Chapter III: Part 3

At that the Sheriff nudged the Rector, who whispered:

"The Factor has still another daughter, Rector."

"What, if he has?" said the Factor. "A man can't have two sisters-in-law to one brother."

"No, but he can give his brother a sister-in-law, too," said the Rector, and then everybody laughed.

"That reminds me," said the Factor, "Helga sent us a photograph the other day. Where is it, Thora?"

"Here it is," said Thora, taking a photograph out of a drawer. Oscar held out his hand for it, and looked at it long and earnestly.

"How fine! I've scarcely ever seen such a splendid face! Quite grown up, too! Is Helga coming home soon, Factor?"

"Not very soon," said the Factor.

And then the lawyer came in with a large portfolio of papers and laid them on the table.

"Ha, ha!" laughed the Hector. "A rich man's child needs a careful christening, it seems!"

"You're right, Rector, and it has taken my clerk the entire day to engross the contract, but it was not that which kept me until now--it was this!"

"The rings!" cried the two elder women, as the lawyer took a small plush box from his pocket.

"Yes, you may remember that when the rings had to be ordered yesterday morning, Magnus could not be found anywhere, so I was compelled to order them myself. Well, I thought I gave careful instructions, but the idea is abroad in the town, do you know, that it is Oscar, not Magnus, who is to marry Thora--nobody believes anything else--so what does Olaf, the silversmith, do but write 'Oscar' on the inside of one of the rings!"

"Never!" said Oscar, trying to laugh with the others.

"Yes, indeed, and the error was not discovered until the very last moment, and then all I could do, as you see, was to have 'Oscar' erased--it was too late to have 'Magnus' inscribed instead."

"Where is Magnus, I wonder?" said the Governor, walking restlessly before the window.

"Don't be anxious about Magnus, Stephen," said Anna. "He grows more and more like my poor father. If father promised to be somewhere at a certain time he would turn up to the minute if he had to kill a couple of ponies in getting there."

The cathedral clock struck five at that moment, and sure enough before the clang of the last stroke had died away Magnus walked into the room. He looked slack and almost untidy in his pea jacket and long boots, and was the only person in the room who had not troubled to dress for the occasion. The Governor's face darkened at sight of him, and the Factor said in a tone of vexation:

"Well, let us get to work and have it over--I've been spoiling for a smoke this half-hour."

The lawyer opened his portfolio, and the company gathered about the table, whereupon Aunt Margret cried:

"Magnus, do you allow of this? Here's Oscar sitting beside Thora."

"Don't disturb him," said Magnus. "This is good enough for me," and he took a low seat by the side of his mother.

"Now, come," said the Factor, "let the one who has the best voice start the singing."

"It must be the lawyer, then," said the Rector, "for every lawyer has a voice of silver--passes it for silver anyway."

And then, amid the general laughter, the lawyer opened the marriage contract and began to read.

*XI*

The company listened intently, and at the close of every clause the Governor, who was resting his head on his hand and his elbow on the table, said: "Good!" "Very good!" "Generous!" "Most generous!"

When the lawyer had finished, the other old people leaned back and drew long breaths of satisfaction, but the Governor rose and crossed to the Factor and shook hands with him, saying: "Just like you, old friend!"

The Factor was gratified by the reception of the document and became bright and almost humorous. Imitating the manner of the auctioneer, he cried: "Anybody bid higher? Then going--going--go----"

"Wait!" said the Governor. "Hadn't we better ask the opinion of the young people themselves? After all, they are the persons ultimately concerned, and though a cow seldom kicks when you are carrying her clover----"

There was a general titter, a nodding of many heads and muttered responses of "Just so!" "Just a matter of form!"

"Very well! Thora, what do you say?" said the Factor, expecting a burst of rapturous approval, but Thora only answered timidly:

"I don't know. Hadn't you better ask Magnus first?"

"Certainly, my dear--Magnus first, as a matter of course. What do you say, Magnus? Any suggestion to make? Any little improvement? How do you like the contract?"

There was an awkward silence which astonished the older people, and then came a great surprise. Magnus, who had been sitting with his head down, raised a white and firm-set face and answered:

"I do not like the contract at all, Factor, and I cannot sign it."

At this there were looks of bewilderment among the older people, who seemed to be uncertain if they had heard aright, while Thora and Oscar, who partly understood, seemed to be struggling to catch their breath. The Factor was the first to recover his self-possession, and he said, with a slightly supercilious accent:

"Is that so? I thought I knew something of these matters; but if you think you can draw up a better document, Magnus----"

But then the Governor interposed: "Some trifle, no doubt," he said suavely. "Magnus will explain. What is the point you object to, my son?"

There was another moment of tense silence, and then Magnus said in a harsh voice:

"By this contract I am required to live in Iceland all my life--that's slavery, and I will not submit to it."

"But, my dear Magnus," said Anna, "don't you see the reason for that? To all intents and purposes Thora is the Factor's only daughter--his only child--and if she goes away, who is to cheer him up and make home bright for him? Be reasonable, Magnus!"

"Anna, hadn't we better let the young man finish?" said the Factor. "He may have other objections. Have you?"

