“Near her!” exclaimed the stranger, “she has never so much as let me touch her hand.  When she saw me for the first time her glance intimidated me; she said:  ’You are welcome here, for you were to come.’  I fancied that she knew me.  I trembled.  It is fear that forces me to believe in her.”

“With me it is love,” said Minna, without a blush.

“Are you making fun of me?” said Monsieur Becker, laughing good-humoredly; “you my daughter, in calling yourself a Spirit of Love, and you, Monsieur Wilfrid, in pretending to be a Spirit of Wisdom?”

He drank a glass of beer and so did not see the singular look which Wilfrid cast upon Minna.

“Jesting apart,” resumed the old gentleman, “I have been much astonished to hear that these two mad-caps ascended to the summit of the Falberg; it must be a girlish exaggeration; they probably went to the crest of a ledge.  It is impossible to reach the peaks of the Falberg.”

“If so, father,” said Minna, in an agitated voice, “I must have been under the power of a spirit; for indeed we reached the summit of the Ice-Cap.”

“This is really serious,” said Monsieur Becker.  “Minna is always truthful.”

“Monsieur Becker,” said Wilfrid, “I swear to you that Seraphita exercises such extraordinary power over me that I know no language in which I can give you the least idea of it.  She has revealed to me things known to myself alone.”

“Somnambulism!” said the old man.  “A great many such effects are related by Jean Wier as phenomena easily explained and formerly observed in Egypt.”

“Lend me Swedenborg’s theosophical works,” said Wilfrid, “and let me plunge into those gulfs of light,—­you have given me a thirst for them.”

Monsieur Becker took down a volume and gave it to his guest, who instantly began to read it.  It was about nine o’clock in the evening.  The serving-woman brought in the supper.  Minna made tea.  The repast over, each turned silently to his or her occupation; the pastor read the Incantations; Wilfrid pursued the spirit of Swedenborg; and the young girl continued to sew, her mind absorbed in recollections.  It was a true Norwegian evening—­peaceful, studious, and domestic; full of thoughts, flowers blooming beneath the snow.  Wilfrid, as he devoured the pages of the prophet, lived by his inner senses only; the pastor, looking up at times from his book, called Minna’s attention to the absorption of their guest with an air that was half-serious, half-jesting.  To Minna’s thoughts the face of Seraphitus smiled upon her as it hovered above the clouds of smoke which enveloped them.  The clock struck twelve.  Suddenly the outer door was opened violently.  Heavy but hurried steps, the steps of a terrified old man, were heard in the narrow vestibule between the two doors; then David burst into the parlor.

“Danger, danger!” he cried.  “Come! come, all!  The evil spirits are unchained!  Fiery mitres are on their heads!  Demons, Vertumni, Sirens! they tempt her as Jesus was tempted on the mountain!  Come, come! and drive them away.”