“There, there, Daniel dear, the time will pass, and you can rest to-day and be stronger to-morrow, and then we shall follow her all through the woods way down to the wicket, indeed we shall. But now we must go home, and you shall rest on the soft couch and drink a good pot of ale, and then we shall play a game of reversis, and later on, when their highnesses have supped, Reinholdt Vintner will come, and then you shall ask him the news, and we’ll have a good honest lanterloo, till the sun sinks in the mountains, indeed we shall, Daniel dear, indeed we shall.”
“’Ndeed we shall, ’ndeed we shall!” jeered Daniel. “You with your lanterloo and games and reversis! When my brain is burning like molten lead, and my mind’s in a frenzy, and—Help me to the edge of the road and let me sit down a moment—there! Am I in my right mind, Magnille? Huh? I’m mad as a fly in a flask, that’s what I am. ’Tis sensible in a lowborn lout, a miserable, mangy, rickety wretch, to be eaten up with frantic love of a prince’s consort! Oh ay, it’s sensible, Magnille, to long for her till my eyes pop out of my head, and to gasp like a fish on dry land only to see a glimpse of her form and to touch with my mouth the dust she has trodden—’tis sensible, I’m saying. Oh, if it were not for the dreams, when she comes and bends over me and lays her white hand on my tortured breast—or lies there so still and breathes so softly and is so cold and forlorn and has none to guard her but only me—or she flits by white as a naked lily!—but it’s empty dreams, vapor and moonshine only, and frothy air-bubbles.”
They walked on again. At the wicket they stopped, and Daniel supported his arms on it while his gaze followed the hedges.
“In there,” he said.
Fair and calm the park spread out under the sunlight that bathed air and leaves. The crystals in the gravel walk threw back the light in quivering rays. Hanging cobwebs gleamed through the air, and the dry sheaths of the beech-buds fluttered slowly to the ground, while high against the blue sky, the white doves of the castle circled with sungold on swift wings. A merry dance-tune sounded faintly from a lute in the distance.
“What a fool!” murmured Daniel. “Should you think, Magnille, that one who owned the most precious pearl of all the Indies would hold it as naught and run after bits of painted glass? Marie Grubbe and—Karen Fiol! Is he in his right mind? And now they think he’s hunting, because forsooth he lets the gamekeeper shoot for him, and comes back with godwits and woodcocks by the brace and bagful, and all the while he’s fooling and brawling down at Lynge with a town-woman, a strumpet. Faugh, faugh! Lake of brimstone, such filthy business! And he’s so jealous of that spring ewe-lambkin, he’s afraid to trust her out of his sight for a day, while—”
The leaves rustled, and Marie Grubbe stood before him on the other side of the wicket. After she turned into the side-path, she had gone down to the place where the elks and Esrom camels were kept, and thence back to a little arbor near the gate. There she had overheard what Daniel said to Magnille, and now—
“Who are you?” she asked, “and were they true, the words you spoke?”
Daniel grasped the wicket and could hardly stand for trembling.