"Yes," said Magnus. "According to this contract I am to be taken into partnership on marrying Thora, but only on a quarter share. Partnership is partnership, and where there are two partners it should be half and half--I must have half."

The company listened in consternation, and the Factor began to laugh. "Why not?" he said in a cynical tone. "Everything is hay in hard weather. I'm so hard up for a son-in-law that I shouldn't stick at a trifle."

"Old friend," said the Governor, "let us not be too hasty. Perhaps Magnus has not made himself quite plain."

"As plain as a pikestaff. He wants an equal partnership. But perhaps that is not all. Is there anything else?"

"Yes, there is, sir," said Magnus, in a rather aggressive manner. "By this deed, when you retire I am to take over the business, but I am only to have one-third share of the profits. I must have two-thirds."

"In--deed!" said the Factor. "Do you know I thought if I allowed you to come into the business that I had made, and to work it with my plant and my capital, one-third was generous."

"Most generous!" said the Governor, mopping his forehead. "But Magnus is slow--slow both of thought and speech. He must have some explanation. What do you mean, Magnus? Take your time and speak plainly."

"I mean, sir," said Magnus, "that the barter business in Iceland will break up before long. When the Factor retires--perhaps before--his business will be worth nothing--not even the name, for that will be less than nothing. A new business will have to be created, and if I am to create it I must have two-thirds of the profits, leaving one-third for the use of the Factor's money."

The Factor was losing his temper. "Why any at all?" he said. "Why not kick me out altogether? No use beating a dog with a cheese when a whip is handy."

The company were murmuring at Magnus, when the Governor interposed again. "Magnus," he said, "to say I'm astonished is to say nothing. The Factor has treated you with boundless liberality, but no well is so deep that it can't be emptied, and if you go any farther----"

"Go any farther!" said the Factor. "Why shouldn't he go farther? It isn't fair play between the wind and a straw, but why shouldn't he beat me about a little more? Anything else to ask, sir?"

"Yes," said Magnus, without the change of a muscle. "By this contract my wife is to inherit half her father's fortune at his death--she must inherit the whole of it."

"Good Lord!"

The exclamation seemed to come from everybody in the general chorus of condemnation which followed.

"Are you dreaming?" cried the Governor. "Do you forget that the Factor has another daughter?"

"No, sir, I do not forget it," said Magnus. "But the other daughter has gone away with her mother; she may never come back; and after Thora has spent her life by her father's side--cheering him up and making his home bright, as mother says--and, perhaps, nursing him in his last days--is somebody else, who has done nothing, to sweep off half of all he leaves behind? No! My wife--if I marry--must have everything!"

The older people, both strangers and members of the family, broke into loud expressions of dissent, while the Factor looked round at them, and said, "An eagle isn't displeased with a dead sheep, is it? And so, Mr. Governor's son," he said, wheeling about on Magnus, "these are the only terms on which you will do me the honor to marry my daughter?"

Without noticing the sneer, Magnus answered "Yes."

"Well, I must say I'm deceived in Magnus," said Aunt Margret. "I didn't think he had a selfish thought in his heart."

"I didn't think," said the Factor, who was not laughing any longer, "I didn't think the son of anybody in Iceland could afford to turn up his nose at a daughter of mine."

"Neilsen," said the Governor, firmly, "we have been friends since we were boys, and neither of us knows which will bury the other--don't let us quarrel now over the conduct of our children."

The company murmured approval, and then the Governor turned once more to Magnus.

"My son--for you are my son, though I'm at a loss to understand it--you are making a breach between two families by asking these utterly impossible terms! Don't you see they are impossible? Have you taken leave of your senses? Are you quite mad? Or is it true that you have been drinking--that you are drunk? Good God!"

Magnus made no answer, but the painful silence which followed the Governor's outburst was broken by a pitiful cry. It came from Thora. She understood everything at last; she knew what Magnus was doing for her and the price he was going to pay for it; and she wanted to cry out, but could not; so she dropped her head on Aunt Margret's shoulder and wept bitterly.

Anna mistook Thora's tears for shame and humiliation, and turning to Magnus she said:

"My dear son, you haven't thought of things in the right way or you couldn't do what you are doing. I don't like these marriage contracts myself. It seems like a tempting of Providence to talk about money and business just when two souls who love one another are joining themselves together and becoming one. But you are making it worse, Magnus--you are making it a mere bargain. And, then, think of Thora! If you refuse her father's offer everybody will hear of it, and the poor girl will be shamed. Do you want to see that, Magnus? I'm sure you do not! So come now, for Thora's sake--even though you don't quite like the Factor's conditions, for Thora's sake, Magnus--will you not?"

Everybody waited for Magnus's reply, and even Thora raised her head.

"No," said Magnus, in a voice like a growl, and then he sat with a stolid face while the condemnation of the company fell upon him in a chorus of denunciation. "Infamous!" "Hateful!" "Execrable!" "Damnable!" "The man's heart must be as black as a raven."

Oscar could bear no more. He had been sitting silent, with head down, as if trying to hide his agitated face, while turning Helga's photograph over and over in his restless fingers; but now he rose, walked to the curtains, which divided the front room from the back, parted them with a trembling hand, and looked out over the lake on which the sun was setting.

