Some days passed. I was growing tired of my empty occupation, which consisted in doing nothing but loaf about the place. I went to the foreman of the gang and asked him to take me on as a lumberman, but he refused.

These gentlemen of the proletariat think a good deal of themselves; they look down on farm-workers, and will have nothing to do with them. They are ever on the move, going from one waterway to another, drawing their wages in cash, and spending a fair part of the same in drink. Then, too, they are more popular among the girls. It is the same with men working on the roads or railways, with all factory-hands; even the mechanic is looked down upon, and as for the farm-hand, he is a very slave!

Now, I knew I could be pretty sure of a place in the gang any day if I cared to ask the engineer. But, in the first place, I had no wish to be further indebted to him, and in the second, I might be sure that if I did, my friends the lumbermen would make my life a misery until I had gone through all the trouble of making myself respected for my deserts. And that might take longer than I cared about.

And then one day the engineer came to me with instructions that I was to observe with care. He spoke politely and sensibly this time:

“We’ve had no rain for a long time now; the river’s getting steadily lower, and the logs are piling up on the way down. I want you to tell the man above and the one below to be extra careful about their work just now, and you yourself, of course, will do the same.”

“We’re sure to get rain before long,” I said, for the sake of saying something.

“That may be,” he answered, with the intense earnestness of youth, “but I must act all the same as if there were never to be rain again. Now remember every word I’ve said. I can’t be everywhere at once myself, more especially now that I’ve a visitor.”

I answered him with a face as serious as his own that I would do my very best.

So I was still bound to my idling occupation after all, and wandered up and down the river as before with my boat-hook and my rations. For my own satisfaction I cleared away bigger and bigger jams unaided, sang to myself as if I were a whole gang, and worked hard enough for many men; also I carried the new instructions to Grindhusen, and frightened him properly.

But then came the rain.

And now the sticks went dancing down through channel and rapids, like huge, pale serpents hurrying, hurrying on, now head, now tail in air.

Easy days these for my engineer!

For myself, I was ill at ease in the town and in my lodging there. I had a little room to myself, but one could hear every sound in the place, and there was little rest or comfort. Moreover, I found myself outdone in everything by the young lumbermen who lodged there.

I patroled the river-bank regularly those days, though there was little or nothing for me to do there. I would steal away and sit in hiding under an over-hanging rock, hugging the thought of how I was old, and forsaken by all; in the evenings I wrote many letters to people I knew, just to have some one to talk to; but I did not send the letters.

Joyless days were these. My chief pleasure was to go about noticing every little trifle in the town, wherever it might be, and thinking a little upon each.

But was my engineer so free from care? I began to doubt it.

Why was he no longer to be seen out early and late with this new cousin of his? He would even stop another young lady on the bridge and pass the time of day — a thing he had not done this fortnight gone. I had seen him with Fru Falkenberg once or twice; she looked so young and prettily dressed, and happy — a little reckless, laughing out loud. That’s what it’s like when a woman first steps aside, I thought to myself; but to-morrow or the day after it may be different! And when I saw her again later on I was annoyed with her; there was something overbold about her dress and manner, the old charm and sweetness were gone. Where was the tenderness now in her eyes? Nothing but bravado! And furiously I told myself that her eyes shone like a pair of lamps at the door of a music hall.

By the look of things the couple had begun to weary of each other, since he had taken to going out alone, and she spend much of her time sitting looking out of the window in the hotel. And this, no doubt, was why stout Captain Bror made his appearance once again; his mission was perhaps to bring jollity and mirth to others besides himself. And this jovial lump of deformity certainly did his best; his guffaws of laughter rang through the little town one whole night long. Then his leave expired, and he had to go back to drill and duty — Fru Falkenberg and her Hugo were left to themselves once more.

One day, while I was in a shop, I heard that there had been some slight difference of opinion between Engineer Lassen and his cousin. A commercial traveller was telling the shopkeeper all about it. But so great was the general respect for the wealthy engineer throughout the town that the shopman would hardly believe the story, and questioned the scandal-monger doubtingly.

“It must have been in fun, I’m sure. Did you hear it yourself? When was it?”

The traveller himself did not dare to make more of it.

“My room’s next to his,” he said, “so I couldn’t help hearing it last night. They were arguing; I don’t say it was a quarrel — lord, no! as delicate as could be. She only said he was different now from what he had been; that he’d changed somehow. And he said it wasn’t his fault, he couldn’t do as he liked here in town. Then she asked him to get rid of somebody she didn’t like — one of his men, a lumberman, I suppose. And he promised he would.”

