Bernick: It will eventually touch our town, my dear Hilmar,
because we are going to build a branch line here.

Hilmar: Aha--a new scheme, then?

Rummel: Yes, isn't it a capital scheme? What?

Rorlund: Hm!--

Vigeland: There is no denying that it looks as though Providence
had just planned the configuration of the country to suit a
branch line.

Rorlund: Do you really mean it, Mr. Vigeland?

Bernick: Yes, I must confess it seems to me as if it had been the
hand of Providence that caused me to take a journey on business
this spring, in the course of which I happened to traverse a
valley through which I had never been before. It came across my
mind like a flash of lightning that this was where we could carry
a branch line down to our town. I got an engineer to survey the
neighbourhood, and have here the provisional calculations and
estimate; so there is nothing to hinder us.

Mrs.Bernick (who is still with the other ladies at the verandah
door): But, my dear Karsten, to think that you should have kept
it all a secret from us!

Bernick: Ah, my dear Betty, I knew you would not have been able
to grasp the exact situation. Besides, I have not mentioned it to