"Don't go away, Oscar," cried the Governor. "I know you are disgusted with your brother's turpitude; but I want you to speak to him for all that. It is hardly likely that having refused to pay attention to his mother or me, he should listen to you or anybody else, but try him. For the honor of the family, tell him that if he adheres to the attitude he has taken up, he will be an object of hatred and contempt. As long as he lives people will despise him, and his family will be ashamed to acknowledge his name. If he has no love for Thora, see if he has any respect for himself. Speak to your brother, Oscar, for mercy's sake, speak to him."

Oscar's hand on the curtain shook visibly, and he said, with an effort, while all listened without breathing, and Thora's parted lips quivered:

"I cannot do that, father. I do not feel that I have any right. No doubt Magnus knows as well as we do what he is doing, and has counted all the consequences. Everybody has to live his own life."

At this there was a murmur of disappointment, and the Governor, turning away, walked to the window. Then Oscar stepped back to the table, and said, more firmly, yet with as much emotion:

"But if I cannot appeal to Magnus, there is something I can do--I can offer to take Magnus's place. If you and the Factor will consent I can accept the conditions of the contract just as they are, and be only too proud to marry Thora if she will accept me."

At first there were looks of blank amazement about the table, then a general sigh of relief, and everybody seemed to be saying at once, "Good!" "Splendid!" "The very thing!"

"Yes," said the voice of the Governor, husky with emotion, "it is just like Oscar--always doing the great thing! But in a matter which so intimately concerns the boy's future welfare I cannot allow a momentary impulse of generosity----"

"It isn't a momentary impulse, father. Since I came home from England I have learnt to love Thora. But she was engaged to my brother, and I couldn't speak until Magnus had spoken----"

"Honorable!" "Most honorable!" said several voices, and it was with difficulty that Oscar could go on.

"But now--if it is understood that Magnus retires, that is to say, refuses to marry Thora----"

"He does, undoubtedly he does," said the Factor.

"And if Thora will take me----"

Every eye looked toward Thora; she hesitated for a moment, then rose from her chair and timidly held out her hand. Oscar grasped it eagerly and there was a chorus of congratulation.

"But we cannot allow Thora, either, to be carried away by a momentary impulse," said Aunt Margret, who was vigorously wiping her eyes, "and if she's only doing this to escape from a shameful position----"

"I'm not, auntie," said Thora. "I only consented to marry Magnus because my father wished it, but I love Oscar, and if father will agree----"

The Factor's eyes were sparkling with the light of triumph, and he cried across to the Governor, "What do _you_ say, Stephen?"

"Well, I must say it's fast ambling--too fast," said the Governor, "but if the young people are satisfied, and if Oscar is content to give up his career in England--his music and his studies--and live in Iceland all his life, it may save a breach between our families and tide us over an ugly reef----"

"Then so be it, godson," cried the Factor, slapping Oscar on the back, "and as for England, I'll take care of that!"

This was received with a shout of approval from the strangers, and then the Factor called to the lawyer to alter the names in the contract and get it signed without delay.

"As for you, sir," he said, turning to Magnus, and snapping his fingers in his face, "your ugly chickens have come home to roost. You thought you could corner me, but your selfishness and worldliness have done the work that everybody seems to have wanted. Ha, ha, ha! he laughs best who laughs last! There's nothing I like better than to dish a man who tries to dish me, and I'll go to bed happy to-night."

Magnus had risen from his low seat and was standing with his head down and his hands on his hips while the storm beat over him, and thinking he was still unmoved the Factor burst upon him again in a tone of biting raillery:

"But if the barter trade is going to the dogs, hadn't you better cut it before the crash comes? Heavy is the fall, you know, when an old man tumbles, and I might crush you coming down. I'll trouble you to leave my house, sir, without a day's delay."

"Father!" cried Thora, and she stepped between them, but the Factor brushed her aside.

"You get away, Thora. If a daughter of mine had done to me what he has tried to do to-day she wouldn't have a roof to cover her to-night."

"Neither shall a son of mine--not in this town, at all events," said the Governor. "Magnus Stephenson----"

"Stephen! Stephen!" said Anna, and Oscar, in the same quivering voice as before, cried out to his father.

"Hold your tongue, Anna! Oscar, be quiet, you've done enough for one day! Magnus Stephenson, when you leave the Factor's house you will go to Thingvellir, and stay there, and thank your stars if for the rest of your life you are allowed to earn your bread by the sweat of your brow."

"The amended contract is ready for the signatures," said the lawyer, and then everybody save one turned back to the table, and there was a cackle of cheerful voices. When the names were all signed and witnessed, the rings were exchanged, and there was some joking and happy laughter.

"All's well that ends well," said the Bishop. "That will do as a pledge between you until you come to me to be made man and wife."

"Supper is ready," cried Aunt Margret, drawing the curtains of the inner room, and then seeing a photograph on the floor beneath them, she said, "but who's been treading on poor Helga's portrait?"

"That's Oscar," said Thora. "He had it in his hand when he got up."

When the company were seated about the supper table it was seen that there was one chair too many, and the Governor pushed it back with an impatient hand. Magnus had gone--no one had seen him go.

