He thought of Erik and of what kind of a friend he had been to Erik. He! His childhood memories wrung their hands over him; his youthful dreams covered their heads and wept over him; his whole past stared after him with a long look full of reproach. He had betrayed it all for a love as small and mean as himself. There had been exaltation in this love, but he had betrayed that too.
Whither could he flee to escape these attempts that always ended in the ditch? All his life had been nothing else, and it would never be anything else in the future; he knew that and felt it with such certainty that he sickened at the thought of all this futile endeavor, and he wished with all his soul that he could run away and escape this meaningless fate. If only the ice would break under him now as he skated, and all would be over with a gasp and a spasm in the cold water!
He stopped, exhausted, and looked back. The moon had gone down, and the fjord stretched long and dark between the white hills on either side. Then he turned and worked his way back against the wind. It was very strong now, and he was tired. He skated closer to the shore to get the shelter of the hills, but, as he struggled thus, he came on a hole in the ice made by the winds sweeping down from the hills, and he felt the thin, elastic crust give way under him with a crackling sound.
Ah, he breathed more easily, in spite of all, when he set foot on the firm ice again! Under the stimulus of fear, his exhaustion had almost left him, and he skated on vigorously.
While he was struggling out there, Fennimore sat in the lighted room, baffled and miserable. She felt herself cheated out of her revenge. She hardly knew what she had expected, but it was something entirely different; she had had a vision of something mighty and majestic, something of swords and red flames, or—not that, but something that would sweep her along and lift her to a throne, but instead it had all turned out so small and paltry, and she had felt more like a common scold than like one who utters curses....
After all, she had learned something from Niels.
Early in the morning of the following day, while Niels, overcome with exhaustion, was still asleep, she left the house.
Chapter XII
For the better part of two years Niels Lyhne had roamed about on the Continent.