And he went on his way, with blessings from all. The people stood silently watching him as he went; their hearts had been moved beyond their daily wont by the sight of this unhappy wanderer, and their thoughts followed him now in sympathy along his sorrowful way.
The wanderer’s heart was suffering more than all. His soul ached with loneliness—he felt as if already he were confined within the cold walls of the grave. It seemed a marvel to him that he could endure this and live.
On and on he went, thinking—thinking....
“If no man can forgive me, if no human heart can realize my atonement, can then God ever forgive? The blessings they have given me—can they ever outweigh the curses that were meant for me as well? Lord, if only one might cross my path to know me, and forgive. One who could take my hand and know and pardon all.... Lord, Thy will be done....”
He was taking the road towards the trading station. On the way he entered a house here and there, and was greeted kindly as ever. But at the mention of Sera Ketill’s name, all who heard it had but curses; eyes that had looked on him in kindliness lit now with hatred of the man he named.
“I have done more evil even than I thought,” he muttered to himself as he went on his way, refusing those who would have shared the road. “To have planted so much hatred in all their hearts; to be the cause of all those evil thoughts beyond my own; things grown in the dark from evil seed of my sowing. Lord, who shall ever tear them up and destroy them that they may not rise again? Lord, can it be that the fruits of sin never cease, when good comes to an end at last? Lord, Lord, now I see the greatness of my sin—more than I had dreamed. And now I am come to the verge of death and have no strength even to suffer more. Only Thy mercy, Lord—grant me Thy mercy, that hast denied me the forgiveness of men.”
The trading station had grown considerably in the twenty years that had passed. There were many new houses in the place. And the wanderer looked in vain for the turf huts that had formed the outskirts of the settlement when he knew it. They were gone, and modern buildings stood where they had been.
He limped from door to door, bearing with him each time blessings for Guest the One-eyed and curses for the name of Sera Ketill. At the last house, he asked:
“Where do the poor live now?”