“No,” replied Simon. “Nor do I deem there is anyone who believes it—they know you and her and this Bentein; but so little befalls for folk to talk of in these outparishes—’tis but reason they should fall to on such a fat titbit. ’Tis for us to teach them Kristin’s good name is too fine fare for such clowns as they. But pity it was she let herself be so frighted by his grossness that she went not forthwith to you or to Sira Eirik with the tale—methinks this bordel-priest would but too gladly have avowed he meant naught worse than harmless jesting, had you, Lavrans, got a word with him.” Both Kristin’s parents said that Simon was right in this. But she cried out, stamping her foot: “But he threw me down on the ground, I say—I scarce know myself what he did or did not do—I was beside myself; I can remember naught—for all I know it may be as Inga says—I have not been well nor happy a single day since—” Ragnfrid shrieked and clasped her hands together; Lavrans started up—even Simon’s face fell; he looked at her sharply, then went up to her and took her by the chin. Then he laughed: “God bless you, Kristin—you had remembered but too well if he had done you any harm. No marvel if she has been sad and ill since that unhappy evening she had such an ugly fright—she who had never known aught but kindness and goodwill before,” said he to the others. “Any but the evil minded, who would fain think ill rather than good, can see by her eyes that she is a maid, and no woman.” Kristin looked up into her betrothed’s small, steady eyes. She half lifted her hands—as if to throw them round his neck—when he went on: “You must not think, Kristin, that you will not forget this. ’Tis not in my mind that we should settle down at Formo as soon as we are wed, so that you would never leave the Dale. No one has the same hue of hair or mind in both rain and sunshine, said old King Sverre, when they blamed his Birch-legs for being overbearing in good fortune—” Lavrans and Ragnfrid smiled—it was pleasant enough to hear the young man discourse with the air of a wise old bishop. Simon went on: “’Twould ill beseem me to seek to teach you, who are to be my father-in-law; but so much, maybe, I may make bold to say, that we, my brothers and sisters and I, were brought up more strictly; we were not let run about so freely with the house-folk as I have seen that Kristin is used to. My mother often said that if one played with the cottar carls’ brats, ’twas like one would get a louse or two in one’s hair in the end—and there’s somewhat in that saying.” Lavrans and Ragnfrid held their peace, but Kristin turned away, and the wish she had felt but a moment before to clasp Simon round the neck, had quite left her. * * * * *