Page:Undset - Jenny (1921).djvu/67

 something of what I had wanted. I could see they were done by me and not by any little girl who had just learnt something about drawing. You see what I mean?

"I've a subject out here—on the other way to the city. We'll go there another time. It is a road between two vineyards—quite a narrow one. In one place there are two baroque gates with iron gratings, each of them with a cypress beside it. I have made a couple of coloured drawings. There is a heavy dark blue sky above the cypresses and clearness of green air, and a star, and a faint outline of houses and cupolas in the distant city. I wanted the picture to be sort of stirring, you see."

Twilight began to fall upon them. Her face looked pale under the brim of her hat.

"Don't you think I ought to get well, and be allowed to work?"

"Yes," he said in a low voice; "dear.…"

He could hear that she was breathing heavily. They were both quiet for a moment, then he said:

"You are very fond of your friends, Miss Jahrman?"

"I want to like everybody, you see," she said quietly, taking a long breath.

Helge Gram bent suddenly forward and kissed her hand, which rested white and small on the table.

"Thank you," said Francesca in a low voice, and after a short pause:

"Let us go back now; it is getting cold."

The next day when he moved into his new room a majolica vase with small blue iris was standing in the sunlight on his table. The signora explained that his "cousin" had brought them. When Helge was alone he bent over the flowers and kissed them one by one.