Part 31 (1/2)

”It is her simple naturalness that makes her say that, John,” said Mrs. Hardy. ”She sees in me what she thinks a perfect woman, although I am an ordinary Englishwoman; while she does not understand the rougher nature men possess. Her thorough truth in thought and feeling is her greatest charm.”

Axel, however, put his oar in. ”Why, father how can Helga say Herr Hardy is not as good as Fru Hardy? He gave her a toilet box with costly things in it.”

”Yes, little father, it is true,” said Helga; ”but it was too costly a present, and I did not like to accept it.”

When dinner was over, Mrs. Hardy told her son to go on deck, and take Axel with him. She then asked Helga to show her father the dressing-case John Hardy had given her. The Pastor started when he read the initials, ”H. H.” His quick apprehension realized the position.

”Herr Pastor,” said Mrs. Hardy, ”our children leave us as we grow older; and is there any better wish for them than that they should have a happy future?”

Mrs. Hardy held out her hand, and Pastor Lindal grasped it. He understood her, and, with the ceremonious politeness habitual to him, raised her hand to his lips.

”I think,” said Mrs. Hardy, ”they can be married on the first of August. There is no reason to delay the happiness of their young life.

They can remain near you at Rosendal for a month, and come to England for the winter, and return to you in May.”

Helga was present, and heard all Mrs. Hardy had said. She put one hand on her father's shoulder.

”Father,” she said in Danish, ”I will wait your wish and time.”

”Mrs. Hardy is right, Helga,” said her father, ”I shall miss you, but it will be a joy to me to lose you to Hardy. He is the one man I like, and I hope he is the one man you love.”

”I can never forget how we wronged him, when Rasmussen was injured and died, and how n.o.ble he has always been!” said his daughter. ”I have been unkind and bad to him, and I now know pained him with what I said. Little father, what you say I should do that will I do.”

”Mrs. Hardy,” said the Pastor, ”my daughter a.s.sents to what you propose, and I a.s.sent. You can order the matter as you will.”

”I will promise you. Pastor Lindal,” said Mrs. Hardy, ”that all the time she can she shall be in Denmark, and that I will be to her as her own mother.” Mrs. Hardy held out her hand to the Pastor, and the compact then made ever after was adhered to.

Mrs. Hardy rose, and kissed Helga on her flaxen hair. ”Will you tell John, or I?” she asked.

”I cannot,” replied Helga, earnestly.

”Then, Herr Pastor,” said Mrs. Hardy, ”we will go on deck, and I should like a walk about Aarhus, if you will take me, and John can take his wife that is to be.”

When Mrs. Hardy came on deck, she said to her son, ”The first of August, John; it is so settled.”

John Hardy lifted his mother from the deck, and positively kissed her in the sight of his own men and a numerous crowd of curious Danes, who had collected to see the yacht, and f Helga had not jumped ash.o.r.e, it was not at all improbable but that she might have shared the same fate.

The trust and confidence the mother and son had in each other was a comfort to the Pastor. It was the best guarantee for Helga's future.

”It is late,” said the Pastor; ”but I know the clerk at the Domkirke (cathedral), and you can possibly see it.”

The advantage of seeing the Domkirke with the Pastor was obvious to Mrs. Hardy, and they were much interested in the details he gave of the old vestments preserved in the Domkirke and the ancient folding pictures at the altar, the date of which is 1479, but the pictures are Italian and older.

”The old church tradition,” said the Pastor, ”is that the patron saint, St. Clement, after suffering martyrdom, came ash.o.r.e after floating about the sea for eleven hundred years, bound to a s.h.i.+p's anchor, which circ.u.mstance is delineated in more than one place in the Domkirke. One of the stories of the Domkirke is recorded on a stone,”

continued the Pastor. ”It is the figure of a woman with a hole in her left breast. She was shot by a rejected lover, as she went to the Domkirke to attend the church service of the times. The stone must have been once in an horizontal position, as it is worn as if it had been placed at the entrance of the Domkirke, as is believed to be the case, and much trodden on.”

”Are there more stories connected with the Domkirke?” asked Mrs. Hardy.

”Yes, many,” replied the Pastor. ”There is the story of the monks being killed by bricks falling on them from the arched roof, when playing cards behind the altar. There is also the story of a large hunting horn, which is said to be now preserved in one of our museums, which horn was used at the evening service before Good Friday, in catholic times. It was blown through a hole in the roof of the Domkirke, and the words shouted as loud as possible, 'Evig forbandet vaere, Judas' (For ever may Judas be accursed). There is also the monument of Laurids Ebbesen who had been unfaithful to the king, who, when he visited the Domkirke, cut the nose off the monumental figure with his sword. The s.h.i.+p which is hung up in the Domkirke, is a model which Peter the Great of Russia had made in France, and it was sent by a French vessel from Toulon, which was wrecked at the Scaw, or, as we call it, Skagen. The cargo of the s.h.i.+p was sold by auction. A seaman of Aarhus bought the model, which is that of a s.h.i.+p of war with seventy-four cannon, and gave it to the Domkirke, at Whitsuntide, 1720.”