He was far down in the town before he could stop and pull himself
together. One thing was clear--after this he could never face that
schoolmaster again. All was lost. Could he even be sure that what he had
done wasn't so frightfully wrong that he would have to go to prison for
it?
Next day the Troen folk were sitting at their dinner when the eldest son
looked out of the window and said: "There's Peer coming."
"Mercy on us!" cried the good-wife, as he came in. "What is the matter,
Peer? Are you ill?"
Ah, it was good that night to creep in under the old familiar skin-rug
once more. And the old mother sat on the bedside and talked to him
of the Lord, by way of comfort. Peer clenched his hands under the
clothes--somehow he thought now of the Lord as a sort of schoolmaster
in a dressing-gown. Yet it was some comfort all the same to have the old
soul sit there and talk to him.
Peer had much to put up with in the days that followed--much tittering
and whispers of "Look! there goes the priest," as he went by. At
table, he felt ashamed of every mouthful he took; he hunted for jobs as
day-labourer on distant farms so as to earn a little to help pay for
his keep. And when the winter came he would have to do as the others
did--hire himself out, young and small as he was, for the Lofoten
fishing.
But one day after church Klaus Brock drew him aside and got him to talk
things over at length. First, Klaus told him that he himself was going
away--he was to begin in one of the mechanical workshops in town, and
go from there to the Technical College, to qualify for an engineer.
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