A gentle peace had filled her. It was soon broken. She collected her thoughts at the word "son"--she had a son. The wave of peace broke against a wave of dread. "His hair?" she contrived to whisper. She could not say more. "Red, Frue." She had a dim idea that that might be either dark or light, perhaps more likely dark. It was not clear--it was---- And everything passed away from her.
For some time those near did not notice her. No one imagined that this powerful woman could be fainting, and therefore some time elapsed before she was brought round, and there was some alarm. It was only by degrees that she realised what had happened--what the whimpering was she heard somewhere--why she had a remembrance of pain. The child was now clothed, and they lifted it up to her, but still not near enough. She could not see it properly. She wished to sign to them to bring it nearer, but it was difficult; she could neither do it with her voice, nor by moving her head, and she did not think of her hand, or perhaps she could not move it. But some one was there who understood, and held the baby up to her, so that it touched her cheek, just where she had felt its father's breath. She felt something soft, something warm, something delicate, the softest thing she had ever touched. She heard a cluck, a whimper, and now she saw--the eyebrows, they were her own, her family's light sparse bristles.
It was too much joy, too much happiness. Her blood circulated more quickly, and soon the warmth came to her cheeks, the tears to her eyes. She lay there weeping quietly, while her little one was held fast to her motherly breast.
With God's help, she would try to accomplish the rest.
III
[A LECTURE]
CHAPTER I
[DETHRONED]
Fru Tomasine Rendalen herself carried the child to the font, and gave him her own name.
Little Tomas's cradle stood by the side of the bed in which she slept. The room was both her reading and working room. The other remained vacant as though only for show. Through her friends in England, France, and Germany she obtained books in three languages on the bringing up of children. But she soon laid them aside; they were all either too vague, or too dogmatic. She began to widen her acquirements in other respects. She wished to be his teacher in everything. But, from the time that he was six months old her work was much interrupted, for he was a most restless child. The doctor assured her that, so far as he could see, the boy ailed nothing. He did not scream from pain. If, at the moment he opened his eyes, for example, the person he wanted was not there--that is to say, the one who could give him food--he not only screamed till she came, which was to be expected, but after she had come and had forced him to drink, he screamed while the milk ran out of his mouth, and continued to give blows, slaps, and spiteful cries. He could not forget. If there were anything he did not like, he screamed himself black in the face, and made himself rigid. Sometimes it seemed to Tomasine as though she had a log on her lap, and not a human being. When he was nine months old, she was obliged to give up nursing him, for he kept her in such a state of irritation and terror, that his health became affected through her. The struggle which ensued on this, was terrible. It lasted altogether for three days and nights, during which time he could only be induced to touch a drop of the strange food by artifice.