'More easily said than done, Ellen.'

'You think I do not know what I am speaking about because I am old, and grey, and wrinkled. Is it not so, Kjeld? But remember that old people have been young themselves once, and let me tell you that the misery which you find it so impossible to bear, I have borne, though I am only a woman. Long ago, when I was a little better-looking than I am now, there was one who was always uppermost in my thoughts--one whom I cherished in my secret soul; in short, to whom I was as much attached as you are to Christine. He wooed me, too; he begged me to be his wife, and swore by Him who made yon heavens above that he loved only me.'

'And what answer did you give him?'

'I told him that we could not be so imprudent as to marry, for he had little, and I had still less; that I would marry the man who was the landlord of the house in which we resided, to provide a comfortable home for my mother as long as she lived. And I did marry that man. He whom I had refused never knew how much I cared for him; he did not think that I had been really attached to him. But I grieved when he went away. There never was a squall at sea that I did not think with anxiety about him; and many a night have I soaked my pillow with my tears, when I could not go to sleep because the tempest raged so without.'

'Do I know the person of whom you are speaking, Ellen?'

'Yes, you do, Kjeld: he is your own father.'

'My father!'

'Can you now comprehend why I have always taken such an interest in you, and why I have some right to advise you to let Christine alone? I do not say that you must forget her.'

'No, because you are convinced it is impossible for me to do so.'

'Not at all--because I know forgetfulness will come of itself. I only desire to impress on you the necessity of leaving this place, and no longer loitering about the sea-shore here. To-morrow I am going to sail to Æro, or Æbler, and if you will come with me, Kjeld, we will go on to Copenhagen. You had better engage yourself on board some ship going to the south, and stay away a few years. When you come back again, if our Lord has spared my life till then, you will thank me for the advice I have given you this night. But see! here are our boats. For God's sake, Kjeld, do your duty! I will fasten our little skiff to one of the gunboats.'