"This is Inkala—yes," answered the girl.
"Is the master at home?"
"No; he went off to Muurila this morning."
"H'm. And when's he coming back?"
"Don't know at all. But maybe mistress'll know. If you'd go in by the front way, I'll tell her."
Olof walked up the front steps.
Hardly had he entered the room when a slender, fair-haired woman appeared from within.
"Good-day to …" Olof began; but the greeting died on his lips, and a shiver passed through his body.
The woman stopped still; her lips moved, but uttered no word.
Stiffly, uneasily, they looked at each other. A glimpse of the past, a sequence of changes, things new and things familiar—the vision of a moment, seen in a flash.