The Emperor of Portugallia

THE CONTEST

It was strange about the little girl of Ruffluck and her father! They seemed to be so entirely of one mind that they could read each other's thoughts.

In Svartsjö lived another schoolmaster, who was an old soldier. He taught in an out-of-the-way corner of the parish and had no regular schoolhouse, as had the sexton; but he was greatly beloved by all children. The youngsters themselves hardly knew they went to school to him, but thought they came together just to play.

The two schoolmasters were the best of friends. But sometimes the younger teacher would try to persuade the older one to keep abreast of the times, and wanted him to go in for phonetics and other innovations. The old soldier generally regarded such things with mild tolerance. Once, however, he lost his temper.

"Just because you've got a schoolhouse you think you know it all, Blackie!" he let fly. "But I'll have you understand that my children know quite as much us yours, even if they do have only farmhouses to sit in."

"Yes, I know," returned the sexton, "and have never said anything to the contrary. I simply mean that if the children could learn a thing with less effort – "

"Well, what then?" bristled the old soldier.

The sexton knew from the old man's tone that he had offended him, and tried to smooth over the breach.

"Anyhow you make it so easy for your pupils that they never complain about their lessons."

"Maybe I make it too easy for them?" snapped the old man. "Maybe I don't teach them anything?" he shouted, striking the table with his hand.

"What on earth has come over you, Tyberg?" said the sexton. "You seem to resent everything I say."

"Well, you always come at me with so many allusions!"

Just then other people happened in, and soon all was smooth between the schoolmasters; when they parted company they were as good friends as ever. But when old man Tyberg was on his way home, the sexton's remarks kept cropping up in his mind, and now he was even angrier than before.

"Why should that strippling say I could teach the children more if I kept abreast of the times?" he muttered to himself. "He probably thinks I'm too old, though he doesn't say it in plain words." Tyberg could not get over his exasperation, and as soon as he reached home he told it all to his wife.

"Why should you mind the sexton's chatter?" said the wife. "'Youth is elastic, but age is solid,' as the saying goes. You're excellent teachers both of you."

"Little good your saying it!" he grunted. "Others will think what they like just the same."

The old man went about for days looking so glum that he quite distressed his wife.

"Can't you show them they are in the wrong?" she finally suggested.

"How show them? What do you mean?"

"I mean that if you know your pupils to be just as clever as the sexton's – "

"Of course they are!" he struck in.

" – then you must see that your pupils and his get together for a test examination."

The old man pretended not to be interested in her proposition, but all the same it caught his fancy. And some days later the sexton received a letter from him wherein he proposed that the children of both schools be allowed to test their respective merits.

The sexton was not averse to this, of course, only he wanted to have the contest held some time during the Christmas holidays, so that it could be made a festive occasion for the children.

"That was a happy conceit," thought he. "Now I shan't have to review any lessons this term."

Nor was it necessary. It was positively amazing the amount of reading and studying that went on just then in the two schools!

The contest was held the evening of the day after Christmas. The schoolroom had been decorated for the occasion with spruce trees, on which shone all the church candles left over from the Christmas Matins, and there were apples enough to give every child two apiece. It was whispered about that the parents and guardians who had come to listen to the children would be served with coffee and cakes. The chief attraction, however, was the big contest.

On one side of the room sat the soldier's pupils, on the other the sexton's. And now it was for the children to defend their teachers' reputations. Schoolmaster Tyberg had to examine the sexton's pupils, and the sexton the Tyberg pupils. Any questions that could not be answered by the one school were to be taken up by the other. Each question had to be duly recorded so that the judges would be able to decide which school was the better.

The sexton opened the contest. He proceeded rather cautiously at first, but when he found that he had a lot of clever children to deal with he went at them harder and harder. The Tyberg pupils were so well grounded they did not let a single quizz get by them.

Then came old man Tyberg's turn at questioning the sexton's pupils.

The soldier was no longer angry with the sexton. Now that his children had shown that they knew their bits, the demon of mischief flew into him. At the start he put a few straight questions to the sexton's pupils, but being unable to remain serious for long at a time he soon became as waggish as he usually was at his own school.

"Of course I know that you have read a deal more than have we who come from the backwoods," said he. "You have studied natural science and much else, still I wonder if any of you can tell me what the stones in Motala Stream are?"

Not one of the sexton's pupils raised a hand, but on the other side hand after hand shot up.

Yet, in the sexton's division sat Olof Oleson – he who knew he had the best head in the parish, and Där Nol, of good old peasant stock. But they could not answer. There was Karin Svens, the sprightly lass of a soldier's daughter, who had not missed a day at school. She, with the others, wondered why the sexton had not told them what there was remarkable about the stones in Motala Stream.

Schoolmaster Tyberg stood looking very grave while Schoolmaster

Blackie sat gazing at the floor, much perturbed.

"I don't see but that we'll have to let this question go to the opposition," said the soldier-teacher. "Fancy, so many bright boys and girls not being able to answer an easy question like that!"

At the last moment Glory Goldie turned and looked back at her father, as was her habit when not knowing what else to do.

