There’s no sun anymore, so let me carry your parasol. I won’t bother you, I won’t even talk if you like, as long as I may walk beside you and listen to the birds chirping. No, don’t go, not this minute! Why are you running away?”

But since she took to her heels anyway, refusing to listen to me, I ran after her so she could hear my excuse: “I’ll be damned if your lovely face hasn’t made a most powerful impression on me!”

But now she was rushing off at such a frantic pace that I lost sight of her in a couple of minutes. As for that heavy blond braid of hers, she simply held it in her hand as she ran. I never saw anything like it.

This is what happened. I wasn’t going to annoy her, I intended no harm; I bet she loves her lieutenant, it never occurred to me to force myself on her. But it’s okay, it’s quite okay; maybe her lieutenant will challenge me, heh-heh, he will join forces with the deputy, the deputy judge, and challenge me....

By the way, I wonder if that deputy will give Miniman a new coat. We can wait a day, maybe even two days, but if he hasn’t done it within two days we’ll give him a reminder.4 Period. Nagel.5

I know of a poor woman here, she has looked at me so sheepishly, as if she wanted to ask for something but hasn’t yet dared to. I’m quite obsessed by her eyes, although her hair is white; I’ve gone out of my way four times to avoid meeting her. She’s not old, it’s not from age that she’s white; her eyelashes are still startlingly black, fearfully so, giving her eyes a smoldering look. She almost always carries a basket under her apron, which is probably what makes her feel so sheepish. When I turn around once she has passed me, I notice that she walks to the market, takes a few eggs out of her basket and sells those two or three eggs to the first comer, whereupon she returns home the way she came, the basket under her apron. She lives in a tiny little house by the quayside; it’s a one-story house and unpainted. I once saw her through the window—there are no curtains, only a few white flowers to be seen on the windowsill; she was standing far back in the room staring at me as I walked by. God only knows what sort of woman she is; but her hands are quite small. I could always give you a handout, my white maiden, but I would rather give you some assistance.

Incidentally, I know very well why I’m so obsessed by your eyes, I knew that right away. Strange how a youthful infatuation can linger for so long and crop up again every once in a while. But her lovely face is not yours, and you’re much older than she, alas. And yet she married a telegraph operator and moved to Kabelvag! Well, there is no accounting for tastes; I couldn’t expect to have her love, nor did I get it. There’s nothing to be done about that—. Listen, the clock is striking half-past ten—. There certainly isn’t, there’s nothing to be done about that. But if you only knew how dearly I have remembered you these ten or twelve years, not forgetting you for a moment—. Heh-heh, but that is really my own fault, she can’t help that. While other people remember someone for a year and that’s that, I go on remembering for ten.

I’ll give that white-haired egg-wife an assistance, well, both a handout and an assistance, for the sake of her eyes. I’ve got worlds of money to take from, sixty-two thousand kroner for a landed property, cash in hand at that. Ho-ho, I need only glance at the table to find three telegraphic documents of the greatest value before my eyes—. Ah, some joke that was, what a trick! One is an agronomist and a capitalist, one doesn’t sell just like that, at the first offer, one sleeps on it and thinks it over. That’s what one does, one thinks it over.