He ran
round the front wing of a building and stood suddenly before a
brightly, restlessly lighted window. The light did him good, the
flames yielded to it; he went to the window and looked in. It was a
brew-room, a girl stood at the hearth and stirred the kettle. The
light which she held in her hand had a slightly reddish sheen on
account of the dense fumes. Another girl was sitting down, plucking
poultry, and a third was singeing it over a blazing straw-fire. When
the flames grew weaker, new straw was put on, and they flared up
again; then they again became weaker and still weaker; they went out.
Mogens angrily broke a pane with his elbow, and slowly walked away.
The girls inside screamed. Then he ran again for a long time with a
low moaning. Scattered flashes of memory of happy days came to him,
and when they had passed the darkness was twice as black. He could
not bear to think of what had happened. It was impossible for it to
have happened. He threw himself down on his knees and raised his hands
toward heaven, the while he pleaded that that which had happened might
be as though it had not occurred. For a long time he dragged himself
along on his knees with his eyes steadfastly fixed on the sky, as if
afraid it might slip away from him to escape his pleas, provided he
did not keep it incessantly in his eye. Then pictures of his happy
time came floating toward him, more and more in mist-like ranks. There
were also pictures that rose in a sudden glamor round about him, and
others flitted by so indefinite, so distant, that they were gone
before he really knew what they were.
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