She did not answer at first: "So that was Niels Fürst?"
A little time afterwards she shivered as if from cold, but she did not give any further explanation. She understood what had happened so far as that the gymnastics had been the cause of it. That, being weakened, he had had a singular influence upon her. She would not say a word about it.
Miss Hall now went away. The two others sat there still: Tora asked them to do so. It was so nice to hold their hands.
CHAPTER III
[SEPARATED FROM THE OTHERS]
By the next day Tora had heard that Niels Fürst said she was "out and away the handsomest girl he had seen in Norway." She would not believe it at first, but she heard it on all sides during the next few days. The next time she met Kaja Gröndal she told her the same thing. Tora knew her through Milla, and always spoke to her. She had so far recovered her usual flippancy that she answered that, "If Lieutenant Fürst had not such bad taste, it would have been embarrassing for the rest of the Norwegian girls."
The summer came in with great heat; every one who could, went into the country, to different places on the coast, or up to the houses on the mountains. As soon as ever the school closed they were off; only a few of the poorer ones remained behind, and Tora among them. Nora went to the Baths with her mother; Tinka's relations were well to do, and had a country house. Anna Rogne was in the town; with Rendalen's help she was preparing herself for the post of history teacher in place of Karen Lote, who was leaving the school. But Anna was not easy of access, more especially for Tora, on account of her friendship with Milla. Even when, for all that, Tora did go to see her, she found her so occupied and anxious (she was to take the junior classes after the holidays) that Tora became tired of her. Tora was now again living down at the Point with her mother (her father was never mentioned), where she shared an attic with two of her sisters. She lived in a hurry-scurry and disorder, and had a feeling of self-reproach and disgust for herself, which she shook off whenever she could cross the ferry and run up into the wood above "The Estate," or along the road to the right from the market-place, to the "Groves." This was a pleasure-ground in the wood near the road, a large open space with a number of small "groves"--that is to say, levelled patches, sometimes with benches and tables; an elaborate network of paths went in and out among them.
One Saturday afternoon she wished to go there to listen to the band, but on the way to the Fröckener Jensens, where she was going to try to get a companion, she met Kaja Gröndal; she had come into the town to meet her husband, but he had not arrived. "Would not Tora come back with her instead? The steamer left in an hour's time."
Tora had a great weakness for invitations. Within the hour she was back again with a large hat-box, in which she had put her night-things and a white dress.
The next morning, Sunday, she was standing on the terrace before the Gröndals' little country house. On her right were all the flowers from the house, which had just been brought out to have the benefit of the rain--as yet it was only wet fog; behind the garden, on the right, it was drifting among the fir-woods; she could see the nearest trees and a little of the bare hillside lower down towards the sea, a faintly gleaming strip of which, was also to be seen. The fog lay very low, there was not a breath of wind. She could hear the steamer, which had just whistled, away to the left where the pier was; now she could see her passing quickly--a vague outline, a thicker, darker, moving cloud--through the white fog. She did not concern herself further about her, but looked towards the path which led up from the landing-place between this garden and the next. Just opposite was a low yellow railing, a very handsome one, of cast-iron; behind it, some old trees in a garden blotted out by the fog; there, she knew, stood several houses which she could not see from here. One of them was the Wingaards', where there was to be a party to-day.