Page:Pontoppidan - Emanuel, or Children of the Soil (1896).djvu/39



A of an hour later the Parsonage had fallen back into its usual state of peace and quietness. Miss Ragnhild went about in the rooms putting them to rights for the night. She closed the grand piano in the corner, beneath the laurel crowned bust of Beethoven; put away the music, and kissed the sleepy parrot on the beak before covering up the cage. Then she took her accustomed seat by the table under the lamp, and went on with her work.

The Provst filled his pipe in his own room, and began wandering up and down through both rooms. Now and then he glanced somewhat nervously at his daughter, puffing out immoderately thick clouds of smoke from his pursed up lips. At last he stopped before her, and said with somewhat forced gaiety;

"Well, my little Ragnhild, what do you think of our new guest?"

The young lady's expression became cold and reserved. The question was evidently disagreeable.

"Oh! he makes a very pleasant impression," she said, indifferently.

"Yes, doesn't he? there seems to be a pleasing ingenuousness about him—a childlike freshness which is very uncommon at the present time. Now-a-days young people of twenty are already old and weary of life—I am very glad you like