“If you had just gone by....”

“I thought of going by—­seeing I’m one that has no right ever to stay....  I couldn’t see if it was right to stop and look at you.”

“Now I don’t quite understand.”

“You can’t understand it at all—­’twas only something I was trying to think out myself....  But I did stop and look—­and ’tis thanks to that I’ve had this lovely autumn, after all.”

“And I, too,” whispered the girl.

“Yes, thanks to you, I have learned that autumn can be beautiful as well; lovelier even than the spring—­for the autumn is cooler, calmer, and gentler than the spring.  And it was then I learned for the first time what it is that makes life beautiful—­what it is that human beings seek.”

The girl has slipped down to the ground, and sat now looking up at him, resting her arms on his knees.

“Tell me more—­more about that.  It’s so pretty to hear, and I understand it all, though I could never say it that way myself.”

“Yes, you know, and all know, that there is nothing beautiful in life but that one thing—­and all of us live for that, and nothing else.  Without that we have only our hands and work for them, our teeth and food for them; but, when that comes, all is changed.  You have seen yourself, and felt, how it changes everything.”

“Oh, have I not!  How could I help it?”

“How sad faces learn to smile, and eyes to speak, and how we learn a new tongue altogether.  Even the voice is changed, to a silvery ring.  All the world is changed, to something lovelier—­and we ourselves grow beautiful beyond words.”

“Yes, yes—­Olof, how wonderful of you!  It is all like a beautiful dream.”

“Do you remember the time when you first began to care for me?”

“I shall always remember that time—­always.”

“It was pretty to watch—­how you blushed and paled, and blushed again, and never knew which way to turn your eyes, and your heart throbbed, and you never dared confess even to yourself what made it so.  I watched you then, and I found myself wishing you might not see me at all, only that I might watch you for ever from some secret place.”

“Oh, but you don’t know how it hurt, all the same—­how anxious I was all the time—­I could not have borne it long, I know.”

“Yes—­I understand....  And you were more beautiful still when you opened your heart to me.  I read in your eyes as in an open book, and it made life bright and beautiful again for me.”

“I—­I have done nothing at all ...” said the girl, blushing, and looking down.  But she raised her head again, laid one hand on his knee, and looked questioningly at him.

He laughed in reply.

Slowly she drew herself up into his embrace, and put her arms about his neck.

“May I sit here like this?”

“Yes, you may—­like this,” said he, slipping an arm round her waist.

The girl’s face drew nearer to his own, still questioning.