And Rolandsen waved his hat and walked off, ending on a lordly note. Surely, after that, it would be strange if she did not think and wonder over him a little now.
What was it that had happened? Even the parish clerk’s daughter had refused him. Well and good! But was there not much to indicate that it was all a sham? Why had she been sitting outside the door at all if it were not that she had seen him coming? And why had she decked herself out with red ribbons like a lady?
But, a few evenings later, Rolandsen’s conceit was shattered. From his window he saw Olga go down to Mack’s store. She stayed there till quite late, and when she went home, Frederik Mack and his sister Elise walked up with her. And here, of course, the lordly Rolandsen should have kept calm, and merely hummed a little tune, or drummed with his fingers carelessly, and kept his thoughts on his work. Instead of which, he snatched up his hat and made off at once towards the woods. He hurried round in a wide curve, and came out on the road far ahead of the three. Then he stopped to get his breath, and walked down to meet them.
But the three took an unreasonable time; Rolandsen could neither hear nor see them. He whistled and trolled a bit of a song, as if they might sit somewhere in the woods and watch him. At last he saw them coming, walking slowly, dawdling unpardonably, seeing it was late at night, and they should have been hurrying towards their respective homes. Rolandsen, great man, walks towards them, with a long stalk of grass in his mouth and a sprig of willow in his buttonhole; the two men raised their hats as they came up, and the ladies nodded.
“You look warm,” said Frederik. “Where have you been?”
Rolandsen answered over his shoulder, “It’s spring-time; I’m walking in the spring.”
No nonsense this time, but clean firmness and confidence. Ho! but he had walked past them with an air—slowly, carelessly, all unperturbed; he had even found strength to measure Elise Mack with a downward glance. But no sooner had they passed out of sight than he slipped aside into the wood, no longer great at all, but abject. Olga was a creature of no importance now; and at the thought of it, he took the agate pin from his pocket, broke it up thoroughly, and threw it away. But now there was Elise, Mack’s daughter Elise, tall and brown, and showing her white teeth a little when she smiled. Elise it was whom God had led across his path. She had not said a word, and to-morrow, perhaps, she would be going away again. All hope gone.
Well and good....
But on coming back to the telegraph station, there was Jomfru van Loos waiting for him. Once before he had reminded her that past was past, and what was done was over; she had much better go away and live somewhere else. And Jomfru van Loos had answered that he should not have to ask her twice—good-bye! But now here she was again, waiting for him.