hands. The gentlemen were also in full dress, and many of them wore
decorations of gold and silver. The place was so brilliantly lighted that it
seemed like sunshine, and glorious music rolled through the building.
Everything looked more beautiful than in the theatre at Copenhagen, but
then Joanna had been there, and-could it be? Yes-it was like magic,-she was
here also: for, when the curtain rose, there stood Joanna, dressed in silk and
gold, and with a golden crown upon her head. She sang, he thought, as only
an angel could sing; and then she stepped forward to the front and smiled,
as only Joanna could smile, and looked directly at Knud. Poor Knud! he
seized his master’s hand, and cried out loud, “Joanna,” but no one heard
him, excepting his master, for the music sounded above everything.
“Yes, yes, it is Joanna,” said his master; and he drew forth a printed bill,
and pointed to her name, which was there in full. Then it was not a dream.
All the audience applauded her, and threw wreaths of flowers at her; and
every time she went away they called for her again, so that she was always
coming and going. In the street the people crowded round her carriage, and
drew it away themselves without the horses. Knud was in the foremost row,
and shouted as joyously as the rest; and when the carriage stopped before a
brilliantly lighted house, Knud placed himself close to the door of her
carriage. It flew open, and she stepped out; the light fell upon her dear face,
and he could see that she smiled as she thanked them, and appeared quite
overcome. Knud looked straight in her face, and she looked at him, but she
did not recognize him. A man, with a glittering star on his breast, gave her
his arm, and people said the two were engaged to be married. Then Knud
went home and packed up his knapsack; he felt he must return to the home
of his childhood, to the elder-tree and the willow. “Ah, under that willow-
tree!” A man may live a whole life in one single hour.
The old couple begged him to remain, but words were useless. In vain
they reminded him that winter was coming, and that the snow had already
fallen on the mountains. He said he could easily follow the track of the
closely-moving carriages, for which a path must be kept clear, and with
nothing but his knapsack on his back, and leaning on his stick, he could step
