in one place and then in
another. It could not be fear of any one at home, and then it suddenly
dawned upon him that she was ashamed that people should see her standing
and talking to him, so with a "Good-bye, Silla!" he darted from her.

Afterwards he thoroughly enjoyed seeing her look so unhappy and so eager
to show him that she did not care what people thought. What did she care
about him, when he had nothing to treat her with? It was not fit for her
to stand talking to a fellow like him.

There is a splendid friend and ally for every one who has thin, ragged
clothes, and that is the sun. He distributes overcoats in the shape of
warm, sunny walls, brings life and movement with him, and then there
need no longer be any uncertainty about a midday-meal.

Nikolai had had work on the quay the whole morning, and was now
standing, in the midday rest, baking himself against the sunny wall, and
yawning.

He stopped in the middle of a yawn. That slight figure in the faded
cotton dress, that was running with her body bent forwards, and a
handkerchief over the little, dark head, to keep off the sun--it was no
other than Silla!

She was darting along among the baskets and traffic on the fish-quay;
there was a searching haste in her like that of a frightened corn-crake,
that turns its head now to one side now to the other as it runs. She had
caught sight of him, and now she began calling:

"Nikolai! Nikolai!

"Nikolai!"--she almost choked in her hurry to speak--"Nikolai, just
think! Mother, when she was unpicking my old blue dress to-day, she
found the money in the lining, inside the lining, both the notes, and
the silver too. I ran down to tell you directly I had taken father's
dinner to the workshop. And now I'm going to the smithy, and they shall
hear what they have done to you. Could you believe it! Inside the
lining! I am so awfully, awfully glad"--and her eyes did look almost
wild--You can't think what a grave face mother put on!"

"Just tell them at home that it's all the same to me!" said he bitterly
and unmelted. But she did not notice it; she wanted to go to the smithy,
and away she went.

He had no objection. But now that Anders Berg had set up for himself in
Svelvig, there was no one there he cared about, to hear it. For he was a
free man now!

He stood with his hands in his trouser pockets, gazing over the edge of
the quay at a sunken sugar-loaf, which a crowd of small boys, amid noise
and clamour, were l