After that, she could never get rid of him. It was always he, nothing but he; or rather every moment of the day she fled from him, but he always reappeared.
Her sisters reported to her that he hung about the house and looked in; walked past and looked in, talked to them, asked them to remember him to her. This immensely excited them, they were proud of it; his remark that Tora was "the handsomest girl" had reached them too. But Tora's terror increased; she was pursued. She knew that he would not give up.
Where could she go to? None of the Rendalens were at home. She could go to them after the holidays, but nearly three weeks still remained. She could not speak to any one else, she was too much ashamed. She did not think once of shoemaker Hansen, but Fru Hansen was severe, she would not exactly understand. Her mother she never once thought of. But after all it was a thing which entirely concerned herself; she need be in no man's power if she did not choose.
No, but when she could not by any means get him out of her thoughts?
On Saturday evening she had flung herself upon her bed, as weary as though she had passed the day in the hardest manual labour. She lay there and looked at the yards of a ship which was being towed past. She watched the folds in the loosely hanging sails which were swaying in the wind. The vessel was so near that she could almost have touched her. Outside there was a heavy sea, the storm driving the swell up into the harbour: she, too, longed to find a haven! It was Saturday evening, to-morrow she would have to go to church. Karl Vangen's face smiled to her as she remembered this, and she felt happy before she fell asleep. If he had been a girl she would have gone to him--just to him--with the trouble which oppressed her.
The next day she occupied a seat at the furthest end of the church. Karl Vangen had met her, and said how nice it was that she was coming up to them again to help Fru Rendalen. On account of this remark she had chosen the most remote seat; she did not feel sure that she might not begin to cry.
She did not, however; there was something soothing in the church and the stillness and the people, which was unlike the summer day outside. But when Karl Vangen went into the pulpit, and his prayer was the one which he had used on her first school-day--that on meeting, almost word for word the same--it disturbed her: that even Karl Vangen's prayer should be a lesson from earlier days. This little coincidence occupied her, and she did not follow him. She gathered that the sermon dealt with conversion, and that Karl Vangen, as was his custom, illustrated what he was saying by examples from real life. But she had heard these examples at school, every one of them.
She was roused by the name of John Wesley. His conversion, Vangen considered, was the most thorough, the fullest in every particular, that he knew of. He related it, and then passed on to give examples of sudden conversions, especially some by Wesley himself; other natures with different pasts, with different kinds of knowledge, influenced by other fears. He wished to speak of these sudden conversions separately to-day. He had known a young girl who had a burning desire for grace for her sins, which she could by no means obtain, until one day she saw Rubens' picture of the Crucifixion, and Mary Magdalene standing with long flowing hair at the foot of the cross. She would be Mary Magdalene. And all at once it was a joy to her to imagine herself at the foot of the cross in the place of Mary Magdalene; her thoughts dwelt on this so powerfully that it seemed as though she, and no one else, stood there. At once she received the knowledge that it was for her that Jesus was crucified, her sins were forgiven. She was seized with a great, great joy. The preacher knew several such examples especially among women. They had clung so persistently to some single incident in the life of Jesus, some single word of His, something special in the mystery of grace, and had gazed upon it until it had the effect of a strong light, a special knowledge. From that time all became clear to them, their sins were taken from them; their will became stronger from that day and hour.
Tora did not hear more, least of all that it was against this that Vangen wished to speak. Then and there her mind was occupied with an attempt to follow these examples. His too familiar voice murmured on; everything round her seemed to fade away. She saw Jesus on the cross in a strange country, with driving black clouds above Him, each height, each valley, each tree veiled and mourning. She saw His eyes close, His chest rise and fall, and it all became night. She felt her own small sorrows hidden in that awful moment. How long she remained in this condition she did not know. The sermon was not over, she could not therefore go; but she could not listen, she did not desire to do so.
When at length she left the church she had only one wish--to be able to renew that vision as soon as she could.