“Oh, don’t bother about that.”

“No, I am like the dust beneath your feet, you care no more for me. Not one kind word, only hard words; contempt, that is good enough for me.”

“The others are neither better nor worse than you. Good-by, Laura!”

He held out his hand to her, but she kept hers on her back and wailed: “No, no, not good-by! not good-by!”

Mogens raised the blind, stepped back a couple of paces and let it fall down in front of the window. Laura quickly leaned down over the window-sill beneath it and begged: “Come to me! come and give me your hand.”

“No.”

When he had gone a short distance she cried plaintively:

“Good-by, Mogens!”

He turned towards the house with a slight greeting. Then he walked on: “And a girl like that still believes in love!—no, she does not!”