“Is it here?” he said, and stopped just at the foot of the little sand-hill.

He bent his head imperceptibly and went on towards the little cottage.

“Wait,” she called after him, “we must talk this over before I go into your home.  You have lied,” she went on, threateningly, when he turned to her.  “You have deceived me worse than if you were my worst enemy.  Why have you done it?”

“I wanted you for my wife,” he answered, with a low, trembling voice.

“If you had only deceived me within bounds!  Why did you make everything so fine and rich?  What did you have to do with man-servants and triumphal arches and all the other magnificence?  Did you think that I was so devoted to money?  Did you not see that I cared enough for you to go anywhere with you?  That you could believe you needed to deceive me!  That you could have the heart to keep up your lies to the very last!”

“Will you not come in and speak to my mother?” he said, helplessly.

“I do not intend to go in there.”

“Are you going home?”

“How can I go home?  How could I cause them there at home such sorrow as to return, when they believe me happy and rich?  But with you I will not stay either.  For one who is willing to work there is always a livelihood.”

“Stop!” he begged.  “I did it only to win you.”

“If you had told me the truth, I would have stayed.”

“If I had been a rich man, who had pretended to be poor, then you would have stayed.”

She shrugged her shoulders and turned to go, when the door of the cottage opened and Boerje’s mother came out.  She was a little, dried-up old woman with few teeth and many wrinkles, but not so old in years or in feelings as in looks.

She had heard a part and guessed a part, for she knew what they were quarrelling about.  “Well,” she said, “that is a fine daughter-in-law you have got me, Boerje.  And you have been deceiving again, I can hear.”  But to Astrid she came and patted her kindly on the cheek.  “Come in with me, you poor child!  I know that you are tired and worn out.  This is my house.  He is not allowed to come in here.  But you come.  Now you are my daughter, and I cannot let you go to strangers, do you understand?”

She caressed her daughter-in-law and chatted to her and drew and pushed her quite imperceptibly forward to the door.  Step by step she lured her on, and at last got her inside the house; but Boerje she shut out.  And there, within, the old woman began to ask who she was and how it had all happened.  And she wept over her and made her weep over herself.  The old woman was merciless about her son.  She, Astrid, did right; she could not stay with such a man.  It was true that he was in the habit of lying, it was really true.