*XII*

Alone and forgotten, a prey to the devilish voices which had tortured him in the time of his temptation, angry and unsatisfied although he had carried out his purpose and triumphed as he had intended, Magnus was in his room at the top of the house gathering up his belongings by the light of a candle.

They were few and not valuable--a little money, two or three suits of clothes, two or three pairs of riding, fishing, and snow boots, some musical exercise books, the "Book of Job," "The Pilgrim's Progress" (having illustrations of Apollyon with horns), and the precious flute with which he had beguiled those blessed evenings that now seemed to belong to another existence. He had sent for two ponies to take him to the farm--a saddle pony and a pack pony--and two small boxes held everything. When all was packed he came upon the remains of a bottle of brandy which he had kept in his bedroom as medicine, and he drank the spirit and threw the bottle away.

During that short hour of pain and degradation he heard at intervals the various noises of the company at supper below--sometimes in single voices, sometimes in climbing cries like the sounds of a geyser, sometimes in peals of joyous laughter--and his heart grew bitter. He could plainly distinguish Oscar's voice among the rest, at first quiet enough, but afterward loud and hilarious, and his very soul sickened.

"You fool!" said the other voices at his ear. "What did you expect? Did you think he would be overwhelmed with sorrow? He is glad; he'll walk over your head, and over Thora's head, too! Listen to him already--the sweet, unselfish, privileged pet of everybody!"

After the boxes had been sent down-stairs Magnus took a last look round, and then he tried to shut out all bitter thoughts and evil passions, for he believed that he was leaving that room for ever. It had been his home through seven long years, and some of them had been bad years, but some of them had been good, and the good ones filled the little place with memories of many visions.

The sloping roof, the dormer window, the deal furniture, the sheep's skin on the bare floor, and the sunflower pattern on the wall-paper were all ghosts of the dreams he had dreamt there. Some were dreams of the great things he was going to do for Iceland, but more were dreams of Thora, and remembering that both sorts were dead now, and that Thora belonged to Oscar, to save himself from further repining and to crush down the riot that was rising within, he blew out the candle and that chapter of his life was at an end.

But the devilish voices were not yet done with him. Going down-stairs he had to pass the door of the front room on the first landing, and he went by it on tiptoe. For years he had always passed that door on tiptoe, for it was the door to Thora's room, a holy place, half nursery, half sanctuary, as Thora herself had grown to be half saint to him and half child; but he was not thinking of that this time. He was thinking he must get out of the house without seeing her again, for she belonged to Oscar now, and if they were to meet and she began to thank him for giving her to Oscar--but God forbid!

Thora's door was closed, but the next room stood open. It was Aunt Margret's bedroom, and Magnus knew that a photograph of Thora was on the chest of drawers near the door. He had often envied it, and now he stooped to look at it for the last time, and the voices at his ear seemed to say, "Take it; it's all you are going to carry away of her."

Going down the last flight of stairs he heard the two sitting-rooms buzzing like the mill-house, and knew that others must have joined the party; but above all other sounds he heard the sound of Oscar's voice, clear as a flute, saluting people as they came in. "Listen to him! The darling!" said the mocking voices by his side.

Coming to the hall, he encountered some of the women of the town in their feast-day dresses, and with garden flowers in their hands. Hardly any of them looked at him, but all passed into the sitting-room, where Oscar waited to welcome them.

The hat-stand in the hall had been cleared for the new-comers, therefore Magnus had to go to a rail under the stairs for his overcoat and riding-whip, and while he was there Aunt Margret opened the door of the back sitting-room to ventilate the crowded place. She did not see him, for she had taken off the spectacles she usually wore, and he was standing in the shadow, but he saw everybody in the room, and Thora among the rest.

Thora was sitting by the wall, and the townspeople were going up to her one after another and offering their flowers and making congratulatory speeches. And she was thanking them in her soft voice and looking very happy.

Magnus was hurt by Thora's happiness. He had done all he could to make her happy; he had sacrificed everything; but now that he looked on her happiness he was hurt by it; and when Oscar went and stood by her chair, looking bright and proud, he felt hot with anger and hatred.

While he pulled on his overcoat he could not help hearing what was being said within the room. "Such an extraordinary thing, Thora," said one, "people in the town actually said it was Magnus you were going to marry!" "I heard that, too," said another. "I heard it at Olaf's, the silversmith's, when we were drinking coffee." "Such an idea!" said a third, "as if any girl would marry Magnus who could get Oscar!" And then Oscar's voice, large, expansive, indulgent, almost patronizing, "Tut, tut! You mustn't say anything against Magnus, Elisabet!" "But I hear Magnus insulted Thora this evening, and the Factor has turned him out for it." "Can it be possible? I saw him in the hall as I was coming in!" "No, no, not insulted--not insulted exactly," said Oscar's voice again, and then Magnus, sick and dizzy, turned away.

He was going out of the house with head down when the door of the front sitting-room opened and closed quickly, and he found himself face to face with Thora. She was trying to look sad, but the light of her happiness was still in her eyes, and her parted lips were smiling.

"I heard you were here," she said, "and I couldn't help coming out to see you. Oscar told me yesterday I was not to speak, whatever happened, but it seems so terrible that you should leave us like this."

"We made a mistake, and we had to get out of it somehow," said Magnus.

