CHAPTER XI
HOW TO FIND A SILVER MINE
When Nelly set off on her next trip to Rosita, she felt a little sad and a little afraid. It had been decided that it would not be best for Rob to go at present, even if he had wished to; that it would be better to wait until the boys had forgotten the fight about the yokes before he was seen in town again. Rob walked with Nelly as far as Billy's cabin. Here they waited awhile for Nelly to rest, and to make sure that she did not get into town till nine o'clock, after the boys were all safe inside the school-house. In the bottom of her heart, Nelly was really afraid of seeing them again. She would not own, even to herself, that she felt fear; but she could not help wondering all the time what the boys would do,—if they would say any thing when they saw her walking along all alone, and without her yoke on her shoulders. Rob was to spend the day with Lucinda, and be ready to walk home with her in the afternoon. He too felt very uncomfortable about being left behind; and there were two sad little faces which looked wistfully into each other, as the good-bys were being said.
"I'll come part way and meet you," said Rob. "It's too mean!"
"No, don't!" said Nelly: "the sun will be so hot; and perhaps I sha'n't come till late. Good-by!"
Nelly wore on her head a man's hat, with a brim so broad you could hardly see her face at all. She had had to wear this ever since the summer weather began: the sun is so hot in Colorado that no one can bear it on his head or face in the summer. On Nelly's arm swung her neat white sun-bonnet, tied by its strings, and pinned up in paper. When she reached the last hill before entering the town, she always took off her hat, and hid it in a hollow place she had found in the root of a great pine-tree; then she wore her sun-bonnet into town, and people sometimes said to her:—
"Why, Nelly, how do you keep your sun-bonnet so clean, after this long, dusty walk?"
But Nelly never told her secret. She was afraid some boy might hear it, and go and find the hiding-place of her hat.
There wasn't a boy to be seen when Nelly entered the town this morning. How relieved her heart was you can imagine. She just drew a long breath, and said to herself, "Oh! but I'm thankful. Poor Rob! he might as well have come as not."
Then she ran on to Ulrica's house. Ulrica was very busy ironing some fine white clothes for a young lady who was visiting in Rosita: Ulrica was the only nice washerwoman in the town. Nelly stood by the ironing-board, watching Ulrica flute the pretty lace ruffles. Presently she sighed, and said:—
"Mamma has ever so many pretty things like these put away in a trunk. I used to wear such ruffles on my aprons and in my neck every day at home. But mamma does all our washing now, and it is too much trouble to iron them. So we don't wear them any more."
"Ah, the dear child!" exclaimed Ulrica. "Bring to Ulrica: she will them do; it are not trouble; look how quick can fly the scissors." And in five minutes she had fluted the whole of one neck-ruffle.
"Oh! would you really, Ulrica?" said Nelly. "We could pay you in eggs."
"Pay! pay!" said Ulrica, angrily: "who did say to be paid? No pay! no pay! Ulrica will do for you: not'ing pay. You are mine child."
"I'm afraid mamma would not like to have you do them without pay," said Nelly. "She would not think it was right to take your time."
"It is not'ing; it is not time: bring them to Ulrica," was all Ulrica would say. And Nelly ran on, resolving to ask her mother, that very night, for some of the old ruffles she used to wear in the necks of her gowns. After she had left the butter and eggs for Mrs. Clapp, and had sold the rest of her eggs at another house near by, she walked slowly down the hill past the hotel. Just below the hotel was a little one-story wooden building, which had a sign up over the door—
| "Wilhelm Kleesman, |
| "Assayer." |
While the Marches were staying at the hotel, Nelly had often seen old Mr. Kleesman sitting on the steps of his little house, and smoking a big brown pipe. The bowl of the pipe had carved on it a man's head, with a long, flowing beard. Mr. Kleesman himself had a long, flowing beard, as white as snow, and his face did not look unlike the face on the pipe; and the first time Rob saw him smoking, he had run to call Nelly, saying:—
"Come here, Nell! come quick! There's a man out there smoking, with his own portrait on his pipe."
Mr. March had explained to Nelly and Rob that "Assayer" meant a man who could take a stone and find out whether there were really any silver and gold in it or not. This seemed very wonderful to the children; and, as they looked at the old gentleman sitting on his door-step every evening, smoking, they thought he looked like a magician, or like Aladdin who had the wonderful lamp. Rob said he meant to go and show him some of his stones, and see if there were not silver in some of them; but his father told him that it took a great deal of time and trouble to find out whether a stone had silver in it or not, and that everybody who had it done had to pay Mr. Kleesman three dollars for doing it.
