And Herr Askevold knelt by the bedside and prayed. She could never quite remember in after-days what it was that he said, perhaps she never very clearly took in the actual words; but something, either in his tone or manner, brought to her the sense of a presence altogether above all the changes that had been or ever could be. This new consciousness seemed to fill her with strength, and a great tenderness for Swanhild came to her heart; she wondered how it was she could ever have fancied that all had been taken from her.
As they rose from their knees and the old pastor took her hand in his to wish her good-by, he glanced a little anxiously into her eyes. But something he saw there comforted him.
“God bless you, my child,” he said.
And again as they opened the front door to him and he stepped out into the dark wintry night, he looked back, and said:
“God comfort you.”
Sigrid stood on the threshold, behind her the lighted hall, before her the starless gloom of the outer world, her arm was round little Swanhild, and as she bade him good-night, she smiled, one of those brave, patient smiles that are sadder than tears.
“The light behind her, and the dark before,” said the old pastor to himself as he walked home wearily enough. “It is like her life, poor child. And yet I am somehow not much afraid for her. It is for Frithiof I am afraid.”
CHAPTER IX.
When Frithiof found that instead of addressing a stranger at Hyde Park Corner, he had actually spoken to Roy Boniface, his first feeling had been of mere blank astonishment. Then he vehemently wished himself alone once more, and cursed the fate which had first brought him into contact with the little child by the Serpentine, and which had now actually thrown him into the arms of a being who would talk and expect to be talked to. Yet this feeling also passed; for as he looked down the unfamiliar roads, and felt once more the desolateness of a foreigner in a strange country, he was obliged to own that it was pleasant to him to hear Roy’s well-known voice, and to feel that there was in London a being who took some sort of interest in his affairs.
“I wish I had seen you a minute or two sooner; my mother and my sister were in that carriage,” said Roy, “and they would have liked to meet you. You must come and see us some day, or are you quite too busy to spare time for such an out-of-the-way place as Brixton?”