g the turf, but he just lifted his head and looked at her--she
plucked a handful of grass, and offered it, and when he had disposed of
that, she patted his muzzle, and he let her cling round his neck for a
moment.

"I'll be sure to write," she cried out to no one in particular, as she
went back over the courtyard again.

The train moved out of the station, taking with it Uthoug junior and
Louise, each waving from one of the windows of the compartment.

And Peer and Merle were left on the platform, holding their two youngest
children by the hand. They could still see a small hand with a white
handkerchief waving from the carriage window. Then the last carriage
disappeared into the cutting, and the smoke and the rumble of the train
were all that was left.

The four that were left behind stood still for a little while, but they
seemed to have moved unconsciously closer together than before.

Chapter VI

Some way up from the high-road there stands a little one-storeyed house
with three small windows in a row, a cowshed on one side of it and a
smithy on the other. When smoke rises from the smithy, the neighbours
say: "The engineer must be a bit better to-day, since he's at it in the
smithy again. If there's anything you want done, you'd better take it to
him. He doesn't charge any more than Jens up at Lia."

Merle and Peer had been living here a couple of years. Their lives had
gone on together, but there had come to be this difference between them:
Merle still looked constantly at her husband's face, always hoping that
he would get better, while he himself had no longer any hope. Even
when the thump, thumping in his head was quiet for a time, there was
generally some trouble somewhere to keep him on the rack, only he did
not talk about it any more. He looked at his wife's face, and thought
to himself: "She is changing more and more; and it is you that are to
blame. You have poured out your own misery on her day and night. It is
time now you tried to make some amends." So had begun a struggle to keep
silence, to endure, if possible to laugh, even when he could have found
it in his heart to weep. It was difficult enough, especially at first,
but each victory gained brought with it a certain satisfaction which
strengthened him to take up the struggle again.

In this way, too, he learned to look on his fate more calmly. His humour
grew lighter; it was as if he drew himself up and looked misfortune in
the eyes, sa