"I know," said Thora. "And of course I think it will be the best thing in the end. You would have had no joy of me, Magnus, and I should have been very unhappy."

"Perhaps you would," said Magnus.

"But it is a great grief to me that you will have to give up all the schemes you had set your heart upon, Magnus."

"I have given up more than that, Thora," said Magnus, and he tried to push past her and go.

The light of her smile died off her face, and with a wistful look, in a pleading voice, she said:

"I feel as if I am losing a friend, Magnus, and you are saying good-by to me for good."

"Not that exactly," said Magnus.

"Good-by, Magnus!"

"Good-by!"

They were standing with hands clasped in what they believed to be their last parting when the buzz of the inner room broke out upon them again, and a cheery voice cried:

"Thora! Thora! Where are you?--Oh, it's you, Magnus?"

It was Oscar, and at the next moment Thora had gone back, the door of the sitting-room had closed behind her, and Magnus and his brother were together in the hall.

"I meant to come out to you before, old fellow," said Oscar, "but they stuck to me like leeches, and I couldn't get away. I wanted to thank you for what you did for me this evening. It was too generous, too brotherly, and I can never be sufficiently grateful."

Magnus did not answer, so Oscar went on:

"You pledged me to silence, and you were right, plainly right; but, of course, I cannot allow the error about your motive to go much farther, and as soon as it is safe to do so I will set you right. People shall know the truth about what you did, and why you did it; and they will make amends for their mistake."

Still Magnus did not speak, so Oscar continued:

"It's too bad, though, that you should suffer in the meantime, and if there is anything I could do for you--in a material way, I mean--if you are in want of----"

But the dark fire that was rising in Magnus's face frightened him, and he could not finish what he wished to say.

"I don't care a straw what people think I did it for," said Magnus, "and I don't care a damn if they never make amends. You know what I did it for, and that's enough for me. I did it for the sake of Thora. I gave her up to you that you might love her and cherish her and make her happy, and be a better husband to her than I could be. But if you don't do it; if you ever neglect her or desert her or give her up for another woman, I'll take her back. Do you hear me?"--(Magnus swayed like a drunken man and laid hold of Oscar's arm)--"I'll take her back, and then--then, by God, I'll kill you!"

Saying this, he walked heavily out of the house, leaving Oscar with white cheeks and gibbering lips, alone in the hall.

His ponies were waiting for him in the street ready for the journey to Thingvellir. The night was dark, but the windows of the house were bright, for the blinds had been drawn and the sashes thrown open. A cackle of many voices came out of them, for the company within was now large and very merry. While Magnus tightened the girths somebody played a guitar, and as he was riding away Oscar began to sing.

*PART II*

"_Impotent pieces of the game he plays_
_Upon this chequer-board of nights and days;_
_Hither and thither moves, and checks, and slays,_
_And one by one back in the closet lays._"

*I*

Oscar did his best to keep the fire burning in the inner sanctuary--the fire of love and duty--but oftener than he was aware it flickered, and seemed to be in danger of dying out. He tried to tell the truth about Magnus, but as frequently as he thought out a way of doing so he was confronted by the ugly question which would surely be asked: "Can it be possible that you stood passively aside while we condemned Magnus for a vice he was not guilty of, and praised you for a virtue you did not possess?" The humiliation of speech like that would be deeper than the degradation of silence, and from day to day Oscar postponed the painful confession. Thus a month passed, and he had said nothing.

His position would have been easier if he had been getting on better with his work--if he could have felt it impossible that the Factor could regret the loss of Magnus. Then he would have said, "After all, though naturally you didn't think so at the time, everything has been for the best," whereupon the Factor would have said, "You are right, god-son," and after that he would have told all.

But his work was going badly, and there was no blinking the fact that he was a poor business man. On first going into the Factor's, on the footing the contract gave him, he rambled from office to warehouse with aimless and shiftless uncertainty, dressed with Bohemian freedom, and looking like a butterfly in a back alley. Then the Factor said, "Come, come, young fellow, we must be getting to work; choose a department and be responsible for it."

Oscar selected the export department. This brought him into relation with the farmers, and some of them cheated him unmercifully, concealing their inferior wool in the body of the packs he bought from them. Magnus would have rooted out both the bad stuff and the men who brought it, and they would have gone flying before his threatening face; but Oscar wished to stand well with everybody, and the firm suffered accordingly.

After a week he wished to change. He thought the import department would suit him better: "Very well," said the Factor. "Mistakes are made by the young as well as the old--buckle to at the imports, my boy."

The imports brought him into relation with the mates of steamers and trading ships, and they were quick to shuffle their responsibility for damaged freights onto Oscar's shoulders.

After another week he went back to the Factor and said, "I don't think a department is what suits me best, god-father--why not let me have a general supervision?" The Factor shrugged his shoulders, but replied, "I'm willing. You shall be my right-hand man, then, and I'll ease off as soon as you are ready."

But from that moment onward Oscar did nothing, good, bad, or indifferent. He was always running about like one out of breath, but he came at any hour in the morning and left at any time in the evening, and was always skipping off to see Thora. That little lady was entirely content, but the Factor was heard to say to Aunt Margret, "There was something in Magnus after all, Margret." And Aunt Margret was heard to answer, "Many a good sword is in a bad sheath, you know."

