Friends again, as nice as could be.

And when Axel brought out the newspaper he had fetched from the post office, Barbro sat down to read news of the world:  of a burglary at a jeweller’s shop in one Bergen street, and a quarrel between two gipsies in another; of a horrible find in the harbour—­the dead body of a newborn child sewed up in an old shirt with the sleeves cut off.  “I wonder who can have done it?” said Barbro.  And she read the list of marketing prices too, as she always did.

So the summer passed.

Chapter XVI

Great changes at Sellanraa.

There was no knowing the place again, after what it had been at first:  sawmill, cornmill, buildings of all sorts and kinds—­the wilderness was peopled country now.  And there was more to come.  But Inger was perhaps the strangest of all; so altered she was, and good and clever again.

The great event of last year, when things had come to a head, was hardly enough in itself, perhaps, to change her careless ways; there was backsliding now and then, as when she found herself beginning to talk of the “Institute” again, and the cathedral at Trondhjem.  Oh, innocent things enough; and she took off her ring, and let down that bold skirt of hers some inches.  She was grown thoughtful, there was more quiet about the place, and visits were less frequent; the girls and women from the village came but rarely now, for Inger no longer cared to see them.  No one can live in the depth of the wilds and have time for such foolishness.  Happiness and nonsense are two different things.

In the wilds, each season has its wonders, but always, unchangingly, there is that immense heavy sound of heaven and earth, the sense of being surrounded on all sides, the darkness of the forest, the kindliness of the trees.  All is heavy and soft, no thought is impossible there.  North of Sellanraa there was a little tarn, a mere puddle, no bigger than an aquarium.  There lived some tiny baby fish that never grew bigger, lived and died there and were no use at all—­Herregud! no use on earth.  One evening Inger stood there listening for the cowbells; all was dead about her, she heard nothing, and then came a song from the tarn.  A little, little song, hardly there at all, almost lost.  It was the tiny fishes’ song.

* * * * *

They had this good fortune at Sellanraa, that every spring and autumn they could see the grey geese sailing in fleets above that wilderness, and hear their chatter up in the air—­delirious talk it was.  And as if the world stood still for a moment, till the train of them had passed.  And the human souls beneath, did they not feel a weakness gliding through them now?  They went to their work again, but drawing breath first; something had spoken to them, something from beyond.