With that she was off. The housekeeper went back to her work, and, in the rush and excitement, forgot about the woman. It was not till a day or two afterward that she told Mamselle Lovisa what Kaisa Nilsdotter had said and what she herself had replied.
Mamselle Lovisa went white as a sheet.
“Oh, Maja!” she cried, “how could you say that! It would have been better to tell her that I put a few little sprays of whortleberry green in her crown.”
“I had to ease her mind to get her to go,” the housekeeper explained.
“And so you said my crown would be of myrtle as surely as hers was. Now you’ll see, Maja, there will be no bridal-crown for me!”
“Oh, you’ll be married right enough, Mamselle Lovisa. Pastor Milén is not the man to jilt you.”
“Who knows? Something else might come up to prevent it.”
Mamselle Lovisa worried over this a few days, and then let it pass out of mind. She had other things to think of. In six months the wedding was to take place, and she must begin at once on the household linens and the trousseau.
She set up looms, sewed, and worked monograms. She finally went to Karlstad to shop, and returned with the fabric for a wedding dress and a little wire frame of a crown, to be bound with myrtle. She did not wish to use the old frame worn by so many brides, but wanted a bridal-crown of her own.
But these purchases had no sooner been made than the unexpected happened. Pastor Milén became ill and was confined to his bed a long time. When he recovered sufficiently to be up and about he seemed strangely changed. People noticed that he did not care to talk with his betrothed, and never went the short distance to Mårbacka to see her. When summer came he went away to a health resort. During his long absence he never once wrote to Mamselle Lovisa. It was a time of anxiety and distress for her. She inferred from his silence that he wished to break with her, and sent him back his ring. The day this happened she said to the old housekeeper: