impatient movement of her head. Then Pelle turned away a little, re-
crossed his leg, and leant over on the other side, restless as a horse
in blinkers.

Close behind him his neighbor, Madam Frandsen, was bustling about her
little kitchen. The door stood open on to the platform, and she
chattered incessantly, half to herself and half to Pelle, about her
gout, her dead husband, and her lout of a son. She needed to rest her
body, did this old woman. "My God, yes; and here I have to keep slaving
and getting his food ready for Ferdinand from morning to night and from
night to morning again. And he doesn't even trouble himself to come home
to it. I can't go looking into his wild ways; all I can do is to sit
here and worry and keep his meals warm. Now that's a tasty little bit;
and he'll soon come when he's hungry, I tell myself. Ah, yes, our young
days, they're soon gone. And you stand there and stare like a baa-lamb
and the girl down there is nodding at you fit to crick her neck! Yes,
the men are a queer race; they pretend they wouldn't dare--and yet who
is it causes all the misfortunes?"

"She doesn't want anything to do with me!" said Pelle grumpily; "she's
just playing with me."

"Yes, a girl goes on playing with a white mouse until she gets it! You
ought to be ashamed to stand there hanging your head! So young and well-
grown as you are too! You cut her tail-feathers off, and you'll get a
good wife!" She nudged him in the side with her elbow.

Then at last Pelle made up his mind to go clattering down the stairs to
the third story, and along the gallery.