rong staff in a cruel and threatening manner.

"Hate her!" she muttered, "I have hated her ever since she was born! I
hated her mother before her! A nest of devils, every one of them; and
the curse will always be upon us while they dwell here."

She paused and looked at Ulrika steadily.

"Remember!" she said, with an evil leer on her lips, "I hold a secret of
yours that is worth the keeping! I give you two weeks more; within that
time you must act! Destroy the witch,--bring back to me my grandchild
Britta, or else--it will be _my_ turn!"

And she laughed silently. Ulrika's face grew paler, and the hand that
grasped the folds of her shawl trembled violently. She made an effort,
however, to appear composed, as she answered--"I have sworn to obey you,
Lovisa,--and I will. But tell me one thing--how do you know that Thelma
Gueldmar is indeed a witch?"

"How do I know?" almost yelled Lovisa. "Have I lived all these years for
nothing? Look at her! Am _I_ like her? Are _you_ like her? Are any of
the honest women of the neighborhood like her? Meet her on the hills
with knives and pins,--prick her, and see if the blood will flow! I
swear it will not--not one drop! Her skin is too white; there is no
blood in those veins--only fire! Look at the pink in her cheeks,--the
transparency of her flesh,--the glittering light in her eyes, the gold
of her hair, it is all devil's work, it is not human, it is not natural!
I have watched her,--I used to watch her mother, and curse her every
time I saw her--ay! curse her till I was breathless with cursing--"

She stopped abruptly. Ulrika gazed at her with as much wonder as her
plain, heavy face was capable of expressing. Lovisa saw the look and
smiled darkly.

"One would think _you_ had never known what love is!" she said, with a
sort of grim satire in her tone. "Yet even your dull soul was on fire
once! But I--when I was young, I had beauty such as you never had, and I
loved--Olaf Gueldmar."

Ulrika uttered an exclamation of astonishment. "You! and yet you hate
him now?"

Lovisa raised her hand with an imperious gesture.

"I have grown hate like a flower in my breast," she said, with a sort of
stern impressiveness. "I have fostered it year after year, and now,--it
has grown too strong for me! When Olaf Gueldmar was young he told me I
was fair; once he kissed my cheek at parting! For those words,--for that
kiss,--I loved him then--for the same things I hate him now! When I know
he h