the evening, as the sun was setting. This
time she gave her message to a child that was swinging on the gate.
The child ran straight to the house and told the bride.

"Tell her that Ingmar Ingmarsson is dancing with his wife," said
the bride. "He has no time to talk to anyone else."

When the child came back and repeated what had been told her, the
young woman smiled indulgently, and said: "Now you are telling
something that isn't true. Ingmar Ingmarsson is not dancing with
his bride."

This time she did not go away, but remained standing at the gate.

The bride, meanwhile, thought to herself: "I have told a lie on my
wedding day!" Sorry for what she had done, she went up to Ingmar,
and told him that there was a stranger outside who wished to speak
with him. Ingmar went out, and found Gertrude standing at the gate,
waiting.

When Gertrude saw him coming, she started down the road, Ingmar
following. They walked along in silence till they were some
distance away from the house.

As to Ingmar, it could be truthfully said of him that he had aged
in the short time of a few weeks. At any rate, there was something
about his face that showed added shrewdness and caution. He also
stooped more, and looked more subdued, now that he had acquired
riches, than was the case when he had nothing.

Indeed, he was anything but glad to see Gertrude! Every day since
the auction he had been trying to persuade himself into the belief
that he was satisfied with his bargain. "In fact, we Ingmarssons
care for little else than to plow and to sow the fields on the
Ingmar Farm," was what he had said to himself.

But there was something that troubled him even more than the loss
of Gertrude--the thought that now there was one human being who
could say of him that he had not lived up to his word. Keeping a
little behind Gertrude all the while, he went over in his mind all
the scornful things which she had a right to say to him.

Presently Gertrude sat down on a stone at the roadside, and put her
basket on the ground; then she drew her kerchief still farther over
her face.

"Sit down," she said to Ingmar, pointing to another stone. "I have
many things to talk over with you."

Ingmar sat down, and was glad that he felt quite calm. "This will
be easier than I had expected," he said to himself. "I thought it
was going to be much harder on me to see Gertrude again, and to
hear her speak. I was afraid that my love for her would get the
bette