"Very!" responded her little maid. "And it is beginning to snow."
Thelma looked wistful. "It is all snow and darkness now at the Altenfjord," she said.
Britta smiled. "Yes, indeed, Fröken! We are better off here than there."
"Perhaps!" replied Thelma a little musingly, and then she settled herself as though to sleep.
Britta kissed her hand, and retired noiselessly. When she had gone, Thelma opened her eyes and lay broad awake looking at the flicker of rosy light flung on the ceiling from the little suspended lamp in her oratory. All snow and darkness at the Altenfjord! How strange the picture seemed! She thought of her mother's sepulchre,--how cold and dreary it must be,--she could see in fancy the long pendent icicles fringing the entrance to the sea-king's tomb,--the spot where she and Philip had first met,--she could almost hear the slow, sullen plash of the black Fjord against the shore. Her maiden life in Norway--her school days at Arles,--these were now like dreams,--dreams that had passed away long, long ago. The whole tenor of her existence had changed,--she was a wife,--she was soon to be a mother,--and with this near future of new and sacred joy before her, why did she to-night so persistently look backward to the past?
As she lay quiet, watching the glimmering light upon the wall, it seemed as though her room were suddenly filled with shadowy forms,--she saw her mother's sweet, sad, suffering face,--then her father's sturdy figure and fine, frank features,--then came the flitting shape of the hapless Sigurd, whose plaintive voice she almost imagined she could hear,--and feeling that she was growing foolishly nervous, she closed her eyes, and tried to sleep. In vain,--her mind began to work on a far more unpleasing train of thought. Why did not Philip return? Where was he? As though some mocking devil had answered her, the words, "In the arms of Violet Vere!" as uttered by Sir Francis Lennox, recurred to her. Overcome by her restlessness, she started up,--she determined to get out of bed, and put on her dressing-gown and read,--when her quick ears caught the sound of steps coming up the stair-case. She recognized her husband's firm tread, and understood that he was followed by Neville, whose sleeping-apartment was on the floor above. She listened attentively--they were talking together in low tones on the landing outside her door.
"I think it would be much better to make a clean breast of it," said Sir Philip. "She will have to know some day."