There was no doubt in her mind that she would see something; she was so sure of it, in fact, that she hardly dared venture out upon the stones that led across the brook.  Yet something made her do it.  When halfway over, all at once she saw something moving in among the trees on the other side of the brook.  It was no bridal procession, however, but a solitary man, who was slowly coming toward the meadow.

The man was tall and young, and was dressed in a long black garment that came to his feet.  His head was uncovered, and his hair hung in long black locks over his shoulders.  He had a slender and very beautiful face.  He was coming straight toward Gertrude.  In his eyes, which were clear and radiant, there was a wonderful light; and when his gaze fell upon Gertrude, she felt that he could read all her sorrowful thoughts, and she saw that he pitied her whose mind was haunted by fears of the paltry things of earth, whose soul had become darkened by thoughts of revenge, and whose heart had been sown with the thistles and poison flowers of Grief.

As he drew nigh, there came over Gertrude such a blissful sense of ever growing peace and serenity!  And when he had passed by, there was no longer any fear or resentment in her thought.  All that was not good had vanished like a sickness of which one has been healed.

Gertrude stood rapt for a long while.  The vision faded away, but she was still held by the beauty of it, and the impression of what she had seen stayed with her.  Clasping her hands she raised them in ecstasy.

“I have seen the Christ!” she cried out with joy.  “I have seen the Christ!  He has freed me from my sorrow, and I love Him.  Now I can never again love anyone else in the world.”

The trials of life had suddenly dwindled into mere nothings, and life’s long years appeared as but a moment in the Glass of Time, while earthly joys seemed trivial and shallow and meaningless.  All at once it became clear to Gertrude how she was to order her life; so that she might never again sink down into the darkness of fear, nor be tempted into doing anything mean or hateful, she would go with the Hellgumists to Jerusalem.  This thought had come to her when the Christ passed by.  She felt that it had come from Him; she had read it in His eyes.

***

On the beautiful June day when the daughter of Berger Sven Persson was given in marriage to Ingmar Ingmarsson, a tall, slender young woman stopped at the Ingmar Farm early in the morning, and asked if she might speak to the bridegroom.  She wore her kerchief so far down over her face that nothing could be seen of it save a creamy cheek and a pair of rosy lips.  On her arm was a basket that held little bundles of handmade trimmings, a few hair chains, and hair bracelets.

She gave her message to an old maidservant, whom she met in the yard, and who went in and told the housewife.  The housewife answered sharply: