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And when at last there came a sign of life and movement it was enough to make an end of him altogether: Axel and Barbro came out together and went across to the cowshed. They were loving and affectionate now, ay, they had a blessed hour; they walked with their arms round each other, and he was going to help her with the animals. Ho, yes!
Oh, Barbro, she had lived in Bergen, she knew how to jeer at a man; she had seen real walking-sticks, and could ask now what he wanted to go swinging a patched-up umbrella handle like that for. But he let her go on. "I suppose now you'll be wanting that photograph back you gave me," he said.
When are you going to start?" Barbro put in her word here: "Never!" Now that was pure exaggeration and impertinence. Axel had got his stones the autumn before, and carted them home that winter; now, between seasons, he had got the foundation walls done, and cellar and all else all that remained was to build the timbered part above.
Barbro, maybe, found it best to give way a little; she laughed, and answered: "Well, you are serious today I can't help laughing! But if you want me to put on the rings and wear them out weekdays, why, I will!" And she got out the rings and put them on. But seeing him look all foolish and content at that, she grew bolder. "Is there anything else I've done, I'd like to know?"
If all went well, it might mean a good future for the girl, perhaps a future of a sort for all of them. All very well to be housekeeper for two young clerks in Bergen, but who could say what she would get out of that in the long run? Barbro was a pretty girl, and liked to look well; there might be a better chance for her here, after all. For there were two sons at Sellanraa.
There's the cattle at home, they'll be standing in the hut and bellowing for food, not a bite nor a drop since the morning; no Barbro to look to them now no. Barbro's gone, run off and gone, and taken both her rings, gold and silver, taken them with her.
Here at Sellanraa there was nothing of that sort; Jensine, the servant-maid, was a mere nothing, a worker and no more, rather suited to Sivert. "I've a fancy to see how that girl Barbro from Breidablik turned out now she's grown up," said Eleseus one day. "Well, go down to Axel Ström's place and see," said Sivert. Eleseus went down one Sunday.
Here, again, she was right in a way; when she had been heavy and ailing that was the time to talk of help. But then Barbro herself had done her work all the time as if nothing were the matter; she had been quick and clever as usual, did all that had to be done, and had never spoken a word about getting help. "Well, I can't make it out, anyway," said he hopelessly. Silence.
And at last Barbro even took off the rings from her fingers, and wore neither. "What's that mean?" he asked. "What's it mean?" she said, tossing her head. But it could hardly mean anything else than faithlessness and desertion on her part. And he had found the little body by the stream.
I'm staying here for now." "Staying here, are you?" "Ay, staying here, I doubt." Oline waits for a moment, using her old head, full of policy. "Ay, well," says she. "'Twill save me, then, no doubt. And glad I'll be for the same." "Oho," says Barbro in jest, "has Axel here been so hard on you this while?" "Hard on me? Axel!
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