"It's the same suit as I always had," said Pelle.

"Yes, yes; but then you held yourself different--there in town they
all look like lords. Well, shall we go?"

Pelle said good-by to Marie affectionately; it occurred to him that
he had much to thank her for. She looked at him in a very odd way,
and tried to draw his hand under the coverlet.

"What's the matter with father?" said Pelle impatiently, as soon
as they were outside.

Well, Lasse had taken to his heels too! He couldn't stand it when
Pelle had gone. And the work was too heavy for one. Where he was
just at the moment Karna could not say. "He's now here, now there,
considering farms and houses," she said proudly. "Some fine day
he'll be able to take you in on his visit to town."

"And how are things going here?" inquired Pelle.

"Well, Erik has got his speech back and is beginning to be a man
again--he can make himself understood. And Kongstrup and his wife,
they drink one against the other."

"They drink together, do they, like the wooden shoemaker and his
old woman?"

"Yes, and so much that they often lie in the room upstairs soaking,
and can't see one another for the drink, they're that foggy.
Everything goes crooked here, as you may suppose, with no master.