clusters from the rowans drop with a sullen thud and bury themselves in
the moss.

Grindhusen is right, perhaps: tomorrow will surely look after itself, just
as today. I have not seen a paper now these last two weeks, and, for all
that, here I am, alive and well, making great progress in respect of
inward calm; I sing, and square my shoulders, and stand bareheaded
watching the stars at night.

For eighteen years past I have sat in cafes, calling for the waiter if a
fork was not clean: I never call for Gunhild in the matter of forks clean
or not! There's Grindhusen, now, I say to myself; did you mark when he lit
his pipe, how he used the match to the very last of it, and never burned
his horny fingers? I saw a fly crawling over his hand, but he simply let
it crawl; perhaps he never noticed it was there. That is the way a man
should feel towards flies....

In the evening, Grindhusen takes the boat and rows off. I wander along the
beach, singing to myself a little, throwing stones at the water, and
hauling bits of driftwood ashore. The stars are out, and there is a moon.
In a couple of hours Grindhusen comes back, with a good set of
bricklayer's tools in the boat. Stolen them somewhere, I think to myself.
We shoulder each our load, and hide away the tools among the trees.

Then it is night, and we go each our separate way.

Grindhusen finishes his painting the following afternoon, but agrees to go
on cutting wood till six o'clock to make up a full day's work. I get out
Gunhild's boat and go off fishing, so as not to be there when he leaves. I
catch no fish, and it is cold sitting in the boat; I look at my watch