village to get some things, it was wrong of
Barbro to run away from the hut and the animals and leave the place to
itself. They had a few words over that. And where had she been? Only
to her home, to Breidablik, but still ... When Axel came back to the
hut that night, Barbro was not there; he looked to the animals, got
himself something to eat, and turned in. Towards morning Barbro came.
"I only wanted to see what it was like to step on a wooden floor
again," she said, somewhat scornfully. And Axel could find nothing
much to say to that, seeing that he had as yet but a turf hut with a
floor of beaten earth. He did say, however, that if it came to that,
he could get a few planks himself, and no doubt but he'd have a house
with a wooden floor himself in time! Barbro seemed penitent at that;
she was not altogether unkindly. And for all it was Sunday, she went
off at once to the woods and gathered fresh juniper twigs to spread on
the earthen floor.

And then, seeing she was so fine-hearted and behaved so splendidly,
what could Axel do but bring out the kerchief he had bought for her
the evening before, though he had really thought of keeping it by a
while, and getting something respectable out of her in return. And
there! she was pleased with it, and tried it on at once--ay, she
turned to him and asked if she didn't look nice in it. And yes, indeed
she did; and she might put on his old fur cap if she liked, and she'd
look nice in that! Barbro laughed at this and tried to say something
really nice in return; she said: "I'd far rather go to church and
communion in this kerchief than wear a hat. In Bergen, of course, we
always wore hats--all except common servant-girls from the country."

Friends again, as nice as could be.

And when Axel brought out the newspaper he had fetched from the post
office, Barbro sat down to read news of the world: of a burglary at
a jeweller's shop in one Bergen street, and a quarrel between two
gipsies in another; of a horrible find in the harbour--the dead body
of a newborn child sewed up in an old shirt with the sleeves cut off.
"I wonder who can have done it?" said Barbro. And she read the list of
marketing prices too, as she always did.

So the summer passed.

Chapter XVI

Great changes at Sellanraa.

There was no knowing the place again, after what it had been at first:
sawmill, cornmill, buildings of all sorts and kinds--the wilderness
was peopled country now. And there was