Page:The Yellow Book - 08.djvu/317
voice, as she handed the letter to her. This is what the astonished farmer's wife read:
Dear Miss Tubering,
I hope you will not be displeased when you read this. I write to ask you if you will be my wife. I am very lonely here, and when I was at Helga I used to think you cared for me. I am going to write to your uncle to ask him if he will allow your aunt to bring you here to Vik. I know he has relations in the town who would take you in, and what I desire is, if my proposition meets with your approval, that we should be married forthwith. Of course I should have liked to come to Helga and fetch you away myself. But this I cannot do. Pray, then, influence your uncle to waive all ceremony, and what you do must be done quickly. If I could be certain of seeing you this week I should feel happier than I do now. I never thought that in so large a town as this I could feel so much alone. Helga was different.
Believe me
Yours faithfully,
Christian Hjorth.
Johanna only gave her amazed relative time to read to the end of the letter, before she interrupted the exclamation she saw was coming by this question.
"Will you take me this afternoon?" she pleaded. Her aunt flushed anew, but her eyes softened and grew kind as she walked over to the girl's side, laid her hand on her shoulder, and looking into her face said, gently:
"Then it was Hjorth you loved all the time. I knew it."
Johanna did not make any reply, but she too rose, and while her aunt went to the tall bureau in the corner of the room, pulled out a drawer and from it took her black silk dress, Johanna fetched a small desk, which she placed upon the table, and seated herself towrite