You don't mean a girl that was brought in here about a week
ago?"
"Yes, yes--but let me in."
"We've had no end of bother and trouble about that girl, trying to find
out where she came from, and if she had people here. But, of course,
this weather, we couldn't possibly keep her any longer. Didn't you meet
a coffin on a cart as you came along?"
"What--what--you don't mean--?"
"Well, you should have come before, you know. She did ask a lot for some
one called Peer. And she got the matron to write somewhere--wasn't it to
Levanger? Were you the fellow she was asking for? So you came at last!
Oh, well--she died four or five days ago. And they're just gone now to
bury her, in St. Mary's Churchyard."
Peer turned round and looked out over the bay at the town, that lay
sunlit and smoke-wreathed beyond. Towards the town he began to walk, but
his step grew quicker and quicker, and at last he took off his cap
and ran, panting and sobbing as he went. Have I been drinking? was the
thought that whirled through his brain, or why can't I wake? What is
it? What is it? And still he ran. There was no cart in sight as yet; the
little streets of the fisher-quarter were all twists and turns. At last
he reached Sea Street once more, and there--there far ahead was
the slow-moving cart. Almost at once it turned off to the right and
disappeared, and when Peer reached the turning, it was not to be seen.
Still he ran on at haphazard. There seemed to be other people in the
streets--children flying red balloons, women with baskets, men with
straw hats and walking-sticks.
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