The rattle of cart-wheels followed, and Baard fetched a box out of the
cart, and carried it down to the boat.

Then Mathilde, the parson's daughter, came running up calling, "Eli!
Eli!"

The two girls wept in each other's arms.

"You must take this," said Mathilde, giving her friend a bird-cage.
"Mother wants you to. Yes, you must take Narrifas, and then you'll often
think of me."

"Eli! Come, come, Eli!" came the summons from the boat.

A moment after, and Arne saw the boat out in the water, Eli standing up
in the stern, holding the bird-cage and waving her hand to Mathilde. His
eyes followed the boat, and he watched it draw near to the land. He
could see the three forms mirrored in the water, and continued gazing
until they had left the boat and gone indoors at the biggest house on
the opposite side of the lake.

Mathilde had sat for some time by the landing stage, but she had left
now, and Arne was alone when Eli came out again for a last look across
the water. Arne could see her image in the lake. "Perhaps she sees me
now," he thought. Then, when the sun had set, he got up and went home,
feeling that all things were at peace.

Arne's fancies for some time now were of dreams of love and fair
maidens. Old ballads and romances mirrored them for him, as the water