“Come with me,” she said. “I should so like to see if he is really so silly as to think I’d come. We can stand in a corner somewhere and look out.”
Pelle did not answer.
“Mother,” said Hanne, when Madam Johnsen returned with the coffee, “I’m going out to buy some stuff for my bodice. Pelle’s coming with me.”
The excuse was easy to see through. But the old woman betrayed no emotion. She had already seen that Hanne was well disposed toward Pelle to-day; something was going on in the girl’s mind, and if Pelle only wanted to, he could now bridle her properly. She had no objection to make if both the young people kicked over the traces a little. Perhaps then they would find peace together.
“You ought to take your shawl with you,” she told Hanne. “The evening air may turn cold.”
Hanne walked so quickly that Pelle could hardly follow her. “It’ll be a lark to see his disappointment when we don’t turn up,” she said, laughing. Pelle laughed also. She stationed herself behind one of the pillars of the Town Hall, where she could peep out across the market. She was quite out of breath, she had hurried so.
Gradually, as the time went by and the stranger did not appear, her animation vanished; she was silent, and her expression was one of disappointment.
“No one’s going to come!” she said suddenly, and she laughed shortly.
“I only made up the whole thing to tell you, to see what you’d say.”
“Then let’s go!” said Pelle quietly, and he took her hand.