CHAPTER XIV

PER-ERIK AND ANNA-LISA

Anna-Lisa’s big blue eyes filled with tears. She went out to her brothers and sister. The master followed her. He glanced keenly at the little boys.

‘So this is the little one you worry most about? My goodness, such a little fellow to have walked all the way from Barren Moor!’

‘I’m not so little. I’m going on six since Candlemas.’

Per-Erik answered the young man’s glance hastily. He scraped the dish once more, and licked off the wooden spoon systematically and with emphasis.

The master smiled a bit.

‘Maybe they wouldn’t want to let you go, eh?’

Per-Erik stared with big eyes toward the fire.

‘I don’t know what to say. I suppose it would be hard for them not to have any one to worry over, and keep after, now that the little girls were left at the forester’s.’

The wife came in. She stood and listened to the boy’s chatter with a brighter, happier expression than any she had had since her only daughter’s death.

‘Then you can’t get on without him?’ wondered the master with a little special, meaning look at Andy.

Andy met his glance soberly.

‘It isn’t worth talking about that until such a thing comes into question.’

‘There is good, real stuff in these children,’ said Mistress Brita Dea. ‘I believe they bring what is good and blessed to the house.’

‘Maybe we could let this brave little fellow stay here too for a while,’ said the farmer doubtfully. He scratched himself thoughtfully behind the ear.

‘Little Karl will probably get well quicker if he has a playmate,’ said Brita Dea.

Andy became eager too. If Anna-Lisa was to be taken away from them, it would be still harder to take care of the little ones in all the strange, often unpleasant, conditions they came upon.

There were so many bad examples; so much evil would meet the boy’s eyes, so much light-minded chatter, scolding, and quarreling and coarse swearing would reach his ears when one went thus from house to house.

‘It would be awfully nice if Per-Erik could stay at such a place, so he could grow to be a fine man,’ said Andy. His deep dark eyes looked earnestly up at the big strong farmer who stood in front of him.

‘When I get a little older, I’m going to get work as a goatherd, or chore-boy, where I can learn something, and then I’ll come back and get Per-Erik, if he may stay until then.’

‘So he may. I can’t bear to think of our little Karl being sent away and walking the roads the way this little one would be doing. There is real courage in you too, boy. And I believe you’ll do what you say you’ll do, so you can come some day and take the little one again if you keep your health.’

The wife, greatly pleased, put out her hand to Andy with a warm, strong pressure.

‘Make a bed for the boy in the north upper bed,’ said the man. ‘He seems to be clean and neat, even if he does come from the highways.’

Yes, Per-Erik well knew that he was ‘clean and neat.’ It was only Monday now, and the memory of the last Saturday bath, this time followed by a tight, nose-squeezing shirt, was still all too fresh in his mind.

‘Anna-Lisa may lie there too,’ said Brita Dea. Her face shone with happiness, and she talked with the children as if they were old friends.

The maid, who came in with the evening milk foaming in a big blue painted firkin, stopped at the door as if petrified. When she went out to feed and milk the cows, it had been quiet in the house: quiet as when death has taken and stands threatening to take still more. And now--happy, babbling child voices, the clatter of spoons and dishes being washed. In front of the fire a little maid with curly hair who was sewing red roses on a mitten. A boy, who was cutting kindling wood and sweeping the hearth, after putting more wood on the fire. Mistress Brita Dea herself at the spinning-wheel again.

‘Dear me, how cheerful this is!’ said Stina. She opened the door of a big cupboard, where clean empty milk-bowls were ranged in racks, one above the other. Then she put a sieve over each bowl in turn, and poured in the warm milk with a dipper.

The big cat that sat and stared from the bench by the cupboard was also given some in his saucer near the water-barrel at the door.

Stina helped herself to butter, bread, and cold mush from the sideboard. Then she too pulled out a spinning-wheel, and worked so that the wheel looked like a cloud, while the linen thread, fine as silk, increased on the spool.

‘Take these boys to the stable-room,’ said the mistress at last. ‘See that they have pillow-cases and a decent sheepskin cover. The girls and Per-Erik are to be here in the upper bed. Will you see if little Karl is sleeping well first?’

The mistress and Stina went in to the little room on tiptoe.

Stina looked unutterably pleased when she came out. She went up to Anna-Lisa and took her hand.

‘Welcome to us, girl--and you too, little fellow. We’ll be good friends, I feel sure.’