- One week later, and Emil is busy packing up his books. He is getting ready to go study law with a Swedish lawyer in Omaha, before enrolling in law school in Michigan.
- He's not exactly enthusiastic about leaving. It feels like he's finally leaving home once and for all, and embarking on adulthood.
- But still, he doesn't yet have a clear picture what that will mean for him. At least, he thinks, he's pleasing his sister this way.
- He decides to rest for a bit and chat with Alexandra. When he looks at her, he sees for the first time that she's an attractive woman, in addition to being a sister. Marie was the first person to point this out to him.
- They start talking about their father, John Bergson, and their grandfather, who squandered all his fortune on a young woman. Alexandra tells Emil about all the letters their father used to write to his friends back in Sweden, and the plans he initially had to go back to Sweden and pay back the sailors who had lost money due to his father's extravagance.
- She goes on to explain that their father wasn't like their brothers—he was quiet, intelligent, and wanted to make something of himself.
- Alexandra is glad to be able to talk proudly about their father. She knows that Emil is ashamed of his brothers, and that the only thing that would have pleased them is if Emil failed out of school. They resent everything about the different upbringing he has enjoyed.
- She continues telling Emil about John Bergson. When he was a young man in Stockholm, he used to sing in a male chorus. Alexandra used to go with her mother to watch him perform.
- Emil turns the conversation back to his brothers. He believes they would be happier if they were poor. He complains about the Swedes—he thinks they're ignorant and self-satisfied, with no curiosity about the world.
- Alexandra reminds him to be fair to the Swedes. His father and uncle weren't like that, and neither were his brothers, when they were younger.
- As she looks at Emil, Alexandra is satisfied with him, happy that he has finally found his path in life.
- Before Emil heads up to his bedroom to go to sleep, he asks her if she remembers the duck they saw once down by the river. She says she often thinks about it.