The girl blushed.  She made no resistance, but hid her troubled face against his shoulder.

He pressed her closer.  Through her thin blouse he could feel her blood burning against his breast.  He felt his senses going, a painful weakness seemed to stifle him, as if only a violent movement could give him breath.  Feverishly he clenched his left hand, that was round her waist; with his right beneath her chin he raised her head.

“Annikki!” he whispered, his lips still nearer.  “Only one....”

She drew away, shaking her head, and looked at him reproachfully.

“How can you ask?  You know—­you know it wouldn’t be right.”

“Then you don’t care for me, as you said!” he cried passionately, as if accusing her of faithlessness.

The girl burst into tears, her slight shoulders quivering.  The cluster of flowers fell to the ground.

“My flowers ...” she cried.

A flush of shame burned in the young man’s cheek.  As if stricken powerless, his hands loosed their hold, and he set the girl down by his side.

She was trembling still.  He gazed at her helplessly, as one who has done wrong without intent.

“Annikki!” he said imploringly.  “Forgive me, Annikki.  I don’t know what made me do it.  If you only knew how sorry I am.”

The girl looked up, smiling through her tears.  “I know—­I know you would never try to hurt me.”

“And you’ll be just the same now—­as if nothing had happened—­will you?”

He took her hand, and his eyes sought hers.  And trustingly she gave him both.

“May I put them there again?” he asked shyly, picking up the flowers from the ground.

The girl laughed; the blossom laughed.

“And then I must go—­mother is waiting.”

“Must you?”

They rose to their feet, and he fastened the blossoms at her breast.

“How good you are!” he said, with a sense of unspeakable joy and thankfulness.

“And you too....  Good-bye, Olof.”

“Good-bye—­fairy!”

He stood in the clearing, watching her as she went, till the last glimpse of her had vanished between the trees.

She turned round once, and the red flowers in her white blouse burned like the glow of the setting sun on a white cloud.

“I’ll fell no more to-day,” said the youth, and sat down on a fallen tree, with his head in his hands.

GAZELLE

  “My love is like a strawberry sweet,
      Strawberry sweet, strawberry sweet. 
   I’ll dance with her when next we meet,
      Next we meet, next we meet!”

The song came as a welcome from the playing-fields of the village as Olof climbed the hill; it lightened his step, forcing him to keep time.

Even the trees around seemed waving to the tune; the girls’ thin summer dresses fluttered, and here and there gay ribbons in their hair.