Lisbeth Longfrock Part 6

With shout and call they took their way up over the hill again. At the top they looked back and then glanced a little dubiously at each other.

Lisbeth Longfrock was still standing where they had left her, and--she was crying!

Lisbeth felt very small and forlorn as she stood there. She certainly did not want to do anything that Jacob would get a thrashing for. If she only knew where it was that she was not allowed to go! but she had not the least idea where either the Pointing Stump or the Sloping Marsh lay. All that she could do would be to keep with her animals and find out about these places later.

Sometime afterwards, when Lisbeth had mounted a small round hill, she heard the bells of the boys' flocks again. That gave her a fright, and she began to chase her animals off in another direction. But as she turned around to do so she saw, far, far down the marsh, two white figures running, jumping, and playing leapfrog in the sunshine beside a gleaming pond. The boys had let their flocks stray away from them!

Lisbeth dreaded incurring more displeasure, but surely something ought to be done. There was no help for it; she would really have to take care of the stray animals for a while. The boys could not be angry at that, she knew, because the greatest disgrace that can befall a herder is the losing of his flock, and for boys so big as these to go back to the saeter without any animals would be especially humiliating.

So Lisbeth went to work gathering the flocks together, jumping up on a mound every now and then to see if the boys were not ready to come; but they appeared to have forgotten everything except their play.

At length she saw that the boys suddenly stood still and listened, peering about in all directions. Then they started into activity again, s.n.a.t.c.hed up their clothes, put them on in great haste, and started off on a run toward the opposite edge of the marsh. Every little while they would stop and listen, and then run on again. They were so far off that there was no use in Lisbeth's shouting to them or trying to give the call "Ho-i-ho!"

When the boys reached a round hill that lay on the other side of the marsh, they ran to the top and again peered in all directions for a long time. Then, as fast as their legs could carry them, they made their way back across the marsh straight toward the small round hill where Lisbeth was. As they neared it Lisbeth thought that now was the time to give the herder's call, for the flocks were on the other side of the hill and their bells could not be heard by the boys. Her first call was too weak. She gave another somewhat stronger.

The boys stopped and answered.

Lisbeth called again, "Ho-i-ho!" and then the boys came up the hill.

They found it a little difficult to break the silence. It was rather annoying to be obliged to question that "young one" about their flocks; but there was no other way.

"Have you seen our animals?"

Lisbeth looked at them pleadingly. "They are here at the foot of the hill. I have been taking care of them, but you must not thrash Jacob for it."

The boys looked as they felt,--rather crestfallen. But they had to say something, so Ole remarked, as they turned and left her, "Oh, well, we 'll let him off for this one time."

When Lisbeth went to fasten the gate of the fold that evening Peter Lunde came bobbing along outside the fence.

"You haven't a strange sheep here, have you?"

"No; I have counted mine."

"Well, perhaps I counted mine wrong. Very likely they are all there."

The two stood looking at each other for a while; then both grew shy and had to turn their eyes away. At last Peter said: "Lisbeth, if you want to, you may tend your flock wherever we tend ours, and you may come to our pond. I understood Ole to say that he is willing, too; but if he makes any fuss about it, why I _can_ thrash him if I really want to."

"Yes, I will come gladly, you may be sure."

"Well, then, I will come after you to-morrow morning, back of the hill here."

Lisbeth did not get a chance to say anything more, for Peter was off like a flash around the corner. He had seen Ole coming.

Ole came lounging along in his usual fashion, with his hands in his pockets.

"You haven't seen a strange sheep, have you?"

"No."

"Humph!"

"Is one of yours missing?"

"Oh, I don't know exactly. Humph! I thought I would tell you that you need not bother yourself about what I said to-day. I did not mean anything by it. It was Peter that made me say it; and if you want me to, I can thrash him for it to-morrow."

CHAPTER VI

THE TAMING OF CROOKHORN

It was early morning in the latter part of the summer, and the sun was shining brightly over Hoel Saeter.

