Chapter VIII: Book II: Lotta Hedman (4)

Suddenly he checked himself, and, regaining calmness, moved quietly away from her and drew up a chair.

"Will you not tell me how all this came about?"

She stood up beside him, and began hesitatingly:

"There is so much to say. I hardly know how to begin." For a moment she was on the point of giving way to tears, but restrained herself. "We were not very happy in our marriage, my husband and I."

He did not seem to notice that she was standing while he was seated. But he understood that she needed help to tell her story.

"My wife was not happy either," he said.

He rested one elbow on the table and leaned forward so as to cover his eyes.

Sigrun understood that he was encouraging her to go on.

"There's been talk about us here and there, I dare say," she continued. "If you were in Algeröd yesterday, no doubt you heard about the scene with the man who was staying with us...."

"Yes," he said, "I heard that and more. But there was no ill-will in what was said. Only sorrow--nothing but sorrow."

His voice was almost a sob. He felt the old fierce pain once more. It hurt him beyond words to speak to her like this, when his one desire was to lay his head in her lap and tell her of the sorrow that had racked him the day before and the misery of this morning, when he learned that his wife had come back now--now that his heart longed only to be left to its sorrow for another.

"And no one doubted that I was dead?" asked Sigrun.

"No," he said. "No one doubted that you had died of the smallpox."

She grasped his arm hastily.

"You--you do not know who it was that died. It must have been ..."

She stopped, with open mouth, not daring to go on.

"Was it my wife?" he asked.

"Yes," she said. "I think it must have been ... your wife."

Sven Elversson said nothing, but rose and walked across the room.

Now Sigrun in her turn sank down on a chair. "Death," she thought--"Death will not let me go. I had forgotten that the dead woman was Sven Elversson's wife when I asked him to help me."

She sat crying quietly, and pulling at a handkerchief. The eerie, drowsy, death-like feeling came over her again.

A few moments later, Sven Elversson came back to the table and sat down in the same position as before.

"Now tell me everything," he said.

And she obeyed. She told him all that had passed from the moment when the strange woman had come to her door, until now, when she herself sat in the vagabonds' hostel at Hånger.

He listened with all his soul, and was filled with sorrow for the desperate thing she had done, and all the misery she had brought on herself. He understood better than she did herself that, as she was, all ways in the world were closed to her now. That if she stayed in this world at all, she must be condemned by her own act to endless unrest, endless anxiety, endless penitence and shame.

But despite his sorrow and deep sympathy for her, he could not repress a feeling of rejoicing in himself, that repeated over and over again: "At least she is alive. And she has come to you. Sits here beside you, talking to you. What does all the rest matter now that she is alive?"

Sigrun had long finished her story, and Sven Elversson sat silent, thinking what to say, what must be done. And watching him as he sat, she felt clearly that such a man as he could do nothing else but send her back to her husband. "This man cannot be led to any wrongful deed," she thought.

"And so it has all been in vain," she told herself. "All to no purpose. Death will not let me go."

She looked her fate bravely in the face. And she made no attempt to influence Sven Elversson by speaking of what she had resolved.

"This is a big thing," he said, and was surprised to find himself talking to Sigrun just as he did to others whom he helped. "But the one thing clear to me at the moment is that you must not go about the country now carrying infection. You will have to stay on here at Hånger for a time."

She looked up at him. It was so simple, and she had never thought of it. A few days' respite at least. The thought of death slipped aside.

"There is no one here but my father and mother," he went on. "And I do not think they will be afraid. But I forgot, there are some children staying here too, that I took in a while ago. But we can send them down to the village. And then we can shut up the place to travellers for a while. You can move over to the house and have one of the guest rooms to yourself."

"And after?" she asked almost harshly.

He bowed his head, and tried to think. Because he loved her, he could read her thoughts, and he knew that his answer now meant life or death to her.

He could find only strength to say:

"It must be in the hand of God."

"I cannot drive her to despair," he thought to himself; "but it may be that her own mind will change. Her love for her husband may wake anew. Surely all will go well, all will come right in time."

She understood that this was only a respite, but she gave a sigh of relief.

"The way I look at it is this," he said. "It is never well to lie, and hide things. There's no denying that. But then, again, it is not well to torture a creature to death. That's no less true. But the heart may change. Or, better, may become itself again. And then it will be easy, all that seems so difficult now. May I not believe that?"

She shook her head decisively, but said nothing.

"Nay, let us believe it," he said. "Let us trust to that. And now you will not mind if I tell my father and mother all about it. They are not the sort to tell more than they should. And then we will try not to make this more hard and serious than we need. Just think that it will all come right again in time."

Sigrun felt as if he were playing with her. At any other time his manner would have annoyed her, but now it was indescribably soothing and comforting. She felt as if this man had taken all her burden, all her trouble and misfortune, on himself, to bear it in her stead.