Jan was too far away to whisper the answer to her; but the instant the child caught her father's eye she knew what she must say. Then, in her eagerness, she not only raised her hand, but stood up.

Her schoolmates all turned to her, expectantly, and the sexton looked pleased because the question would not be taken away from his children.

"They are wet!" shouted Glory Goldie without waiting for the question to be put to her, for the time was up.

The next second the little girl feared she had said something very stupid and spoiled the thing for them all. She sank down on the bench and hid her face under the desk, so that no one should see her.

"Well answered, my girl!" said the soldier-teacher. "It's lucky for you sexton pupils there was one among you could reply; for, with all your cock-sureness, you were about to lose the game."

And such peals of laughter as went up from the children of both schools and from the grown folk as well, the two schoolmasters had never heard. Some of the youngsters had to stand up to have their laugh out, while others doubled in their seats, and shrieked. That put an end to all order.

"Now I think we'd better remove the benches and take a swing round the Christmas trees," said old man Tyberg.

And never before had they had such fun in the schoolhouse, and never since, either.

FISHING

It would hardly have been possible for any one to be as fond of the little girl as her father was; but it may be truly said that she had a very good friend in old seine-maker Ola.

This is the way they came to be friends: Glory Goldie had taken to setting out fishing-poles in the brook for the small salmon-trout that abounded there. She had better luck with her fishing than any one would have expected, and the very first day she brought home a couple of spindly fishes.

She was elated over her success, as can be imagined, and received praise from her mother for being able to provide food for the family, when she was only a little girl of eight. To encourage the child, Katrina let her cleanse and fry the fish. Jan ate of it and declared he had never tasted the like of that fish, which was the plain truth. For the fish was so bony and dry and burnt that the little girl herself could scarcely swallow a morsel of it.

But for all that the little girl was just as enthusiastic over her fishing. She got up every morning at the ionic time that Jan did and hurried off to the brook, a basket on her arm, and carrying in a little tin box the worms to bait her hooks. Thus equipped, she went off to the brook, which came gushing down the rocky steep in numerous falls and rapids, between which were short stretches of dark still water and places where the stream ran, clear and transparent, over a bed of sand and smooth stones.

Think of it! After the first week she had no luck with the fishing. The worms were gone from all the hooks, but no fish had fastened there. She shifted her tackle from rapid to still water, from still water to rippling falls, and she changed her hooks – but with no better results.

She asked the boys at Börje's and at Eric's if they were not the ones who got up with the lark and carried off her fish. But a question like that the boys would not deign to answer. For no boy would stoop to take fish from the brook, when he had the whole of Dove Lake to fish in. It was all right for little girls, who were not allowed to go down to the lake, to run about hunting fish in the woods, they said.

Despite the superior airs of the boys, the little girl only half-believed them. "Surely someone must take the fish off my hooks!" she said to herself. Hers were real hooks, too, and not just bent pins. And in order to satisfy herself she arose one morning before Jan or Katrina were awake, and ran over to the brook. When near to the stream she slackened her pace, taking very short cautious steps so as not to slip on the stones or to rustle the bushes. Then, all at once her, whole body became numb. For at the edge of the brook, on the very spot where she had set out her poles the morning before, stood a fish thief tampering with her lines. It was not one of the boys, as she had supposed, but a grown man, who was just then bending over the water, drawing up a fish.

Little Glory Goldie was never afraid. She rushed right up to the thief and caught him in the act.

"So you're the one who comes here and takes my fish!" she said. "It's a good thing I've run across you at last so we can put a stop to this stealing."

The man then raised his head, and now Glory Goldie saw his face. It was the old seine-maker, who was one of their neighbours.

"Yes, I know this is your tackle," the man admitted, without getting angry or excited, as most folks do when taken to task for wrongdoing.

"But how can you take what isn't yours?" asked the puzzled youngster.

The man looked straight at her; she never forgot that look; she seemed to be peering into two open and empty caverns at the back of which were a pair of half-dead eyes, beyond reflecting either joy or grief.

"Well, you see, I'm aware that you get what you require from your parents and that you fish only for the fun of it, while at my home we are starving."

The little girl flushed. Now she felt ashamed.

The seine-maker said nothing further, but picked up his cap (it had dropped from his head while he was bending over the fishing-poles) and went his way. Nor did Glory Goldie speak. A couple of fish lay floundering on the ground, but she did not take them up; when she had stood a while looking at them, she kicked them back into the water.

All that day the little girl felt displeased with herself, without knowing why. For indeed it was not she who had done wrong. She could not get the seine-maker out of her thoughts. The old man was said to have been rich at one time; he had once owned seven big farmsteads, each in itself worth as much as Eric of Falla's farm. But in some unaccountable way he had disposed of his property and was now quite penniless.

However, the next morning Glory Goldie went over to the brook the same as usual. This time no one had touched her hooks, for now there was a fish at the end of every line. She released the fishes from the hooks and laid them in her basket; but instead of going home with her catch she went straight to the seine-maker's cabin.

When the little girl came along with her basket the old man was out in the yard, cutting wood. She stood at the stile a moment, watching him, before stepping over. He looked pitifully poor and ragged. Even her father had never appeared so shabby.

The little girl had heard that some well-do-to people had offered the seine-maker a home for life, but in preference he had gone to live with his daughter-in-law, who made her home here in the Ashdales, so as to help her in any way that he could; she had many children, and her husband, who had deserted her, was now supposed to be dead.

"To-day there was fish on the hooks!" shouted the little girl from the stile.

"You don't tell me!" said the seine-maker. "But that was well."

"I'll gladly give you all the fish I catch," she told him, "if I'm only allowed to do the fishing myself." So saying, she went up to the seine-maker and emptied the contents of her basket on the ground, expecting of course that he would be pleased and would praise her, just as her father – who was always pleased with everything she said or did – had always done. But the seine maker took this attention with his usual calm indifference.

"You keep what's yours," he said. "We're so used to going hungry here that we can get on without your few little fishes."

There was something out of the common about this poor old man and

Glory Goldie was anxious to win his approval.

"You may take the fish of and stick the worms on the hooks, if you like," said she, "and you can have all the tackle and everything."

"Thanks," returned the old man. "But I'll not deprive you of your pleasure."

Glory Goldie was determined not to go until she had thought out a way of satisfying him.

"Would you like me to come and call for you every morning," she asked him, "so that we could draw up the lines together and divide the catch – you to get half, and I half?"

Then the old man stopped chopping and rested on his axe. He turned his strange, half-dead eyes toward the child, and the shadow of a smile crossed his face.

"Ah, now you put out the right bait!" he said. "That proposition

I'll not say no to."

AGRIPPA

The little girl was certainly a marvel! When she was only ten years old she could manage even Agrippa Prästberg, the sight of whom was enough to scare almost any one out of his wits.

Agrippa had yellow red-lidded eyes, topped with bushy eyebrows, a frightful nose, and a wiry beard that stood out from his face like raised bristles. His forehead was covered with deep wrinkles and his figure was tall and ungainly. He always wore a ragged military cap.

One day when the little girl sat all by herself on the flat stone in front of the hut, eating her evening meal of buttered bread, she espied a tall man coming down the lane whom she soon recognized as Agrippa Prästberg. However, she kept her wits about her, and at once broke and doubled her slice of bread buttered side in – then slipped it under her apron.

She did not attempt to run away or to lock up the house, knowing that that would be useless with a man of his sort; but kept her seat. All she did was to pick up an unfinished stocking Katrina had left lying on the stone when starting out with Jan's supper a while ago, and go to knitting for dear life.

She sat there as if quite calm and content, but with one eye on the gate. No, indeed, there was not a doubt about it – Agrippa intended to pay them a visit, for just then he lifted the gate latch.

The little girl moved farther back on the stone and spread out her skirt. She saw now that she would have to guard the house.

Glory Goldie knew, to be sure, that Agrippa Prästberg was not the kind of man who would steal, and he never struck any one unless they called him Grippie, or offered him buttered bread, nor did he stop long at a place where folk had the good luck not to have a Darlecarlian clock in the house.

Agrippa went about in the parish "doctoring" clocks, and once he set foot in a house where there was a tall, old-fashioned chimney clock he could not rest until he had removed the works, to see if there was anything wrong with them. And he never failed to find flaws which necessitated his taking the whole clock apart. That meant he would be days putting it together again. Meantime, one had to house and feed him.

The worst of it was that if Agrippa once got his hands on a clock it would never run as well as before, and afterward one had to let him tinker it at least once a year, or it would stop going altogether. The old man tried to do honest and conscientious work, but just the name he ruined all the clocks he touched.

Therefore it was best never to let him fool with one's clock. That

Glory Goldie knew, of course, but she saw no way of saving the

Dalecarlian timepiece, which was ticking away inside the hut.

Agrippa knew of the clock being there and had long watched for an opportunity to get at it, but at other times when he was seen thereabout, Katrina had been at home to keep him at a safe distance.

When the old man came up he stopped right in front of the little girl, struck the ground with his stick, and rattled off:

"Here comes Johan Utter Agrippa Prästberg, drummer-boy to His Royal Highness and the Crown! I have faced shot and shell and fear neither angels nor devils. Anybody home?"

Glory Goldie did not have to reply, for he strode past her into the house and went straight over to the big Dalecarlian clock.

The girl ran in after him and tried to tell him what a good clock it was, that it ran neither too fast nor too slow and needed no mending.

"How can a clock run well that has not been regulated by Johan

Utter Agrippa Prästberg!" the old man roared.

He was so tall he could open the clock-case without having to stand on a chair. In a twinkling he removed the face and the works and placed them on the table. Glory Goldie clenched the hand under her apron, and tears came to her eyes; but what could she do to stop him?

Agrippa was in a fever of a hurry to find out what ailed the clock, before Jan or Katrina could get back and tell him it needed no repairing. He had brought with him a small bundle, containing work-tools and grease jars, which he tore open with such haste that half its contents fell to the floor.

Glory Goldie was told to pick up everything that had dropped. And any one who has seen Agrippa Prästberg must know she would not have dared do anything but obey him. She got down on all fours and handed him a tiny saw and a mallet.