Lisbeth was alone inside the fold, milking goats. All was quiet and peaceful. Not a bell was heard. The only sounds were the gentle rush of the river far below and an occasional soft thud from the cow house when a cow b.u.mped her horns against the wall in getting up. The milkmaid was inside the cow house, milking the cows. Lisbeth's hands were still too small for that work, so it had been arranged that she should have entire charge of the goats instead of helping with the larger animals.

Suddenly from the hill above the saeter rang out "Ho-o-i-ho!" and in a few minutes the call was answered a little farther off with a touch of irritation in the tone, "Ho-o-i-ho!"

[Ill.u.s.tration: UP AT THE SaeTER]

Lisbeth looked up and listened. Then with a smile of happy satisfaction she went over to the fence and called, "Ho-o-i-ho!" Now she could send out the tones with vigor, so that they rang back from all the hills around; her voice no longer trembled when she answered the big boys'

call.

To-day she knew that they were calling especially to summon her, and that they dared to come close to the saeter with their animals because they had an errand,--something that they had planned with the milkmaid and Lisbeth.

By the sound of the bells she could tell that the boys were driving the animals as fast as they could. The boy that was behind--Peter, of course--was provoked at not being first.

But, if you please, they would have to wait until she had finished her work. They were out extremely early to-day!

However strange it may seem, Lisbeth Longfrock, soon after her arrival at Hoel Saeter, had become a prime favorite with the other herders. The day after her first painful experiences the boys, as proposed, had met her behind the hill, Peter first and then Ole. No reference was made to the previous day; it was merely taken for granted that in future she would be with them. Ole said that she could look after their animals, together with her own, while they went off to bathe. Peter thought she could, too. So she agreed to the arrangement.

But the boys did not play very long on the bank of the pond that day when they had finished bathing. It was not much fun, after all, to be down there by themselves.

So it had come to pa.s.s that Lisbeth and her animals never came strolling over the hill in the morning without meeting the boys. They generally came at nearly the same time, each from the direction of his own saeter, apparently trying to see who could be the first to give the call. But when they met each did his best to make out to the other that he had come there by the merest chance, both sheepishly realizing that the very evening before they had put on big-boy airs about "that young one whom they could never get rid of," and had said that they would go off in an entirely different direction the next day, to avoid her if possible.

Often the boys would have athletic contests, turning handsprings and wrestling from one meal-time to another because neither boy was willing to give up beaten. More than once in a single morning or afternoon would Lisbeth have to remind them to look after their animals, because, completely forgotten by the boys, the flocks had strayed nearly out of sight.

Occasionally it happened that one boy would reach Hoel Saeter ten or fifteen minutes before the other and would find Lisbeth ready to set out. In that case the first comer would insist that he and Lisbeth should start out by themselves, urging that the other boy had probably gone somewhere else that day. Such times were almost the pleasantest, Lisbeth thought, for then the one boy had always so much to show her that the other boy did not know about,--a marshy ledge, white as snow with cloudberry blossoms, where there would be many, many berries in the autumn (that ledge they could keep for themselves,--it was not worth while to let the other boy know about everything they found); or a ptarmigan nest with thirteen big eggs in it; or a ridge where scouring rushes[12] grew unusually long and thick.

[12] A species of horsetail rush (_Equisetum hyemale_), having a rough, flinty surface. It is used for scouring and polishing.

Each boy talked more with her, too, when by himself, and was less boastful and rough. And the one boy would climb trees and get spruce gum for her, while she would seek scouring rush for him. Scouring rush is something that requires a special knack in the one who is to discover it, and the boys had never seen Lisbeth's equal in spying it out. Peter said that if there was a single spear growing anywhere, you might be sure that she would find it; to which Ole jokingly responded that, for his part, he believed she could find one even where there wasn't any!

And how many, many things both boys thought of that they could make!

One day when it rained Ole made Lisbeth a hat out of birch bark, and the next day Peter came with a pair of birch-bark shoes for her. The milkmaid must have laughed when she saw Lisbeth coming home that second day wearing the birch-bark hat and shoes, and carrying her ordinary shoes in her hand. Another day Ole gave her a pocketknife. She ought to have something to whittle with, he thought, and he did not need that knife because he had one with a sheath that he always wore in his belt.