh, we might meet again! That might be difficult! Indeed? I should have thought _he_ would be the last person in the world to say it was difficult to meet. He laughed at that, with a quick sidelong look he has, like a Finn dog, and said I was sharp, awfully sharp, as if he liked being caught. By the way, he occasionally used strong language; said I must forgive him, he wasn't very used to ladies' society.