But the pensioners did not go far on their happy way, for when they came to Björne, they found Marianne lying in the snow-drift, just by the door of her home.
They trembled and raged to see her there. It was like finding a worshipped saint lying mangled and stripped outside the church-door.
Gösta shook his clenched hand at the dark house. “You children of hate,” he cried, “you hail-storms, you ravagers of God’s pleasure-house!”
Beerencreutz lighted his horn lantern and let it shine down on the livid face. Then the pensioners saw Marianne’s mangled hands, and the tears which had frozen to ice on her eyelashes, and they wailed like women, for she was not merely a saintly image, but a beautiful woman, who had been a joy to their old hearts.
Gösta Berling threw himself on his knees beside her.
“She is lying here, my bride,” he said. “She gave me the betrothal kiss a few hours ago, and her father has promised me his blessing. She lies and waits for me to come and share her white bed.”
And Gösta lifted up the lifeless form in his strong arms.
“Home to Ekeby with her!” he cried. “Now she is mine. In the snow-drift I have found her; no one shall take her from me. We will not wake them in there. What has she to do behind those doors, against which she has beaten her hand into blood?”
He was allowed to do as he wished. He laid Marianne in the foremost sledge and sat down at her side. Beerencreutz sat behind and took the reins.