No, she must not go away to-morrow. What good would that do? One day more or less didn't matter. And Irgens confessed frankly that he was not very flush at present, or he would have accompanied her.... If not in the same compartment, at least on the same train. He wanted to be near her to the very last. But he was too poor, alas! Wasn't it a crying shame that a man like him should be so hard up? Not that she would have allowed him to come, but.... How it impressed her that he so frankly told her of his poverty! "Besides, I am not sure that my life is safe here any more," he said smilingly. "Did you tell my friend Ole how I acted?" "It is never too late to do that," she said. They told the driver to stop. They walked ahead, talking gaily and happily. He asked her to forgive him his rashness--not that he wanted her to think that he had forgotten her, or could forget her. "I love you," he confessed, "but I know it is useless. I have now one thing left--my pen. I may write a verse or two to you; you must not be angry if I do. Well, time will tell. In a hundred years everything will be forgotten." "I am powerless to change anything," she said. "No, you are not. It depends, of course--At least, there is nobody else who can." And he added quickly: "You told me to give you a little time, you asked me to wait--what did you mean by that?" "Nothing," she answered. They walked on. They came into a field. Irgens spoke entertainingly about the far, blue, pine-clad ridges, about a tethered horse, a workingman who was making a fence. Aagot was grateful; she knew he did this in order to maintain his self-control; she appreciated it. He even said with a shy smile that if she would not think him affected he would like to jot down a couple of stanzas which just now occurred to him. And he jotted down the couple of stanzas. She wanted to see what he wrote. She bent toward him and asked him laughingly to let her see. If she really wanted to! It was nothing much, though. "Do you know," he said, "when you bent toward me and your head was so close to me, I prayed in my heart that you would remain like that! That is the reason I first refused to let you see what I had written." "Irgens," she said suddenly, in a tender voice, "what would happen if I said yes to you?" Pause. They looked at each other. "Then it would happen, of course, that--that you would say no to another." "Yes--but it is too late now, too late! It is not to be considered--But if it is any comfort to you to know it, then I can say that you are not the only one to grieve--" He took this beautifully. He seized her hand and pressed it silently, with a happy glance, and he let it go at once. They walked along the road. They had never been closer to each other. When they reached the new fence the workman took off his cap. They stopped before a gate; they looked at each other a moment and turned back. They did not speak.