"Well, it was for them, I asked for some of it the other day."
Then Arne asked the boys to bring him something their sisters had written. They did so; and he corrected the errors in the writing with his carpenter's pencil, and asked the boys to lay it in some place where their sisters might easily find it. Soon after, he found the paper in his jacket pocket; and at the foot was written, "Corrected by a conceited fellow."
The next day, Arne completed his work at the parsonage, and returned home. So gentle as he was that winter, the mother had never seen him, since that sad time just after the father's death. He read the sermon to her, accompanied her to church, and was in every way very kind. But she knew only too well that one great reason for his increased kindness was, that he meant to go away when spring came. Then one day a message came from Böen, asking him to go there to do carpentry.
Arne started, and, apparently without thinking of what he said, replied that he would come. But no sooner had the messenger left than the mother said, "You may well be astonished! From Böen?"
"Well, is there anything strange in that?" Arne asked, without looking at her.
"From Böen!" the mother exclaimed once more.
"And, why not from Böen, as well as any other place?" he answered, looking up a little.
"From Böen and Birgit Böen!—Baard, who made your father a cripple, and all only for Birgit's sake!"
"What do you say?" exclaimed Arne; "was that Baard Böen?"
Mother and son stood looking at each other. The whole of the father's life seemed unrolled before them, and at that moment they saw the black thread which had always run through it. Then they began talking about those grand days of his, when old Eli Böen had himself offered him his daughter Birgit, and he had refused her: they passed on through his life till the day when his spine had been broken; and they both agreed that Baard's fault was the less. Still, it was he who had made the father a cripple; he, it was.