Jerusalem (Historical Novel). Selma Lagerlöf

yet started; and many persons were sitting in the grass and on the stone hedge, watching the people arrive. The instant they saw Ingmar and Brita they began to nudge each other, and whisper, and point. Ingmar glanced at Brita. She sat there with clasped hands, quite unconscious of the things about her. She saw no persons, apparently, but Ingmar saw them only too well. They came running after the wagon, and did not wonder at their running or their stares. They must have thought that their eyes had deceived them. Of course, they could not believe that he had come to the house of God with her—the woman who had strangled his child. "This is too much!" he said. "I can't stand it.

      "I think you'd better go inside at once, Brita," he suggested.

      "Why, certainly," she answered. To attend service was her only thought; she had not come there to meet people.

      Ingmar took his own time unharnessing and feeding the horse. Many eyes were fixed upon him, but nobody spoke to him. By the time he was ready to go into the church, most of the people were already in their pews, and the opening hymn was being sung. Walking down the centre isle, he glanced over at the side where the women were seated. All the pews were filled save one, and in that there was only one person. He saw at once that it was Brita and knew, of course, that no one had cared to sit with her. Ingmar went and sat down beside her. Brita looked up at him in wonderment. She had not noticed it before, but now she understood why she had the pew to herself. Then the deep feeling of devotion, which she had but just experienced, was dispelled by a sense of black despair. "How would it all end?" she wondered. She should never have come with him.

      Her eyes began to fill. To keep from breaking down she took up an old prayerbook from the shelf in front of her, and opened it. She kept turning the leaves of both gospels and epistles without being able to see a word for the tears. Suddenly something bright caught her eye. It was a bookmark, with a red heart, which lay between the leaves. She took it out and slipped it toward Ingmar. She saw him close his big hand over it and steal a glance at it. Shortly afterward it lay upon the floor. "What is to become of us?" thought Brita, sobbing behind the prayerbook.

      As soon as the preacher had stepped down from the pulpit they went out. Ingmar hurriedly hitched up the horse, with Brita's help. By the time the benediction was pronounced and the congregation was beginning to file out, Brita and Ingmar were already off. Both seemed to be thinking the same thought: one who has committed such a crime cannot live among people. The two fell as if they had been doing penance by appearing at church. "Neither of us will be able to stand it," they thought.

      In the midst of her distress of mind, Brita caught a glimpse of the Ingmar Farm, and hardly knew it again. It looked so bright and red. She remembered having heard that the house was to be painted the year Ingmar married. Before, the wedding had been put off because he had felt that he could not afford to pay out any money just then. Now she understood that he had always meant to have everything right; but the way had been made rather hard for him.

      When they arrived at the farm the folks were at dinner. "Here comes the boss," said one of the men, looking out. Mother Martha got up from the table, scarcely lifting her heavy eyelids. "Stay where you are, all of you!" she commanded. "No one need rise from the table."

      The old woman walked heavily across the room. Those who turned to look after her noticed that she had on her best dress, with her silk shawl across her shoulders, and her silk kerchief on her head, as if to emphasize her authority. When the horse stopped she was already at the door.

      Ingmar jumped down at once, but Brita kept her seat. He went over to her side and unfastened the carriage apron.

      "Aren't you going to get out?" he said.

      "No," she replied, then covering her face with her hands, she burst into tears.

      "I ought never to have come back," she sobbed.

      "Oh, do get down!" he urged.

      "Let me go back to the city; I'm not good enough for you."

      Ingmar thought that maybe she was right about it, but said nothing.

       He stood with his hand on the apron, and waited.

      "What does she say?" asked Mother Martha from the doorway.

      "She says she isn't good enough for us," Ingmar replied, for

       Brita's words could scarcely be heard for her sobs.

      "What is she crying about?" asked the old woman.

      "Because I am such a miserable sinner," said Brita, pressing her hands to her heart which she thought would break.

      "What's that?" the old woman asked once more.

      "She says she is such a miserable sinner," Ingmar repeated.

      When Brita heard him repeat her words in a cold and indifferent tone, the truth suddenly flashed upon her. No, he could never have stood there and repeated those words to his mother had he been fond of her, or had there been a spark of love in his heart for her.

      "Why doesn't she get down?" the old woman then asked.

      Suppressing her sobs, Brita spoke up: "Because I don't want to bring misfortune upon Ingmar."

      "I think she is quite right," said the old mistress. "Let her go, little Ingmar! You may as well know that otherwise I'll be the one to leave: for I'll not sleep one night under the same roof with the likes of her."

      "For God's sake let me go!" Brita moaned.

      Ingmar ripped out an oath, turned the horse, and sprang into the cart. He was sick and tired of all this and could not stand any more of it.

      Out on the highway they kept meeting church people. This annoyed Ingmar. Suddenly he turned the horse and drove in on a narrow forest road.

      As he turned some one called to him. He glanced back. It was the postman with a letter for him. He took the letter, thrust it into his pocket, and drove on.

      As soon as he felt sure that he could not be seen from the road, he slowed down and brought out the letter. Instantly Brita put her hand on his arm. "Don't read it!" she begged.

      "Why not?" he asked.

      "Never mind reading it; it's nothing."

      "But how can you know?"

      "It's a letter from me."

      "Then tell me yourself what's in it."

      "No, I can't tell you that."

      He looked hard at her. She turned scarlet, her eyes growing wild with alarm. "I guess I will read that letter anyway," said Ingmar, and began to tear open the envelope.

      "O Heavenly Father!" she cried, "am I then to be spared nothing? Ingmar," she implored, "read it in a day or two—when I am on my way to America."

      By that time he had already opened the letter and was scanning it. She put her hand over the paper. "Listen to me, Ingmar!" she said. "It was the chaplain who got me to write that letter, and he promised not to send it till I was on board the steamer. Instead he sent it off too soon. You have no right to read it yet; wait till I'm gone, Ingmar."

      Ingmar gave her an angry look and jumped out of the wagon, so that he might read the letter in peace. Brita was as much excited now as she had been in the old days, when things did not go her way.

      "What I say in that letter isn't true. The chaplain talked me into writing it. I don't love you, Ingmar."

      He looked up from the paper and gazed at her in astonishment. Then she grew silent, and the lessons in humility which she had learned in prison profited her now. After all she suffered no greater embarrassment than she deserved.

      Ingmar, meanwhile, stood puzzling over the letter. Suddenly, with an impatient snarl, he crumpled it up.

      "I can't make this out!" he said, stamping his foot. "My head's all in a muddle."

      He went up to Brita and gripped her by the arm.

      "Does it really say in the letter that you care for me?" His tone was shockingly brutal, and the look of him was terrible.

      Brita