“I don’t remember.”
“But I do, Joh! I still remember every syllable. You said: ‘I don’t hear a word you say—I only hear “Hel!” If I were to be blinded—I should still see Hel! If I were to be paralysed—with paralysed feet, I should still find my way to Hell—’ Freder is your son. What do you think, Joh, he would answer me were I to say to him: give up the girl you love...?”
Joh Fredersen was silent.
“Take care, Joh,” said the old mother. “I know what it means when your eyes grow cold, as now, and when you grow as pale as one of the stones of the wall. You have forgotten that lovers are sacred. Even if they are mistaken, Joh, their mistake itself is sacred. Even if they are fools, Joh, their folly itself is sacred. For where lovers are, there is God’s garden, and no one has the right to drive them out. Not even God. Only their own sin.”
“I must have my son back,” said Joh Fredersen. “I had hoped you would help me, and you would certainly have been the gentlest means I could have chosen. But you will not, and now I must seek another means....”
“Freder is ill, you say....”
“He will get well again....”
“So you will continue in your way?”
“Yes.”
“I believe, Joh, that Hel would weep were she to hear you!”