"God bless you," she said, and began to sob again. "There now, you mustn't cry. Here comes Nikolai walking up the road as good and placid as ever." "Is he? Oh, thank God. You know, I haven't really any fault to find with him; I was too hasty when I said that. Even if I tried to find something, I couldn't. Of course he uses expressions sometimes--I mean he says some words differently, but it was only his sister that put that into my head. I must go out and meet him now." She began to look around for something to slip over her shoulders, but it took her a few minutes because she was still quite shaken. Before she had found anything, Nikolai trudged into the yard. "Oh, there you are! You haven't done anything rash, have you?" Nikolai's features were still a little drawn as he replied: "No, I just took him over to see his son." "Has Solem got a son here?" I asked. Neither of them replied. Nikolai turned to go back to his work, and his wife went with him across the field. Suddenly I understood: Sophie's child. How well I remember that day at Tore Peak, when Schoolmistress Sophie Palm came in to tell us the latest news about Solem, about the bandage on his finger, the finger he never had time to get rid of--stout fellow! They made each other's acquaintance then, and probably met again later in the town. Solem was everywhere. The ladies at the Tore Peak resort--well, Solem was no angel, but they did little to improve him. And so he met this woman who had learned nothing but to teach.... * * * * * I ought to have understood before this. I don't understand anything any more. But something has happened to me now. At last I'm beginning to suspect that their chief reason for wanting to keep me here is simply that they need money; my board and rent are to pay for the mare. That's all it amounts to. I should have known it long ago, but I am old. Perhaps I may add without being misunderstood that the brain withers before the heart. You can see it in all grandparents. At first I said "Bravo!" to my discovery, "Bravo! Fru Ingeborg," I said, "you are priceless once again!" But human nature is such that I began to feel hurt. How much better it would be to pay for the mare once and for all and depart; I should have been more than pleased to do so. But I should not have succeeded. Nikolai would have shaken his head as though it were a fairy tale. Then I began to calculate that in fact there couldn't be much to pay for the mare now--perhaps nothing, perhaps she was paid for....