"Whew!" said Rob: "supposing there shouldn't be any silver at all in their stone, what then?"
"They have to pay three dollars all the same," said his father; "and it is much cheaper to find out that way, than it is to go on digging and digging, and spending time and money getting stones out of the earth which are not good for any thing."
After that, Rob and Nelly used to watch the faces of all the men they saw coming out of Mr. Kleesman's office, and try to guess whether their stones had turned out good or not. If the man looked sad and disappointed, Nelly would say:—
"Oh, see that poor man: his hasn't turned out good, I know."
And, whenever some one came out with a quick step and a smiling face, Rob would say:—
"Look! look! Nell. That man's got silver. He's got it: I know he has."
As Nelly walked by Mr. Kleesman's house this morning, she saw lying on the ground a queer little round cup. It was about half as big as a small, old-fashioned teacup; it was made of a rough sort of clay, like that which flower-pots are made of; the outside was white, and the inside was all smooth and shining, and of a most beautiful green color.
"Oh, what a pretty little cup!" thought Nelly, picking it up, and looking at it closely. "I wonder how it came here! Somebody must have lost it; some little girl, I guess. How sorry she will be!"
At that minute, old Mr. Kleesman came to his door. When he saw Nelly looking at the cup, he called out to her:—
"Vould you like more as dat? I haf plenty; dey iss goot for little girls."
Mr. Kleesman was a German, and spoke very broken English.
Nelly looked up at him, and said:—
"Thank you, sir. I should like some more very much. They are cunning little cups. I thought somebody had lost this one."
Mr. Kleesman laughed, and stroked his long, white beard with his hand.
"Ach! I throw dem away each day. Little girls come often to mine room for dem: I have vary goot customers in little girls. Come in! come in! you shall have so many that you want." And he led Nelly into a small back room, where, in a corner on the floor, was a great pile of these little cups: some broken ones; some, like the one Nelly had, green on the inside; some brown, some yellow, some dark-red. Nelly was delighted. She knelt down on the floor, and began to look over the pile.
"May I really have all I want?" she said. "Are they not of any use?"
"Only to little girls," said Mr. Kleesman: "sometimes to a boy; but not often a boy; mostly it is for little girls; they are my goot customers."
Nelly picked out six. She did not like to take more, though she would have liked the whole pile. Mr. Kleesman stood watching her.
"Vy not you take more as dem?" he said.
"I am afraid there will not be enough for the other little girls," replied Nelly.
Mr. Kleesman laughed and shook till his white beard went up and down.
"Look you here," he said, and pointed behind the door. There was another pile, twice as big as the one which Nelly was examining.
"Oh, my!" said Nelly: "what a lot! I'll take a few more, I guess."
"I gif you myself. You haf too modest," said the old gentleman. And he picked up two big handfuls of the cups, and threw them into Nelly's basket. Then he sprang to a big brick stove which there was in the room, and opened its iron door and looked in. A fiery heat filled the room, as he opened the door.
"Oh!" said Nelly, "I wondered what made it so hot in here. Why do you have a fire in such hot weather?" she said.
"To make mine assays," replied Mr. Kleesman. "I haf made three to-day already. I shall make three more. I haf big fire all day. You can look in if you like. Do you like?"
"Very much," said Nelly. Mr. Kleesman lifted her up on a block of wood, so that her face came directly opposite the door into the furnace. Then he gave her a piece of wood shaped like a shovel, with two round holes in it. He told her to hold this up in front of her face, so to keep off the heat, and then to look through the two holes into the furnace. Nelly did so; and, as soon as she looked into the fiery furnace, she gave a little scream. The fire was one mass of glowing red coals. In the centre, on a stand, stood three little cups, the same size as those she had. In these cups was something which was red hot, and bubbling in little bubbles.
"Oh! what is it in the cups?" she cried.
"Silver ore," replied Mr. Kleesman. "It have to be burnt and burnt wiz fire before I can tell if it are good. It are done now. I take out." Then with a long pair of tongs he took out one cup after another, and set them all on an iron block on the table.
Nelly stood on tiptoe, and looked into the little cups. The fiery red color died away very quickly; and there, in the bottom of each cup, was a tiny, little round speck of silver. One was as big as the head of a common-sized pin, and one was a little smaller, and the third one was so small you could but just see it. In fact, if it had been loose on the floor or on a table, you would not have noticed it at all.