But one day Oscar came flying to the Factor in breathless haste with his mouth full of great news. The Member of Parliament for the town was dead, and the Radical party were already preparing to run a candidate--an out-and-out Socialist named Oddsson, an enemy of the old order in both politics and trade.

"Why shouldn't I go into Althing?" said Oscar. "I could protect the business against these rascally revolutionaries, and help to preserve the old principles."

"Let me talk to your father first," said the Factor.

The old friends agreed that the scheme was a good one. Not only was the man Oddsson a believer in Magnus's doctrine about the barter trade, but he was the champion of an agitation for establishing a new constitution in Iceland, which would abolish the Governor and set up a Minister responsible to Parliament alone. He must be kept out. In self-defense they must fight the common enemy! Oscar would be a good candidate, being young and bright and clever, and a personal favorite.

"But I cannot appear in the contest," said the Governor.

"Leave it to me," said the Factor, and he went back and told Oscar, who shouted with delight and shot off to tell Thora.

By this time Thora had spent a long month in radiant happiness. If she thought sometimes of Magnus's position, she remembered that Oscar had said he would set things right, and the delay counted for little, because she measured existence by days no longer, but by emotions, and she was conscious of one emotion only--love for Oscar, and therefore for everybody and everything in the world.

As the year was growing elderly and its withering winds made further excursions to the islands of the fiord impossible, they remained at home and romped like children or played the guitar and piano. At such times Thora was not without certain backward thoughts of Magnus, for the room was the same and nothing was different except the hour of the day, but there was always the difference of its being Oscar.

He taught her some Icelandic love songs, and she sang them in a thin sweet treble, which Oscar cheered tumultuously. It did not hurt her in the least that Oscar never took her singing seriously--he did not take Thora herself seriously. He called her "Baby Thora," and she christened him the "Bad Boy."

The moment he had left her sight she would send a letter after him, like a handkerchief he had forgotten. He always replied, and his letters were full of affectionate banter, but perhaps at the bottom of her heart she was a little disappointed with them. They were not quite lover-like enough; there were scarcely any of them she could not read aloud to Aunt Margret; there was hardly one that was her very own. But Oscar made up for every deficiency when he arrived himself, and on the day when he came with a hop, skip, and a jump into the sitting-room, and announced that he was to be member of Althing, she saw him for one moment great and glorious, like the top of a mountain when it has broken through the mist and the sun has flashed on to it, and then she said, "And now the Bad Boy must play with me--he hasn't played me blindman's buff since yesterday."

Thora was too happy to think of her happiness, but she told herself sometimes that there was only one thing wanted to make it complete--that Helga should come home to share it. She broached the subject to Oscar, but it was at a moment when he was immersed in his manifestoes, and he merely said, "Good idea! Splendid! Helga looks like a stunner! Send for her certainly if the Factor approves," and he went on with his tiresome politics.

She broached it next to Aunt Margret, who was less encouraging. Putting her spectacled face close to Thora's, she shook her ringlets, and said, "Don't be a ninny! Two's company, three's none!"

But Thora mentioned the matter to Anna also, and the motherly old thing was moved. "That would be beautiful if you could manage it, Thora," she said, "and if it should lead to bringing the others together, what a blessing it would be!"

After that Thora regarded herself in the light of the family peace-maker, and in this character she approached her father. The Factor listened to her with sympathy, for nature is stronger than lawyer's ink, and he had often told himself he had been foolish to part with his child. "Well, I don't see why she shouldn't," he said. "She might come for the wedding--or, say for a year--one year at all events. I'll write to the lawyer in Denmark."

By the same mail Thora wrote to Helga:

Dearest Helga:--Father is writing to the lawyer to ask him to send you back to Iceland. It is only for a year, so I hope mamma will not object. I am sure you will not when I tell you what is to happen. There is to be a wedding, and, of course, a party, and great goings on.

Dear, I am to be married to Oscar Stephenson, who has come back from England, and is so handsome and so clever. If you could see him as he is now, you would fall in love with him instantly, but he is so fond of me, and I am so happy. I was to have married his brother Magnus, but the engagement broke down, and now I am very sorry for Magnus, and if ever you hear anything against him when you come home you are not to believe a word of it, because Magnus is as good as gold, only I could not care for him, so it was no use trying.

Dear, there are such lots of things I want to tell you, but I must save them until you come. We have had bad trade this summer, and Oscar has gone into father's business. I am weaving a web of cloth for father's Christmas suit, but it does not make much progress, because somebody is always interrupting, and when you are about to be married there is so much to do--isn't there?

Dearest Helga, I have no more to write about now, so give my love to mamma, and mind you come before long, for the wedding may be soon, although nothing is fixed yet. Your affectionate sister, Thora.

P.S.--Come quickly. I am dying to introduce you to Oscar.

A fortnight later the Factor announced that he had heard from the lawyer in Denmark, and Helga was to come by the next steamer.

"The 'Laura,' and she's due on the first of November, and that's the day of the election!" said Oscar.

"What a good omen!" said Thora, and she sang her Iceland love songs all that evening through, for she was very happy.

