And she realized that the fight for Finn would become harder than that which broke the seal on the door of the old room.
Finn was absorbed in what had filled his mind, the whole day, with light and color. He was thinking now of his mother’s visit to the room on the evening when she had broken the spell:
“I simply cannot understand how you could have the heart,” he said.
She knew at once what he meant, but said nothing.
“There ought to be some law, like that in the fairy-story, where he who lifted the veil had to die,” he said. “And there ought to be veils upon veils ... veils upon veils.... Can you bear to look at the sun, mother? Women ought to go in a veil and never ... never raise it, except when the occasion was so great that everything grew great.... And one ought not to see the people who play....”
Fru Adelheid half raised herself in her chair.
She wanted to tell him that, on that evening, she was punished for her presumption with the greatest terror which she had ever experienced in her life. But she could not. Then she said, quite quietly and with her eyes looking out over the square:
“And suppose there were some one who could not ... suppose the veil stifled one....”
Finn looked out into space like her:
“Veils upon veils.... Veils over the dead,” he said.