No, 'twas all awry with the haymaking the year before. Inger had put
in all she could, as she had promised. Leopoldine did her share too,
not to speak of having a machine for a horse to rake. But the hay
was much of it heavy stuff, and the fields were big. Sellanraa was a
sizeable place now, and the women had other things to look to besides
making hay; all the cattle to look to, and meals to be got, and all
in proper time; butter and cheese to make, and clothes to wash, and
baking of bread; mother and daughter working all they could. Isak was
not going to have another summer like that; he decided without any
fuss that Jensine should come back again if she could be got. Inger,
too, had no longer a word against it; she had come to her senses
again, and said: "Ay, do as you think best." Ay, Inger was grown
reasonable now; 'tis no little thing to come to one's senses again
after a spell. Inger was no longer full of heat that must out, no
longer full of wild blood to be kept in check, the winter had cooled
her; nothing beyond the needful warmth in her now. She was getting
stouter, growing fine and stately. A wonderful woman to keep from
fading, keep from dying off by degrees; like enough because she had
bloomed so late in life. Who can say how things come about? Nothing
comes from a single cause, but from many. Was Inger not in the best
repute with the smith's wife? What could any smith's wife say against
her? With her disfigurement, she had been cheated of her spring, and
later, had been set in artificial air to lose six years of her summer;
with life still in her, what wonder her autumn gave an errant growth?
Inger was better than blacksmiths' wives--a little damaged, a little
warped, but good by nature, clever by nature ... ay....

Father and son drive down, they come to Brede Olsen's lodging-house
and set the horse in a shed. It is evening now. They go in themselves.

Brede Olsen has rented the house; an outbuilding it had been,
belonging to the storekeeper, but done up now with two sitting-rooms
and two bedrooms; none so bad, and in a good situation. The place
is well frequented by coffee-drinkers and folk from round about the
village going by the boat.

Brede seems to have been in luck for once, found something suited to
him, and he may thank his wife for that. 'Twas Brede's wife had hit on
the idea of a coffee-shop and lodging-house, the day she sat selling
coffee at the auction at Breidablik; 'twas a pleasant enou