“Et de la débauche polie
Viens noyer dans nos Vins Muscats
Ta soif et ta mélancolie!”
She was in high spirits, rather heated, and the notes of her song rose louder than she knew. At last Ulrik Frederik caught the dog. He carried it to the window in triumph, pressed the rose chaplet down over its ears, and, kneeling, presented it to Karen.
“Adorable Venus, queen of hearts, I beg you to accept from your humble slave this little innocent white lamb crowned with flowers—”
At that moment, Marie Grubbe opened the wicket. When she saw Ulrik Frederik on his knees, handing a rose garland, or whatever it was, to that red, laughing woman, she turned pale, bent down, picked up a stone, and threw it with all her might at Karen. It struck the edge of the window, and shivered the glass in fragments, which fell rattling to the ground.
Karen darted back, shrieking. Ulrik Frederik looked anxiously in after her. In his surprise he had dropped the dog, but he still held the wreath, and stood dumbfounded, angry, and embarrassed, turning it round in his fingers.
“Wait, wait!” cried Marie. “I missed you this time, but I’ll get you yet! I’ll get you!” She pulled from her hair a long, heavy steel pin set with rubies, and holding it before her like a dagger, she ran toward the house with a queer tripping, almost skipping gait. It seemed as though she were blinded, for she steered a strange meandering course up to the door.
There Ulrik Frederik stopped her.
“Go away!” she cried, almost whimpering, “you with your chaplet! Such a creature”—she went on, trying to slip past him, first on one side, then on the other, her eyes fixed on the door—“such a creature you bind wreaths for—rose-wreaths, ay, here you play the lovesick shepherd! Have you not a flute, too? Where’s your flute?” she repeated, tore the wreath from his hand, hurled it to the ground, and stamped on it. “And a shepherd’s crook—Amaryllis—with a silk bow? Let me pass, I say!” She lifted the pin threateningly.
He caught both her wrists and held her fast. “Would you sting again?” he said sharply.
Marie looked up at him.