And that nature of hers, he knew now, was pity. To do good, to sacrifice herself for others, to care for the sick, that had been all her natural craving, but he had set himself against it. He could not endure it. He would have her all to himself, and not share her with any besides.
And the thing that had happened, that had seemed so abominable to him before, was there, after all, anything in it but what must necessarily come? It was the steel spring, long compressed, which had unfolded as soon as the pressure was released.
"Sigrun is pity itself," he thought. "Mercy is her aim, her task. I should have realized it."
The sudden acknowledgment of his own fault comforted him now. Sigrun no longer appeared to have sunk so low, to be so unspeakably hard and without feeling.
He turned the thought over in his mind. "Yes," he said to himself. "That must be why we were never happy together. I hindered her from being what her nature commanded her to be."
Then, suddenly, the old agony returned. "This fellow, Sven Elversson, he cares for her better than I. He too is given up to works of charity. And that is why she stays with him."
He had not thought of Sven Elversson with any jealousy before. "Sigrun knows what he has done," he had said to himself. "She could never love him."
But now, the whole thing seemed more than suspicious. Why had Sven Elversson not told him at once that Sigrun had come to Hånger? Was he in love with her, and had he thought to keep her for himself?
But in the midst of his anger came one of those thoughts that seemed to hover in the air above that desolate land, and refreshed the soul of the unhappy man like cool summer rain.
"Have you any right to expect service and aid from Sven Elversson?" said the thought.