The Greatest Works of Selma Lagerlöf. Selma Lagerlöf
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fisherman sat quietly thinking a moment. It was plain that he continued the conversation only to please his friend, the Lapp.
"I presume the girl is one of your race?"
"No," said Ola, "she doesn't belong to the Saméfolk."
"Perhaps she's the daughter of some new settler and is accustomed to the life here?"
"No, she's from the far south," replied Ola, as if this was of small importance.
The fisherman grew more interested.
"Then I don't believe that you can take her," he said. "It's doubtful if she could stand living in a tent in winter, since she was not brought up that way."
"She will find kind parents and kind brothers and sisters in the tent," insisted Ola Serka. "It's worse to be alone than to freeze."
The fisherman became more and more zealous to prevent the adoption. It seemed as if he could not bear the thought of a child of Swedish parents being taken in by Laplanders.
"You said just now that she had a father in the mine."
"He's dead," said the Lapp abruptly.
"I suppose you have thoroughly investigated this matter, Ola?"
"What's the use of going to all that trouble?" disdained the Lapp. "I ought to know! Would the girl and her brother have been obliged to roam about the country if they had a father living? Would two children have been forced to care for themselves if they had a father? The girl herself thinks he's alive, but I say that he must be dead."
The man with the tired eyes turned to Ola.
"What is the girl's name, Ola?" he asked.
The mountaineer thought awhile, then said:
"I can't remember it. I must ask her."
"Ask her! Is she already here?"
"She's down at the camp."
"What, Ola! Have you taken her in before knowing her father's wishes?"
"What do I care for her father! If he isn't dead, he's probably the kind of man who cares nothing for his child. He may be glad to have another take her in hand."
The fisherman threw down his rod and rose with an alertness in his movements that bespoke new life.
"I don't think her father can be like other folk," continued the mountaineer. "I dare say he is a man who is haunted by gloomy forebodings and therefore can not work steadily. What kind of a father would that be for the girl?"
While Ola was talking the fisherman started up the strand.
"Where are you going?" queried the Lapp.
"I'm going to have a look at your foster-daughter, Ola."
"Good!" said the Lapp. "Come along and meet her. I think you'll say that she will be a good daughter to me."
The Swede rushed on so rapidly that the Laplander could hardly keep pace with him.
After a moment Ola said to his companion:
"Now I recall that her name is Osa—this girl I'm adopting."
The other man only kept hurrying along and old Ola Serka was so well pleased that he wanted to laugh aloud.
When they came in sight of the tents, Ola said a few words more.
"She came here to us Saméfolk to find her father and not to become my foster-child. But if she doesn't find him, I shall be glad to keep her in my tent."
The fisherman hastened all the faster.
"I might have known that he would be alarmed when I threatened to take his daughter into the Lapps' quarters," laughed Ola to himself.
When the man from Kiruna, who had brought Osa to the tent, turned back later in the day, he had two people with him in the boat, who sat close together, holding hands—as if they never again wanted to part.
They were Jon Esserson and his daughter. Both were unlike what they had been a few hours earlier.
The father looked less bent and weary and his eyes were clear and good, as if at last he had found the answer to that which had troubled him so long.
Osa, the goose girl, did not glance longingly about, for she had found some one to care for her, and now she could be a child again.
HOMEWARD BOUND!
THE FIRST TRAVELLING DAY
Saturday, October first.
The boy sat on the goosey-gander's back and rode up amongst the clouds. Some thirty geese, in regular order, flew rapidly southward. There was a rustling of feathers and the many wings beat the air so noisily that one could scarcely hear one's own voice. Akka from Kebnekaise flew in the lead; after her came Yksi and Kaksi, Kolme and Neljä, Viisi and Kuusi, Morten Goosey-Gander and Dunfin. The six goslings which had accompanied the flock the autumn before had now left to look after themselves. Instead, the old geese were taking with them twenty-two goslings that had grown up in the glen that summer. Eleven flew to the right, eleven to the left; and they did their best to fly at even distances, like the big birds.
The poor youngsters had never before been on a long trip and at first they had difficulty in keeping up with the rapid flight.
"Akka from Kebnekaise! Akka from Kebnekaise!" they cried in plaintive tones.
"What's the matter?" said the leader-goose sharply.
"Our wings are tired of moving, our wings are tired of moving!" wailed the young ones.
"The longer you keep it up, the better it will go," answered the leader-goose, without slackening her speed. And she was quite right, for when the goslings had flown two hours longer, they complained no more of being tired.
But in the mountain glen they had been in the habit of eating all day long, and very soon they began to feel hungry.
"Akka, Akka, Akka from Kebnekaise!" wailed the goslings pitifully.
"What's the trouble now?" asked the leader-goose.
"We're so hungry, we can't fly any more!" whimpered the goslings. "We're so hungry, we can't fly any more!"
"Wild geese must learn to eat air and drink wind," said the leader-goose, and kept right on flying.
It actually seemed as if the young ones were learning to live on wind and air, for when they had flown a little longer, they said nothing more about being hungry.
The goose flock was still in the mountain regions, and the old geese called out the names of all the peaks as they flew past, so that the youngsters might learn them. When they had been calling out a while:
"This is Porsotjokko, this is Särjaktjokko, this is Sulitelma," and so on, the goslings became impatient again.
"Akka, Akka, Akka!" they shrieked in heart-rending tones.
"What's wrong?" said the leader-goose.
"We haven't room in our heads for any more of those awful names!" shrieked the goslings.
"The more you put into your heads the more you can get into them," retorted the leader-goose, and continued to call out the queer names.
The boy sat thinking that it was about time the wild geese betook themselves southward, for so much snow had fallen that the ground was white as far as the eye could