She dropped her porridge-stick and looked at me with big eyes.
"Saw him? In Rome, you say? After he sailed, you mean?"
I nodded, and then she cried excitedly to the doctor who was just then coming into the house, after washing his hands under the pump.
"Father, she saw himself in Rome after he sailed."
There was only one himself in that house, therefore it was not difficult for the doctor to know who was meant. And so great was the eagerness of the old people to hear the last news of the son who was the apple of their eye that I had to stay to breakfast and tell them all about our meeting.
While Martin's mother laid the tables with oat-cake and honey and bowls of milk and deep plates for the porridge, I told the little there was to tell, and then listened to their simple comments.
"There now, doctor! Think of that! Those two meeting in foreign parts that used to be such friends when they were children! Like brother and sister, you might say. And whiles and whiles we were thinking that some day . . . but we'll say no more about that now, doctor."
"No, we'll say no more about that now, Christian Ann," said the doctor.
Then there was a moment of silence, and it was just as if they had been rummaging among half-forgotten things in a dark corner of their house, and had come upon a cradle, and the child that had lived in it was dead.
It was sweet, but it was also painful to stay long in that house of love, and as soon as I had eaten my oat-cake and honey I got up to go. The two good souls saw me to the door saying I was not to expect either of them at the Big House on my wedding-day, because she was no woman for smart clothes, and the doctor, who was growing rheumatic, had given up his night-calls, and therefore his gig, so as to keep down expenses.