*II*

On the morning of the day when the "Laura" was due, there was no sign of her on the sea, but that was a matter of moment only to Thora, who had been up early and down at the jetty before breakfast. The rest of the little world in which she lived were immersed in preparations for the election and were going about like dogs on the leash before the hunt begins. Oscar was flying to and fro with red ribbons in his button-hole; ponies were coming and going with red ribbons in their bridles, and red flags were hanging all over the town; but, nevertheless, there was a sense of uncertainty everywhere and an atmosphere of intense excitement.

The day opened dull and rayless, with a pale sun behind a slaty sky like a white wafer on an old parchment. An hour before the polling booths opened the Governor called upon the Factor, under pretense of his morning's walk, and said:

"I'm doubtful of the result, Neilsen, and I now see that Oscar was the worst possible candidate to stand for our cause. Everybody who has a grievance against the Governor is going to vote against the Governor's son, and everybody who has a grievance against the Factor will vote against his son-in-law."

"Oh, I know the people, bless them," said the Factor. "Master when you want anything--slave when you don't. But we'll see, Stephen, we'll see!"

After finishing his breakfast comfortably the Factor walked leisurely to his counting-house and called for his ledger. It showed that nearly half of the electors of the town were indebted to him, some of them slightly, others deeply, and not a few beyond hope of payment without pressure or distraint. He counted up their total indebtedness, and it proved to be frightful. "But life is precious when death is at the door," he thought, and lighting his long German pipe, he put the leather-bound book under his arm and strolled quietly across to the polling-station.

As chairman of Oscar's committee the Factor had a right to sit inside the polling booth, but he merely asked to be allowed to take a chair outside the counter to which the voters would come up when they recorded their votes. "A low seat is often easy," he said, sitting with his face to the Sheriff and his back to the door.

When the doors were opened the Factor laid his ledger across his knees and took out a thick blue pencil. Then, as each voter came up to the counter and his name was called and looked up in the register, the Factor was seen to turn up the voter's account in his own book and hold his blue pencil over it.

"Whom do you vote for?" asked the Sheriff, "Oscar Stephenson or Jon Oddsson?" and if the voter answered "Oscar Stephenson," the blue pencil was seen to descend in two broad strokes across the account as if cancelling it altogether; but if he answered "Jon Oddsson," it was seen to score the total with a double underline as if marking it for immediate recovery.

The opposition had entered in hot haste, but the effect was instantaneous. A voter would come swaggering up to the counter, call his name in a robustious voice, and then (while waiting for the verification of his right to vote) see the Factor sitting below with his own account open before him, and, understanding everything in a moment, would begin to answer the Sheriff with a faltering, "Odd----," then pause, tremble, mumble "Stephenson," and go stumbling out of doors.

Silently, hour after hour, from the beginning of the day to the end of it, the Factor sat at his task, never once looking up from his ledger and apparently doing nothing but checking, as he had a right to do, the Sheriff's record of the votes. Aunt Margret came to say that dinner was ready, but he answered that he was not hungry. Toward three in the afternoon Thora arrived in great excitement to say that the "Laura" had been sighted outside the head, but he told her to meet her sister herself, and tell her that he did not expect to be home before midnight.

When the cathedral clock struck four the Sheriff rose and ordered the shutting of the doors. The short winter's day had closed in by this time, and while the counting was going on with its monotonous beat in the silence of the breathless room, like the splashing of rain on the pavement--"Stephenson, Stephenson, Oddsson, Stephenson"--the Factor, who had lit his pipe, was pacing the corridor outside, like a man who walks in his orchard when the fruit is ripe.

When the counting was finished the Sheriff told the attendants to open the window, and then the deep hum of a crowd which had been cheering and singing outside, with a noise like the waves breaking on a bar far off, rose to a roar, like that of the sea running up a stony beach. At the next moment everybody was shaking hands with Oscar, a band was beginning to play in the street, and the Sheriff was stepping on to the balcony.

Meantime Thora, fluttering with excitement of another sort, had gone down to the jetty to meet Helga. As soon as the "Laura" had steamed up the fiord and cast anchor outside the town, she put off in her father's white boat and drew up alongside. It was now quite dark, but lights were burning on the steamer and the dark figures of a line of passengers were silhouetted against the sky as they leaned over the rail and shouted to the friends in little boats who had come out to meet them. Thora was sure that Helga must be there, and she wanted to call to her, but her heart was beating so fast that her voice would not answer. At length the ladder was let down, and Thora's boat swayed up to it, and then she climbed up the steamer's side.

"Helga!"

"Miss Helga is below," said a voice out of the darkness, and though she felt a pang of disappointment that Helga was not waiting, she ran down the stairs to the saloon. At the bottom she called "Helga" again, and the stewardess said:

"The young lady is in her cabin."

"Which?"

"Second to the left."

Feeling conscious of increasing disappointment, but still panting in her eagerness, Thora skipped off to the cabin, and then came a shock of surprise.

Somehow she had expected to find Helga a little thing, grown certainly, but still smaller than herself. In her dreams of their first meeting she had pictured herself stooping to kiss Helga, and then in a sisterly-motherly sort of way putting her arms about her waist. But the young lady who came leisurely out of the cabin with her veil down and buttoning her kid gloves, was much taller than Thora and quite dignified and stately.

