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Page 48
"I don't, as a rule, offer refreshments at these affairs," he said.
"The others have to be content with just music and dancing, but
Ingmar Ingmarsson must have a bite to eat under my roof."
Drawing up a little three-legged stool, the old man sat down in
front of Ingmar, and looked sharply at him.
"So you're going to be a school-teacher, eh?" he queried.
Ingmar closed his eyes for a moment, and there was the shadow of a
smile on his lips, but all the same he answered rather mournfully:
"They have no use for me at home."
"No use for _you_?" cried the old man. "You don't know how soon you
may be needed on the farm. Elof lived only two years, and who knows
how long Halvor will hold out?"
"Halvor is a strong, hearty fellow," Ingmar reminded.
"You must know, of course, that Halvor will turn the farm over to
you as soon as you're able to buy it back."
"He'd be a fool to give up the Ingmar Farm now that it has fallen
into his hands."
During this colloquy Ingmar sat gripping the edge of the plain deal
table. Suddenly a noise was heard as of something cracking. Ingmar
had broken off a corner of the table. "If you become a school-teacher,
he'll never let you have the farm," the old man went on.
"You think not?"
"Think--think? Well it's plain how you have been brought up. Have
you ever driven a plow?"
"No."
"Or tended a kiln, or felled a huge pine?"
Ingmar sat there looking quite placid, but the table kept crumbling
under his fingers. Finally the old man began to take notice.
"See here, young man!" he said when he saw what was happening, "I
shall have to take you in hand once more." Then he picked up some
of the splinters of the table and tried to fit them into place.
"You rogue! You ought to be going around to fairs, showing your
tricks for money!" he laughed, and dealing Ingmar a hard whack on
the shoulder, he remarked: "Oh, you'd make a fine school-teacher,
you would!"
In a twinkling he was back at the fireplace, fiddling away. Now
there was a snap and a go to his performance. He beat time with his
foot and set the dancers whirling. "This is young Ingmar's polka,"
he called out. "Hoop-la! Now the whole house must dance for young
Ingmar!"
Two such pretty girls as Gertrude and Gunhild had to be in every
dance, of course. Ingmar did not do much dancing. He stood talking
most of the time with some of the older men at the farther end of
the room. Between dances the people crowded around him as if it did
them good just to look at him.
Gertrude thought Ingmar had entirely forgotten her, which made her
quite miserable. "Now he feels that he is the son of Big Ingmar,
and that I am only the school-master's Gertrude," she pouted. It
seemed strange to her that she should take this so to heart.
Between the dances some of the young folks went out for a breath of
air. The night had grown piercingly cold. It was quite dark, and as
no one wanted to go home, they all said: "We'd better wait a little
while; the moon will soon be out. Now it's too dark to start for home."
Once, when Ingmar and Gertrude happened to be standing outside the
door, the old man came and drew the boy away. "Come, let me show
you something," he said, and taking Ingmar by the hand, he led him
through a thicket a short distance away from the house. "Stand
still now and look down!" he said presently. Then Ingmar found
himself looking down a cleft, at the bottom of which something
white shimmered. "This must be Langfors Rapids," said young Ingmar.
"Right you are," nodded the old man. "Now what do you suppose a
waterfall like that can be used for, eh?"
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