this was a sorrow there was no forgetting. On his
return from every voyage he sent her the money he had made, and
some little token of his love with it. She always sent both back
without a word. She understood from them that Jan would come no more
in person, and that she would have to make the next advance, either
by voice or letter. Many times she had declared she would never do
this, and the declaration even in her tenderest hours, bound her
to her self-inflicted loneliness and grief. So on Snorro's rude
table the pretty womanly trinkets accumulated, and Snorro looked
at them with constantly gathering anger.

One morning in October he heard a thing that made his heart leap. The
physician of the town hurried into the store, and cried, "Peter Fae,
here hath come a little man to thy house. A handsome lad he is,
indeed. Now then, go and see him."

"What of my daughter, Doctor?"

"She will do well enough."

Snorro lifted never an eyelash, but his face glowed like fire. Jan,
then, had a son! Jan's son! Already he loved the child. Surely he
would be the peacemaker. Now the mother and father must meet. He had
almost forgiven Margaret. How he longed for Jan to come back. Alas!
when he did, Margaret was said to be dying; Peter had not been at his
store for three days.

The double news met Jan as soon as he put his foot on the quay. "Thou
hast a son, Jan." "Thy wife is dying." Jan was nearly distraught. With
all a man's strength of feeling, he had emotions as fervent and vivid
as a woman: he forgot in a moment every angry feeling, and hastened to
his wife. Peter opened the door; when he saw Jan, he could have struck
him. He did what was more cruel, he shut the door in his face, and
drew the bolt passionately across it.

Jan, however, would not leave the vicinity. He stopped the doctor, and
every one that came and went. In a few hours this became intolerable
to Peter. He ordered him to go away, but Jan sat on a large stone by
the gate, with his head in his hands, and answered him never a word.
Then he sent Thora to him. In vain Jan tried to soften her heart.
"Margaret is unconscious, yet she mourns constantly for thee. Thou art
my child's murderer," she said sternly. "Go thy ways before I curse
thee."

He turned away then and went down to the seaside, and threw himself,
in an agony of despair, upon the sand and the yellow tangle. Hour
after hour passed; physical exhaustion and mental grief produced at
length a kind of l