"Thora!" said the girl.

"So it is you--really you?" said Thora.

"Really me," laughed Helga, and then it was Helga who stooped to kiss Thora, who had to lift up her face to her.

Thora's heart was in her mouth in both senses. She looked at Helga again by the dim light of the saloon lamp, and felt herself small and insignificant. Helga was beautiful, with fine features, large gray eyes and rich dark complexion, and Thora felt herself to be plain and commonplace. Helga was fashionably dressed in the Danish manner, with the soft silk things about the neck and bosom which give charm to a charming girl, and Thora felt herself to be dowdy and countrified in her Iceland hufa and stiff velvet cloak.

"Have you come alone?" asked Helga.

"Quite alone," said Thora.

"But hasn't father come with you? Or Aunt Margret? Or that wonderful Oscar? Is there nobody but you?"

"Nobody but me," said Thora, and then, though she felt crushed and small, she delivered the Factor's message and told about the election.

"So that was the meaning of the band we heard as we were sailing up?" said Helga, and at the first moment Thora thought perhaps Helga had hoped it was in honor of her own arrival, but at the next she felt ashamed and foolish.

"We might as well go, then," said Helga, and she swept up the stairs, leaving Thora to follow. It was all so different from what Thora had expected--so utterly different--that she would have given anything to run away and cry.

But going ashore in the boat, she sat at the helm side by side with Helga, and there, the lights being gone, and Thora no longer in awe of Helga's fashion and beauty, she slipped her arm about her sister's waist, as she had always intended to do, and after that they got on better.

When they touched the jetty there was much shouting and scrambling in the darkness, and Thora was nervous and excited, but Helga was quiet and even amused.

"No carriages in this benighted country yet, I suppose?" said Helga.

"No, but I've brought Silvertop to take you up," said Thora.

"And what is there for you?"

"Oh, I'll walk--I love walking."

The street at the top of the jetty was thronged with the people who were waiting outside the polling place to hear the result of the election, and when the girls came to the crowd, which was good-natured but boisterous, they found it difficult to plow their way through until a big man stepped before them and swept the people aside like ninepins.

"What a tremendous creature that was," said Helga. "He could have felled an ox, I fancy."

"But didn't you know him, Helga? It was Magnus Stephenson," said Thora.

"Magnus? Why didn't he speak, I wonder?"

They had reached the outskirts of the crowd and were crossing in front of the polling place when the people raised a great shout, for it was the moment when the Sheriff stepped on to the balcony.

"He's going to declare the poll. Shall we wait?" asked Thora.

"It might be amusing," said Helga.

As soon as there was silence the Sheriff read the figures. Oscar had been elected by three votes to one. At this there was another hurricane of cheers, with cries of "Oscar!" "Oscar!" and Thora said:

"Oscar will come next. Shall we wait and see him?"

"Why not? It will be good fun," said Helga, and in the interval Thora patted Silvertop to keep him quiet, and creeping closer to her sister squeezed her hand.

Then Oscar came bounding on to the balcony amidst a wild breaker of applause, and behind him came two men bearing torches, so that his figure and face were plainly visible to the crowd below--his slight, lithe form, his fair hair slightly ruffled, his sparkling eyes, his mobile mouth and the never-failing smile that captivated everybody.

It was thus that Helga saw him for the first time since he became a man, and her face, which had worn a playful expression, became grave.

"How fine!" she said.

Thora could hardly catch the words over the sibilation of the running cheers, but she said:

"He will speak--shall we wait to hear him?"

"Assuredly," said Helga, and when Oscar began with "Fellow townsmen and fellow countrymen," Thora felt Helga's hand shiver and heard her say, "The same voice!"

Oscar's speech was punctuated by applause at the end of every sentence, and when it was finished, and the speaker and the men with the torches had disappeared, Thora spoke to Helga again, but she answered at random, and sat in her saddle like one in a dream.

Somebody else came on to the balcony and had a mixed reception.

"It must be father," said Thora, and then the Factor's voice, utterly indifferent to hostile interruptions, was heard to say that a supper had been prepared at the hotel for the committee of the successful candidate, and they were to go there at once--the new member would follow presently.

With that the crowd broke up, and the girls went their way--Thora clinging closer than ever to her sister, for her heart was warm with love and pride.

"Well," she said, "what did you think of him?"

"Think of him? Oscar?" said Helga. She laughed uncomfortably, and then stooped from the saddle and whispered:

"Only to think that a little thing like you, dear, should capture a man like that!"

Thora laughed also, but she hardly knew whether she was pleased or hurt. A sudden chill had struck her. It was like the breath of the mountain snow which sometimes comes down in summer.

*III*

The gods of riot were playing so hard a game with Thora that she was in a fever to introduce Oscar to Helga, and when he did not appear by noon of the following day she sent a letter across to Government House to order him to come forthwith. The "Bad Boy" was too full of his silly politics, while there was something far more charming and absorbing waiting for him there. But an answer came back from Anna to say that Oscar was still asleep, and after the excitement of the day before, and the late hour of the previous night, she was unwilling to waken him.