“A spirit, you mean?” said Egholm, with a gasp.
“Yes, yes.—Be careful, you’re spilling the soup. I lay there quite quiet, and looked at him, and he looked at me. I dared hardly breathe, for fear he should vanish again. His eyes were ever so big—and I can’t tell you what a gentle look in them.”
“Did he say anything?”
“He nodded several times, and then he said: ‘That boy is sent to help you.’ Oh, you can’t think how lovely it was. When I woke up I could feel I had been crying.”
“When you woke up—why, then, it was only a dream.” Egholm was deeply disappointed.
“Dream? No; I wasn’t asleep, only just dozing, I tell you. He stood there as plain and alive as you are now.”
But Egholm went on with his soup. And he had his way. He was to go off that very day. Sivert was despatched to the pawnbroker’s for the camera, and while he waited, Egholm was as gentle as could be. His wife could not remember having seen him so kind, not for years past. He took one of the snowdrops from the bedside—Hedvig, with her usual readiness, had stolen them from Eriksens’ garden for her mother—and put it in his buttonhole.
“Good-bye, dear, and take care of yourself,” said Egholm, and kissed his wife on both cheeks.
Anna was touched at so much gentleness. The tears flowed from her eyes.