All the evening I had a bitter feeling that I should not have come to that party. My coming was hardly noticed at all, they were all so occupied with one another; Edwarda hardly bade me welcome. I began drinking hard because I knew I was unwelcome; and yet I did not go away.

Herr Mack smiled a great deal and put on his most amiable expression; he was in evening dress, and looked well. He was now here, now there, mingling with his half a hundred guests, dancing one dance now and then, joking and laughing. There were secrets lurking in his eyes.

A whirl of music and voices sounded through the house. Five of the rooms were occupied by the guests, besides the big room where they were dancing. Supper was over when I arrived. Busy maids were running to and fro with glasses and wines, brightly polished coffee-pots, cigars and pipes, cakes and fruit. There was no sparing of anything. The chandeliers in the rooms were filled with extra-thick candles that had been made for the occasion; the new oil lamps were lit as well. Eva was helping in the kitchen; I caught a glimpse of her. To think that Eva should be here too!

The Baron received a great deal of attention, though he was quiet and modest and did not put himself forward. He, too, was in evening dress; the tails of his coat were miserably crushed from the packing. He talked a good deal with Edwarda, followed her with his eyes, drank with her, and called her Fr?ken, as he did the daughters of the Dean and of the district surgeon. I felt the same dislike of him as before, and could hardly look at him without turning my eyes away with a wretched silly grimace. When he spoke to me, I answered shortly and pressed my lips together after.

I happen to remember one detail of that evening. I stood talking to a young lady, a fair-haired girl; and I said something or told some story that made her laugh. It can hardly have been anything remarkable, but perhaps, in my excited state, I told it more amusingly than I remember now — at any rate, I have forgotten it. But when I turned round, there was Edwarda standing behind me. She gave me a glance of recognition.

Afterwards I noticed that she drew the fair girl aside to find out what I had said. I cannot say how that look of Edwarda’s cheered me, after I had been going about from room to room like a sort of outcast all the evening; I felt better at once, and spoke to several people, and was entertaining. As far as I am aware, I did nothing awkward or wrong . . .

I was standing outside on the steps. Eva came carrying some things from one of the rooms. She saw me, came out, and touched my hands swiftly with one of hers; then she smiled and went in again. Neither of us had spoken. When I turned to go in after her, there was Edwarda in the passage, watching me. She also said nothing. I went into the room.

“Fancy — Lieutenant Glahn amuses himself having meetings with the servants on the steps!” said Edwarda suddenly, out loud. She was standing in the doorway. Several heard what she said. She laughed, as if speaking in jest, but her face was very pale.

I made no answer to this; I only murmured:

“It was accidental; she just came out, and we met in the passage . . . ”

Some time passed — an hour, perhaps. A glass was upset over a lady’s dress. As soon as Edwarda saw it, she cried:

“What has happened? That was Glahn, of course.”

I had not done it: I was standing at the other end of the room when it happened. After that I drank pretty hard again, and kept near the door, to be out of the way of the dancers.

The Baron still had the ladies constantly round him. He regretted that his collections were packed away, so that he could not show them — that bunch of weed from the White Sea, the clay from Korholmerne, highly interesting stone formations from the bottom of the sea. The ladies peeped curiously at his shirt studs, the five-pointed coronets — they meant that he was a Baron, of course. All this time the Doctor created no sensation; even his witty oath, D?d og Pinsel, no longer had any effect. But when Edwarda was speaking, he was always on the spot, correcting her language, embarrassing her with little shades of meaning, keeping her down with calm superiority.

She said:

“ . .............