"That is not good for any t'ing," said Mr. Kleesman, pointing to this small one. "I tell the man ven he bring his ore, I think it are no good."
Nelly did not speak; but her face was so full of eager curiosity that Mr. Kleesman said:—
"Now I show you how I tell how much silver there will be in each ton of the ore."
Then he went into the front room, and Nelly followed him. On a table in the window stood a long box; its sides and top were made of glass, set in narrow wooden frames. In this box was a beautiful little pair of brass scales; and in one of these scales was a tiny silver button. One side of this glass box drew up like a sliding door. Mr. Kleesman set his little cups down very carefully on the table; then he sat down in a chair opposite the glass box, and told Nelly to come and stand close to him.
"Now I weigh," he said, and pulled up the sliding side of the glass box; then with a very fine pair of pincers he took up one of the little buttons which had come out of the furnace, and laid it in the empty scale.
"See which are the heaviest," he said to Nelly.
Nelly strained her eyes; but she could hardly see that one scale was heavier than the other.
"They are alike," said Nelly.
Mr. Kleesman laughed.
"Ah, no! but they are not," he said. "Look! here it is written." And he pointed to a little needle which was fastened on the upright bar from which the scales swung. This needle was balanced so that the very smallest possible weight would make it move one way or the other, and point to figures printed on a scale behind it,—just as you have seen figures on the scales the cooks weigh sugar and butter on in the kitchen. Mr. Kleesman took off the glasses he was wearing, and put on another pair. "These are my best eyes," he said, "to read the small figures with." Then he peered a few minutes at the needle; then he shut down the glass slide, and watched it through the glass.
"Even my breath would make that it did not swing true," he said.
Presently he pushed up the slide, and took out the little button with his pincers, and put it up on a bar above the scales, where there were as many as a dozen more of the little buttons, all arranged in a row,—some larger, some smaller. Then he wrote a few words in a little book.
"There," he said, "I haf good news for two men, and bad news for one man,—the man who haf the little button; his mine are not goot. The other two can make twelve dollars of silver from one ton of ore."
By this time Nelly looked so hopelessly puzzled, that the old gentleman laughed, and said:—
"You haf not understand: is that so?"
"Oh, no, sir!" said Nelly: "I have not understood at all. Could I understand?"
"Ach, yes! it is so simple, so simple; the smallest child shall understand, if I show him. Stay you here till afternoon, and I show you from beginning," said Mr. Kleesman. "I make two more assays this afternoon."
"Thank you, sir," replied Nelly: "I should like to stay very much; but my brother is waiting for me. I must hurry home. Some other day, if you will let me, I will come. May I bring my brother?"
"Is he goot like you; not to touch, and not ask the questions that are foolish?" said Mr. Kleesman.
Nelly colored. She was afraid Rob would not be able to keep as quiet as she had, or to refrain from touching things. Yet she wanted to have him see the curious sight.
"I think he will not touch any thing if you ask him not to; and I will try to keep him very still," said Nelly.
"Vary goot: he may come. Little one, it will be to me pleasure to show you all. You are like German child, not like American child," replied Mr. Kleesman, whose heart warmed towards Nelly more and more the longer he watched her quiet ways and her thoughtful face.
Nelly was so full of thoughts about the fiery furnace, the wonderful little silver buttons in the glowing red cups, and the kind old man with the white beard, that, for the first time all summer, she forgot Ulrica, and set out for the valley on a shorter road, which did not pass Ulrica's house. Poor Ulrica stood in her door, watching for a long time, till she grew anxious; at last, she pinned her white handkerchief over her head, and walked up into the town to see what had become of the child.
"If it is that she haf again to be frighted by the bad boys," said Ulrica, doubling up her fist, as she strode along, "I will make Jan that he go to the townmaster, and haf punish them all."
No Nelly was to be found. Each person that Ulrica asked had seen Nelly early in the forenoon; but no one had seen her since. At last, a man who was driving a long string of pack-mules overheard Ulrica's questions, and stopped his mules to say:—
"Is it that little brown-eyed gal o' March's, down in the valley, you're asking after?"
"Yes, yes, it are she!" exclaimed Ulrica: "haf you saw?"
"Yes," said the man: "I met her two hours ago well down the valley road, most to Cobb's cabin,—she an' her brother."
