“Swanhild,” she said, “you are crying.”
“No,” said the child, driving back the tears that started again to her eyes at this direct assertion, and struggling hard to make her voice cheerful.
But Sigrid put her arm round her waist and drew her close.
“Frithiof told me all about it, and I think he made a great mistake in scolding you. Don’t think any more about it.”
But this was more than human nature could possibly promise; all that she had read assumed now a tenfold importance to the child. She clung to Sigrid, sobbing piteously.
“He said I ought to be ashamed of myself, but I didn’t know—I really didn’t know.”
“That was his great mistake,” said Sigrid quietly. “Now, if he had found me reading that report he might justly have reproached me, for I am old enough to know better. You see, poor Blanche has done what is very wrong, she has broken her promise to her husband and brought misery and disgrace on all who belong to her. But to pry into all the details of such sad stories does outsiders a great deal of harm; and now you have been told that, I am sure you will never want to read them again.”
This speech restored poor little Swanhild’s self-respect, but nevertheless Sigrid noticed in her face all through the evening a look of perplexity which made her quite wretched. And though Frithiof was all anxiety to make up for his hasty scolding, the look still remained, nor did it pass the next day; even the excitement of dancing the shawl dance with all the pupils looking on did not drive it away, and Sigrid began to fear that the affair had done the child serious harm. Her practical, unimaginative nature could not altogether understand Swanhild’s dreamy, pensive tendencies. She herself loved one or two people heartily, but she had no ideals, nor was she given to hero-worship. Swanhild’s extravagant love for Blanche, a love so ardent and devoted that it had lasted more than two years in spite of every discouragement, was to her utterly incomprehensible; she was vexed that the child should spend so much on so worthless an object; it seemed to her wrong and unnatural that the love of that pure, innocent little heart should be lavished on such a woman as Lady Romiaux. It was impossible for her to see how even this childish fancy was helping to mold Swanhild’s character and fit her for her work in the world; still more impossible that she should guess how the child’s love should influence Blanche herself and change the whole current of many lives.
But so it was; and while the daily life went on in its usual grooves—Frithiof at the shop, Sigrid busy with the household work, playing at the academy, and driving away thoughts of Roy with the cares of other people—little Swanhild in desperation took the step which meant so much more than she understood.
It was Sunday afternoon. Frithiof had gone for a walk with Roy, and Sigrid had been carried off by Madame Lechertier for a drive. Swanhild was alone, and likely to be alone for some time to come. “It is now or never,” she thought to herself; and opening her desk, she drew from it a letter which she had written the day before, and read it through very carefully. It ran as follows: