man, no doubt, since he had called in folk from the village to build
his house, and hired men to plough up a patch of sandy moorland for
potatoes; he himself did little or nothing. The new man was Brede
Olsen, Lensmand's assistant, a man to go to when the doctor had to be
fetched, or a pig to be killed. He was not yet thirty, but had four
children to look after, not to speak of his wife, who was as good as
a child herself. Oh, Brede was not so well off, perhaps, after all;
'twas no great money he could earn running hither and thither on all
odd businesses, and collecting taxes from people that would not pay.
So now he was trying a new venture on the soil. He had raised a loan
at the bank to start house in the wilds. Breidablik, he called the
place; and it was Lensmand Heyerdahl's lady that had found that
splendid name.

Isak hurries past the house, not wasting time on looking in, but he
can see through the window that all the children are up already, early
as it is. Isak has no time to lose, if he is to be back as far as this
on the homeward journey next night, while the roads are hard. A man
living in the wilds has much to think of, to reckon out and fit in as
best can be. It is not the busiest time for him just now, but he is
anxious about the children, left all alone with Oline.

He thinks, as he walks, of the first time he had come that way. Time
has passed, the two last years had been long; there had been much that
was good at Sellanraa, and a deal that was not--eyah, _Herregud_! And
now here was another man clearing ground in the wilds. Isak knew the
place well; it was one of the kindlier spots he had noted himself on
his way up, but he had gone on farther. It was nearer the village,
certainly, but the timber was not so good; the ground was less hilly,
but a poorer soil; easy to work on the surface, but hard to deal with