"Ach!" said Ulrica, and turned away without another word. Nor did she speak to a soul all the way home. She was hurt and offended. "It are first time," she said; "but it will not be last time. She haf found more as Ulrica," and poor Ulrica brooded over the thing till she made herself very unhappy. She would have been quite comforted if she had known that Nelly was feeling almost as badly about it as she did. Nelly did not remember, till she was half way to Lucinda's cabin, that she had not stopped to say good-by to Ulrica. As soon as she thought of it, she stood still, in the middle of the road, and said, "Oh, dear!" out loud. At first, she had half a mind to go back; but she knew that would be silly. So she trudged along, trying to hope that Ulrica would not have been watching for her. As soon as she saw Rob, she exclaimed:—
"Oh, Rob! I forgot to come by way of Ulrica's, as we always do. I'm afraid she is watching for me. If it hadn't been so far, I'd have gone back."
Rob looked astonished.
"Why, what in the world made you forget it?" he asked. "You don't like goat's milk as well as I do, or you wouldn't ever forget to go to Ulrica's!"
"Well, you'd have forgotten it yourself, this time," said Nelly, "I know, if you'd seen what I have."
Then she showed him the cups, and told him all about the good time she had had in Mr. Kleesman's rooms.
"What! that jolly old fellow with the pipe that looked like Santa Claus?" cried Rob. "Oh, Nell! don't you believe papa'll let me go with you, next time?"
"I guess so," said Nelly. "I didn't see a boy to-day, not one, when I first went in; and at noon they didn't take any notice of me. Mrs. Clapp says they forget every thing very soon."
"Well, they don't!" said Rob, firing up at this statement about boys; "and Mrs. Clapp needn't think so. I guess I know. You'll see they'll pitch into us again yet,—at least, into me. I dare say they won't bother you. But I'm going in, anyhow. It's too mean."
"I'll ask papa to let you," said Nelly. "We might go in just in time to get in about nine, and we could stay at Mr. Kleesman's at twelve o'clock; and then we needn't see them at all. Say, Rob, do you suppose Ulrica'll care much because I didn't stop?"
"Why, no!" said Rob: "why should she? You saw her in the morning?"
"Yes," said Nelly: "but we always did stop, you know; and she was always standing in the door watching for us, don't you know? I'm awful sorry!"
"Oh, pshaw!" said Rob: "you're always thinking of things, Nell."
It seemed very long to Rob and Nelly before the day came round to go up to Rosita again. It was only two days; but it seemed as much as a week to them both. That is one of the queerest things in this life, I think, that time can seem both so much longer and so much shorter than it really is. Haven't you known Saturday afternoons that didn't seem one bit more than a minute long? I have; and I remember just as well all about them, as if it were only this very last Saturday.
At last the day came. It was Friday, and a lovely, bright day. Mr. March had said that Rob might go too; and both the children were awake long before light, in their impatience to be off.
"It would do just as well if we got up there early enough to be all through with selling things, and get in to Mr. Kleesman's before nine o'clock: wouldn't it, Nell?" said Rob.
"Why, yes," said Nelly, "of course it would. That's splendid. Let's get right up now. It's beginning to be light."
When Mrs. March heard their feet pattering about, she called from her room:—
"What in the world are you about, children?"
"Getting up, mamma," answered Nelly. "We're going up to town real early, so as to get out of the way of the boys, and have a good long time at Mr. Kleesman's. It takes about three hours to do what he does to the ore. Can't we go?"
"I have no objection," replied Mrs. March; "but you must have some breakfast. I will get right up."
"Oh, no! no! please, dear mamma, don't!" cried Nelly. "It's only four o'clock by the clock downstairs: I've just been down. We can get plenty to eat without you. There is beautiful cream in the pantry; and a whole lot of cold potatoes."
Mrs. March laughed, and said:—
"I don't think cold potatoes are a very good breakfast."
"Why, mamma! mamma!" cried Rob, "cold potatoes are splendid. I like them best cold, with lots of salt. Please don't you get up."
Mrs. March was very sleepy; so she turned over in bed, and went sound to sleep. When Nelly was dressed, she peeped cautiously in at the door of her mother's room, which stood open.
"They're both sound asleep, Rob," she whispered: "let's take off our shoes."
"What fun!" whispered Rob; and the two children stole downstairs in their stocking-feet, like two little thieves; then they drank a good tumbler of cream, and ate the cold potatoes with salt, and some nice brown bread, and butter.
