"If thou wilt come into the cowhouse to-morrow, I think I can tell thee something thou wilt like to hear—about the Huldre,[G] the beautiful long-tailed one—but thou must come alone. And I will sing to thee again very willingly, for thou art a kind one. And to-morrow Mette makes Fladbröd.[H] If thou dost wish to see her make the Fladbröd, thou shalt most certainly. Ja, and Mette can sing too. Thou shalt hear her also."
Then she nodded and disappeared into the cowhouse. Tante and Katharine paused for a moment to look at the picturesque winter-house of the seventy cows, and its long, grass-grown roof, its two bridges leading up to the top floor, where some of the hay was stored, and its most curious gap in the centre of the upper floor, through which one could see enclosed in a great oblong frame the valley below, the rivers, and the distant mountains. Tante pointed out this beautiful picture to Katharine and said:
"You know, I really enjoy Nature very much, although I pretend not to do so just to tease Ejnar and Gerda. Ah, they are dears, both of them. It was good of you to come and bring them their parcel. You do not know how eagerly you have been looked for—by them and by me. Of course they wanted their parcel; but I had another reason for being eager to receive you. May a wicked old woman tell you something some day?"
"Tell me now," Katharine said, turning to her.
"Well," said Tante recklessly, "it may be only an old woman's fancy; but he said in his letter that you did not really need a letter of introduction to me, since you were coming to see Ejnar and Gerda, and therefore me."
"But he felt that he could not be left out in the cold where you were concerned."
"Did he say that?" asked Katharine, with a tremor in her voice.
"Yes," answered Tante; and they strolled on together in silence until they came to the hay-barn on the hillside, near the mountain-ashes, Tante's terminus. There they sat, still in silence, but with their hearts and thoughts charged with the remembrance of Clifford Thornton. It was a long silence, probably the longest which Knutty had ever endured without impatience; for an instinctive comradeship had sprung up between her and this Englishwoman in whose eyes the light of love had come when Clifford Thornton's name was spoken. They were both glad to be together, and they knew it. At last Knutty said:
"My dear, since we are both thinking of him all the time, shall we not speak of him?"