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Svensen, who had always had such a kind heart for starving Russians, and who had irritated the Whites in old days by sending money to the Bolshevik government for their relief. The accusing refugee, who looked a hairy ruffian indeed, was supported by applause from a claque of Finns, Ruthenians, Lithuanians, Esthonians, Latvians, and others who had a dislike for the Russian Empire.
But it was a half-hearted business. No one was really interested in anything except the fate of Dr. Svensen, who, it had transpired from inquiry among the boat-keepers, had not taken a boat on the lake last night. "Foul play," said the journalist Grattan, hopefully. "Obviously foul play." "Ask the Bolshevist refugees," the Times correspondent said with a shrug.
Even the reindeer didst thou say they were injured by their fall last night? I I forget, . . ." "No harm has come to them," said Svensen hastily, seeing that the very effort of thinking was becoming too much for the old man. "They are safe and unhurt. Trouble not about these things!" A strange, unearthly radiance transfigured Gueldmar's visage. "Trouble is departing swiftly from me," he murmured.
With beating heart and straining eyes, Valdemar Svensen crouched on the pier-head, watching, in mute agony, the burning vessel. He had fulfilled his oath! that strange vow that had so sternly bound him, a vow that was the outcome of his peculiar traditions and pagan creed.
"'Tis not for me to speak of the daughter of Olaf," here his voice sank a little, and his face grew more and more sombre. "Pardon me, sir, but how did you meet her?" "By accident," replied Errington promptly, not caring to relate his morning's adventure for the pilot's benefit. "Is she some great personage here?" Svensen sighed, and smiled somewhat dubiously. "Great?
After this parenthesis, she resumed the conversation, Valdemar Svensen sitting silently apart, and related all that had happened since Thelma's arrival at the Altenfjord. She also gave an account of Lovisa Elsland's death, though Britta was not much affected by the loss of her grandmother. "Dreadful old thing!" she said with a shudder. "I'm glad I wasn't with her!
Obediently and in haste, Svensen filled the cup he asked for with old Lacrima Christi, of which there was always a supply in this far Northern abode, and gave it to him, watching him with a sort of superstitious reverence as he drained off its contents and returned it empty. "Ah! That warms this freezing blood of mine," he said, the lustre flashing back into his eyes.
A bachelor is no better than a gossiping old woman. He that is always alone must talk, if it be only to woods and waves. It is the married men who know best how excellent it is to keep silence!" They all laughed, though Thelma's eyes had a way of looking pensive even when she smiled. "You would not blame poor Svensen because he is alone, father?" she said. "Is he not to be pitied?
His breathing was scarcely perceptible, and Svensen, alarmed at his appearance, forced some drops of wine between his set lips, and chafed his cold hands with anxious solicitude. Slowly and very gradually he recovered consciousness and intelligence, and presently asked for a pencil and paper to write a few farewell words to his daughter.
"I know it was that Chartreuse," he thought to himself. "That and the midnight sun-effects. Nothing else!" "What!" went on Philip. "No good-looking girls at all about here, eh?" Svensen shook his head, still smilingly. "Not at Bosekop, sir, that I ever heard of." "I say!" broke in Lorimer, "are there any old tombs or sea-caves, or places of that sort close by, worth exploring?"
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