But the coffeepot must have got on somehow, for shortly afterward the housemaid went down to the office and bade Colour-Sergeant von Wachenfeldt come to the living room for coffee. In crossing the yard to the house, he walked with the aid of a cane, which he put by in the outer hall, and carried himself fairly well as he came into the room. Mamselle Lovisa, who stood there to receive him, noticed all the same that he had difficulty in walking. When she took his hands she felt how swollen they were, and when she looked up into his face, his distorted eye stared at her horribly. Then a good part of her resentment vanished. She thought to herself that he had already received his punishment, and she was not going to add woe to woe. “It was nice that Wachenfeldt could come to us again this Christmas,” she forced herself to say. Whereupon she poured him some coffee and he went over to his accustomed place, between the porcelain stove and the folded card table. It was a modest corner, and also the warmest in the room. The Colour-Sergeant knew what he was about when he chose that seat. He at once began telling Mamselle Lovisa about his servant, Inga, and her constant quarrels and fights with the peasants who owned the farm where he lived. He knew that such petty gossip amused his sister-in-law, and did not fail to observe that she presently poured herself a cup of coffee so as to keep him company. Dusk had fallen while they chatted over their coffee cups, a light was brought and placed on the round table over by the sofa, soon after which Fru Lagerlöf appeared. She had not conquered her feeling of aversion, and it was a cool reception the Colour-Sergeant got from her; she barely touched his hand, but did not speak, and then sat down to her work. The Colour-Sergeant, who calmly went on talking to Mamselle Lovisa, quickly changed the topic of conversation. He told about some strange cases of sickness among the people and the animals on the farm, which he had succeeded in curing. Here was something that interested Fru Lagerlöf; it was in her line. Before she knew it, she had been drawn into the conversation. Finally the Lieutenant came in and sank into his rocker. At first he was silent and depressed. But now, without anyone’s quite knowing how it came about, the conversation drifted in another direction. It carried back to old Karlstad, where the Colour-Sergeant was born and the Lieutenant went to school, and of which the latter loved to talk. Then it swung up to Stockholm, and took in Emilie Högquist, Jenny Lind, and much else of a by-gone day that was beautiful and memorable. At last they fell to telling old Värmland tales, and the evening passed so quickly they were all astonished when the maid came in to lay the table for supper.