Jenny Winge.”
So she moved from one widow to another, and into another small cottage—this time a red one with whitewashed windowsills and standing in a little garden with flagged paths and shells around the flowerbeds, where the dahlias and chrysanthemums stood black and rotting. Twenty to thirty similar houses stood along a small street leading from the railway station to the fishing harbour, where the waves foamed against the long stone piers. On the beach, a little away from the village, stood a small hotel with the shutters up. Endless roads, with bare, straggling poplars bending in the wind, led out over interminable plains and swamps past small brick farms with a strip of garden front and a couple of haystacks at the back.
Jenny walked along the road as far as she could manage, returning home to sit in her little room, which this time was overloaded with precious knickknacks, coloured plaster casts of castles, and merry scenes at country inns in brass frames. She had not the strength to change her wet shoes even, but Mrs. Schlessinger took off the boots and stockings, talking all the time, exhorting her to keep up her courage, telling her about all the other young ladies she had had in the house—how So-and-so had married and was well off and happy now.
When she had been there a month Mrs. Schlessinger came into her room one day, excited and beaming—a gentleman had come to see the young lady. Jenny was paralysed with fright, but managed at last to ask what he looked like. “Quite young,” said Mrs. Schlessinger, with a lurking smile—“and very nice looking.” It dawned upon her that it might be Gunnar, and she got up, but, suddenly changing her mind, wrapped herself up in a rug and sat down in the deepest of her armchairs.
Mrs. Schlessinger departed, pleased to announce a visitor. Showing Gunnar into the room, she remained an instant smiling by the door before closing it.
He squeezed her hand, almost hurting her, and greeted her with a beaming smile:
“I thought I had better come up here to see what kind of a place you had settled on. It is rather a dull part of the world you have chosen, but it is healthy anyway.” He shook the water from his hat as he spoke.
“You must have some tea and something to eat,” said Jenny, making a movement as if meaning to rise, but remained sitting, saying with a blush: “Do you mind ringing the bell?”
Heggen ate with excellent appetite, talking all the while. He was delighted with Berlin; he had lived in a workmen’s quarter—the Moabit—and spoke with equal enthusiasm about the social democrats and the military, for “there is something grand and manly about it, and the one stimulates the other.” He had been over some great factories and had studied night life, having met a Norwegian engineer who was on his honeymoon and a Norwegian couple with two lovely daughters, who were dying to see a little vice at close quarters. They had been to National, Riche, and to Amorsaale, and the ladies had enjoyed it all immensely.
“But I offended them, I’m afraid—asked Miss Paulsen to come home with me late one evening.”
“Gunnar, how could you!”
“Well, I was not quite sober, you understand; it was only a joke, you know. If by any chance she had consented, I should have been in an awful fix. Might have had to marry a little girl who amuses herself sniffing at such things—no, thank you. It was great fun to see her so virtuously offended. There was no danger really—little girls of that sort don’t give away their treasure without making sure of a fair return.”
He blushed suddenly. It struck him that Jenny might think it tactless of him to speak like that before her—now. But she only laughed:
“What mad things you do!”
As Heggen went on talking, the unnatural, painful shyness gradually left her. Once or twice, when she did not notice it, his eyes anxiously scanned her face—heavens! how thin and hollow-eyed she was, and furrowed about the mouth. The sinews of her neck were prominent, and there were a couple of ugly lines across the throat.
The rain had stopped, and she consented to go for a walk with him. They walked in the sea-mist along the deserted road with the scraggy poplars.
“Take my arm,” said Gunnar casually, and Jenny took it, feeling heavy and tired.
“It must be awfully dull for you here, Jenny—don’t you think it would be much better if you went to Berlin?”
Jenny shook her head.
“You would have the museums there to go to and other things besides—and somebody to be with at times. You don’t care to go to National anyway. Won’t you come, just for a bit of a change? You must be deadly dull here.”
“Oh no, Gunnar—I could not go now, you understand.”
“You look quite nice in that ulster,” said Gunnar cautiously, after a short pause.
Jenny bent her head.
“Oh, I am a fool,” said he suddenly. “Forgive me. You must tell me, Jenny, if I bother you.”
“Oh no, you don’t bother me. I am glad you came.”
“I realize that it must be awful for you, Jenny.” His voice had changed completely. “I quite realize it, but I am sure you are making it still worse by going about here all alone. I do think you ought to go somewhere else—somewhere a little less hopeless than this.” He was looking at the dark plain and the rows of poplars losing themselves in the distance.
“Mrs. Schlessinger is so very kind,” said Jenny evasively.
“Oh yes, good soul; I am sure she is.” He smiled. “I think she suspects me of being the culprit.”
“Probably,” said Jenny, smiling too.
They walked on in silence. After a while Gunnar asked:
“How are you going to arrange matters? Have you made any plans as to the future?”
“I don’t know yet. I suppose you mean about the child? I may leave it with Mrs. Schlessinger for a time; she would look
