Chapter VI
Some way up from the high-road there stands a little one-storeyed house
with three small windows in a row, a cowshed on one side of it and a
smithy on the other. When smoke rises from the smithy, the neighbours
say: "The engineer must be a bit better to-day, since he's at it in the
smithy again. If there's anything you want done, you'd better take it to
him. He doesn't charge any more than Jens up at Lia."
Merle and Peer had been living here a couple of years. Their lives had
gone on together, but there had come to be this difference between them:
Merle still looked constantly at her husband's face, always hoping that
he would get better, while he himself had no longer any hope. Even
when the thump, thumping in his head was quiet for a time, there was
generally some trouble somewhere to keep him on the rack, only he did
not talk about it any more. He looked at his wife's face, and thought
to himself: "She is changing more and more; and it is you that are to
blame. You have poured out your own misery on her day and night. It is
time now you tried to make some amends." So had begun a struggle to keep
silence, to endure, if possible to laugh, even when he could have found
it in his heart to weep. It was difficult enough, especially at first,
but each victory gained brought with it a certain satisfaction which
strengthened him to take up the struggle again.
In this way, too, he learned to look on his fate more calmly.
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