Page:Karl Gjellerup - Minna, A novel - 1913.djvu/271

 Stephensen answered gently, and with a strange sorrowful tone in his voice that was quite new to me, and that clearly enough said: "And who knows whether I shall ever do it again!"

Minna sat down without any further objection, and altered her position once or twice according to his directions. He began eagerly to sketch. But soon he stopped, discontented with the light; I placed the lamp in a better position for him. In so doing I noticed that the old globe with the break had been changed for a new one, in honour of Stephensen, as it seemed; but whether Minna or her mother had been so tender over his artistic susceptibilities I did not know. Most probably Minna would have had more important things to think of than the broken globe, and Mrs. Jagemann had evidently not only a deep reverence for "Mr. Stephensen, artist," but also a certain motherly feeling from the time he had been there as a lodger. She gave him now and then an affectionate side-glance, while she rocked her big head over her knitting, as if she said to herself: "Oh dear me, yes, there he sits again! Yes, my word! Why didn't you come before?"

I did not doubt that, if the choice had been left to her, I might as well have retired at once. And though I was quite sure that Minna was far from wanting to take her advice, and that on the morrow she would be quite free from her influence, I had all the time a painful sensation that I was out of favour.

Minna, on the contrary, shared her kindness equally between us both in a natural and unhesitating manner, which astonished me, as if it did not give her the least difficulty to steer between her two suitors, each of whom seemed to have the same claim to her future. As she had hardly expressed her pleasure over possessing the drawing