Page:Karl Gjellerup - Minna, A novel - 1913.djvu/90



afternoon sun shed its full glare on the rocks, but over them dark clouds were hanging, and the rain suddenly began to fall in such big drops that its stormy character could not be mistaken. We were obliged to hurry over the shrub-covered bank to the smithy of the quarry. This effort gave Minna back her strength, and she, who a minute before had hardly been able to support herself, now ran the last few steps through the pouring rain, as if her nerves had not been in the least shaken.

It was a great change to come from the vast, bright space, with its white, sunlit rocks, into a small room overcrowded with workmen, and enveloped in a sooty and black obscurity which was only relieved by red-glowing flames. A strikingly handsome young man stood by the forge; he stretched up his muscular arm, caught a rope, and pulled the long bent pole which worked the bellows. The heap of coal flared brightly, he poked it, threw on another shovelful, put a pickaxe with a blunt end into it, and took out another one with a red-hot point; then he spat on one of his fingers, with which he skimmed the hot metal, and dipped it into a trough of water, causing it to frizzle and send up a white steam.

Minna laughed.

"Just now we saw Siegfried fighting with the dragon, and here we have him alive in the forest smithy."

She had again been speaking Danish to me, and the