to her seat beside Kjersti Hoel in one
of the church pews.

As Lisbeth drew near, Kjersti took her hand and said half aloud, "May
it bring you happiness and blessing, Lisbeth!"

Lisbeth stood a moment, looked up at Kjersti as if just awakening,
smiled, and whispered softly, "Thanks, Kjersti Hoel."

Then, when the service was over, they walked out of church.

Outside the church door stood Jacob and Peter. They lifted their caps
to Kjersti and shook hands with her. Afterward they shook hands with
Lisbeth, lifting their caps to her, too, which had not been their
custom before her confirmation. They also said to her, "May it bring
you happiness and blessing!"

After that Kjersti and Lisbeth walked about the grassy space in front
of the church. They made slow progress, because there were so many
people who wanted to greet the mistress of Hoel and to ask what girl it
was that she had presented for confirmation on that day. At last they
reached the broad wagon, to which the horse had already been harnessed,
and, mounting into it, they set forth on their homeward way, returning
in silence, as they had come. Not until they had reached home did
Kjersti say, "You would like to be alone awhile this afternoon, too?"

"Yes, thank you," responded Lisbeth.

* * * * *

In the afternoon Lisbeth Longfrock again sat alone in the little room
in the hall way. Bearhunter, who had now become blind, lay outside her
door. Whenever he was not in the kitchen, where, as a rule, he kept to
his own corner, he lay at Lisbeth's door, having chosen this place in
preference to his old one on the flat stone in front of the house. To
lie on the doorstep where so many went out and in--and nowadays they
went so rudely--was too exciting for him; but Lisbeth always stepped
considerately.

As Lisbeth sat there in her room she was not reading in any book; in
fact, she was doing nothing at all. Spread out on the bed before her
lay her long frock, which she had not used that winter. It looked very
small and worn.

When she had come into her room, where the afternoon sun fell slantwise
upon the coverlet of her bed, picturing there the small window frame,
she had had a wonderful feeling of peace and contentment. It seemed to
her that there was not the least need of thinking about serious things
or of reading, either. She felt that the simplest and most natural
thing to do was merely to busy herself happily, witho