sed ignorance.
There was nothing for it but to go. He had lost both her and the dog.

Up in her room Mary asked the dog: "Will you be mine? Will you go with
me, little black John?" She clapped her hands to make him bark his
joyful: Yes. The question of ownership was settled thus. A letter which
came from Joergen, probably on this subject, she burned unread.

She expected him to appear at the station, at the time when the train
for Norway left, to claim his property. She drove boldly up with her dog
at her side, washed, combed, perfumed. Joergen was not there.

* * * * *

Mary slept all night with the dog at her feet, on her travelling rug.

But with morning came reflection. Now she was alone, alone with the
responsibility.

Hitherto she had been forcing herself into the one narrow way of
escape--to marry Joergen at once, bear her child abroad, and after
that--endure as long as she could.

But to marry the man she loathed, merely in order to save her good
name--how inconceivable such a step now seemed to her! She had tried to
take it, because she knew what those around her thought on such
subjects, and because she occupied a peculiar position; upon festal
garments a stain was unendurable.

But now she said "For shame!" at the thought of it--said it aloud. And
the dog instantly looking up, she added: "Yes, John, it was 'to the
dogs' I was going when I set off on this journey!"

But what was she to do now?

She knew what could be done. But two besides herself would be in that
secret--Joergen and another. This in itself was prohibitive. She could
never again hold up her head proudly and independently--and to be able
to do so was a necessity to her.

Well, what then?

As long as her journey and what it entailed had seemed to her to be
imperative, for honour's sake inevitable, the idea of the last, the very
last refuge had not suggested itself seriously.

Now it faced her in sad earnest!

She looked mournfully into the dog's honest eyes, as if she were
searching for a way of escape from this too. She read in them the most
unmixed happiness and devotion. Burying her face in his curls, she wept.
She was so young still, she did not want to die.

For the first time she wept for herself, was sorry for herself. It did
not seem to her that she had done anything to deserve this. Nor could
she account to herself for the manner in which it had all come about.

The dog understood that s