"This will never do," she said to herself resolutely, and rising, she went to the window. There was no moon, but everything showed clearly in the light northern night. The trees near the house rose in a dark stippled mass against the sky. Everything was peaceful and quiet, only the drowsy twittering of birds broke the silence from time to time; the owl had gone. Ragna stood at the window breathing the chill night air and let the peace of the night sink into her soul. When she was quite calm she closed the window and taking the candle walked resolutely over to the bed and stood there, looking. The face of the dead woman wore an expression of ineffable peace--a repose almost inhuman in its detachment. Her white hair was brushed in smooth bandeaux over her brow, her features, ashy grey with violet shadows, appeared almost unreal, as though carved in some strange alabaster. Her hands, waxen and stiff with bluish nails lay folded on her bosom. The flickering light of the candle lent no semblance of life. Ingeborg's words came to Ragna's mind. Where indeed was the spirit that had animated this clay? And to the question she found no answer. In the actual presence of death the formally taught maxims regarding a future life--a life of reward and punishment--fell to the ground; the flimsiness of all speculation on the Life hereafter appeared naked to the girl's eyes. "No one can know, no one can tell," she thought, "it is a mystery, but at least one may find peace--she has found peace!" She stooped and reverently kissed her grandmother's cold hands, then she returned to her seat. The moment had been a crucial one, for in that instant of putting her conventional belief to the touchstone of reality, it had failed and she recognized the fact; the bed-rock on which her childish faith had been built fell from beneath her feet, for, if she lost her belief in part, disbelief in all must follow. A chain is no stronger than its weakest link, but the weak link in her chain was not, as she thought, the insufficient grounds for belief, rather the formality of her teaching; to her the "letter which killeth" had indeed become dead, and of the "Spirit which giveth light" she knew as yet nothing. This one thing she knew, that never again should she be afraid of the dead or of death. "It is peace," she said to herself softly, "it is like sleep when one is very, very tired."