“Well, there you are — just nothing at all,” said the shopkeeper.

But the traveller had heard more, I fancy, than he cared to say. I could tell as much by his looks.

And had I not noticed myself how the engineer had changed? He had talked out loud so cheerfully at the station that first day; now he could be obstinately silent when he did go so far as to take Fruen for a walk down to the bridge. I could see well enough how they stood looking each their separate ways. Lord God in heaven, but love is a fleeting thing!

All went well enough at first. She said, no doubt, that it was quite a nice little place, with a great big river and the rapids, and so strange to hear the roar of the waters all the time; and here was a real little town with streets and people in —“And then you here, too!” And he of course, would answer: “Yes, and you!” Oh, they were everything to each other at first! But then they grew weary of good things; they took too much — took love in handfuls, such was their foolishness. And more and more clearly he realized that things were getting awry; the town was such a little place, and this cousin of his a stranger — he could not keep on being her attendant squire for ever. No, they must ease off a little gradually; now and then, perhaps — only occasionally, of course — it would be as well to have their meals at different times. If not, some of those commercial travellers would be getting ideas into their heads about the loving cousins. Remember, in a little place like this — and she . . . how could she understand it? A little place — yes, but surely it was no smaller now than it had been at first? No, no, my friend, it is you that have changed!

There had been plenty of rain, and the timber was coming down beautifully. Nevertheless, the engineer took to going off on little trips up or down the river. It seemed as if he were glad to get away; he looked worried and miserable altogether now.

One day he asked me to go up and tell Grindhusen to come in to town. Was it Grindhusen, I wondered, that was to be dismissed? But Fruen had never so much as set eyes on Grindhusen since she came; what could he have done to offend her?

I fetched Grindhusen in accordingly. He went up to the hotel at once to report, and the engineer put on his things and went out with him. They set out up the river and disappeared.

Later in the day Grindhusen came to my lodging, and was ready enough to tell, but I asked him nothing. In the evening the lumberman gave him Br?ndevin, and the spirit loosened his tongue. What about this cousin, or something, engineer has got with him? How much longer was she going to stay? As to this, nobody could say; and, anyhow, why shouldn’t she stay? “’Tis naught but fooling and trouble with such-like cousin business,” Grindhusen declared. “Why couldn’t he bring along the girl he’s going to marry? — and I told him so to his face.”

“You told him?” asked one of the men.

“Ay, I did that. You may not know it, but engineer and I we sit there talking as it might be me and you,” said Grindhusen, looking mighty big and proud. “What do you suppose he sent to fetch me for? You’d never guess if you sat there all night. Why, he sent for me just to have a talk over things. Not that there’s anything new or strange about that; he’s done the same before now; but, anyhow, that’s what it was.”

“What’d he want to talk to you about?” asked one.

Grindhusen swelled, and was not to be drawn at once. “Eh, I’m not such a fool, but I know how to talk with a man. And it’s not my way to be contrary neither. ‘You know a thing or two, Grindhusen,’ says the Inspector, ‘and there’s two Kroner for you,’ says he. Ay, that’s what he said. And if you don’t believe me, why, here’s the money, and you can see. There!”

“But what was it all about?” asked several voices at once.

“He’d better not say, if you ask me,” I said.

It struck me that the engineer must have been miserable and desperate when he sent me to fetch Grindhusen. He was so little used to trouble that the moment anything went wrong he felt the need of some one to confide in. And now when he was going about day after day, thoroughly disheartened and full of pity for himself, as if he wanted to know how miserable he was at being checked in his play. This sportsman, with his figure moulded in the wrong place, was a travesty of youth, a Spartan in tears. What sort of upbringing could his have been?

Ah, well, if he had been an old man I had found reason and excuse for him enough; if the truth were known, it was perhaps but hatred of his youth that moved me now. Who can say? But I know I looked upon him as a travesty, a caricature.

Grindhusen stared at me when I had spoken my few words; the others, too, looked wonderingly.

“I’ll not say, but it might be better not,” said Grindhusen submissively.

But the men were not to be put off.

“And why shouldn’t he tell? We’re not going to let it go farther.”

“No, that we shan’t,” said another. “But you might be one of that sort yourself and go telling tales to the Inspector.”

Grindhusen took courage at this, and said:

“I’ll say what I like, so don’t you trouble yourself! Tell just as much as I please. For I’m saying no more than’s true. And in case you’d care to know, I can tell you the Inspector’s got a word to say to you very soon. Ay, that he has, or hearing goes for nothing. So you’ve no call to be anyway stuck up yourself. And as for me telling or............