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- in the black chest myself to be driven away!
- Oh, what must a mortal abide and live through!
- God help me in mercy! The whole house is bare!
- What the Hegstad-churl left now the bailiff has taken.
- Not even the clothes on my back have they spared.
- Fie! Shame on them all that have judged so hardly!
- [Seats herself on the edge of the bed.]
- Both the land and the farm-place are lost to our line;
- the old man was hard, but the law was still harder;-
- there was no one to help me, and none would show mercy;
- Peer was away; not a soul to give counsel.
KARI
- But here, in this house, you may dwell till you die.
ASE
- Ay, the cat and I live on charity.
KARI
- God help you, mother; your Peer's cost you dear.
ASE
- Peer? Why, you're out of your senses, sure!
- Ingrid came home none the worse in the end.
- The right thing had been to hold Satan to reckoning;-