"I don't think a king need have a better breakfast than this," said Rob.
"I do!" said Nelly. "If I were a queen, I'd have a better one."
"What would you have, Nelly?" said Rob, earnestly.
"Cold roast turkey," said Nelly, "and bread and honey."
"Pooh!" said Rob, "I hate honey. It has such a twang to it. I'd have melted maple sugar always on my bread, if I were a king. I'd have maple sugar packed up in little houses, as they pack the ice in ice-houses, and just cut out great square junks, to melt up."
As the children went out of the house, the sky in the east was just beginning to be bright red. The sun was not up; but it was very light, and Pike's Peak shone against the red sky like a great mountain of alabaster. The peaks of the mountains in the west were rosy red; all their tops were covered with snow, and in the red light they looked like jewels.
"Oh, Rob, look! look!" cried Nelly: "isn't it perfectly lovely! Let's always come early like this."
Rob looked at the mountains and the sky.
"Yes, 'twould be pretty if 'twould stay so," he said; "but 'twon't last a minute."
Even while he spoke, the red color faded; the mountains began to look blue; and, in a minute more, up came the sun over the Rosita hills, and flooded the whole valley with a yellow light. All along the sides of the road were beautiful flowers,—blue, pink, white, yellow, and red. It had rained in the night; and every flower was shining with rain-drops, and as bright as if it had just been painted.
"Oh, Rob," said Nelly, "I'll tell you what we'll do: we'll pick a perfectly splendid bouquet for Ulrica. I know she'd like it. That'll show her I'm sorry I didn't stop. You pick white and blue, and I'll pick red and yellow; and then we'll put them all together. Have you got any string?"
Rob had a big piece. So they picked a big bunch of flowers; and then they sat down on a log, and Nelly arranged them in a beautiful pyramid: the white ones in the middle, then the blue, then the yellow, and then the red. Last, she put a border of the fine, green young shoots of the fir around it, and it was really superb. Then with some stout twine she swung it on her neck, so that it hung down on her shoulders behind.
"There!" she said; "I don't feel the weight of it a bit, and that'll keep it out of the sun too."
When they reached Ulrica's house, not a window was open. Jan and Ulrica were still asleep. There had been a dance in Rosita the night before; and they had danced nearly all night, and were not likely to wake up very early after such a night as that.
"Nell, hang it on the door," said Rob, "so they'll find it when they first open the door."
"Somebody might steal it," replied Nelly.
"Pshaw!" said Rob: "who'd want it?"
"I'm sure anybody would," retorted Nelly: "it's perfectly splendid."
"You just tie it on," said Rob: "nobody'll touch it."
Nelly had run around to the back side of the house. A small window, which opened from a sort of closet where Ulrica kept milk, was open a little. Nelly squeezed the bouquet in, and ran back to Rob.
"I've thrown it in at the closet window," she said.
"What do you suppose she'll think when she sees it? She'll think fairies brought it. Ulrica believes in fairies: she told me so."
"She don't, though: does she?" exclaimed Rob. "What a goose!"
"I think it would be nice to believe in them," replied Nelly. "I do, just a little, wee wee bit. I don't mean really believe, you know; but just a little bit. I guess there used to be fairies, ever so many, many years ago; oh! longer ago than our great, great, great grandmother: don't you?"
"No!" said Rob, very contemptuously: "there never could have been any such thing, not since the world began. It's just made-up stories for girls."
"Oh, Rob!" cried Nelly: "you used to like to hear the story about the singing tree, the talking bird, and the laughing water; don't you know?"
"That ain't a fairy story," said Rob: "it's a—a—I forget what mamma called it. Don't you recollect how she explained it all to us?—how it was all true?"
"Oh! you mean a parable," said Nelly. "That's what mamma said,—that it meant that we should all find singing trees and talking birds and laughing water, if we loved them enough. But it's a fairy story too, besides all that."
The children had a droll time going to people's houses so early. Nobody was up. At Mrs. Clapp's, they had to pound and pound before they could wake anybody. Then Mr. Clapp put his head out of a window to see what had happened.
"Goodness!" he said: "here are the children with the butter. How did they ever get up here so early?" And he ran down to open the door.
"Ask them to stay to breakfast," said Mrs. Clapp. "The poor little things must be faint."
Nelly and Rob thanked Mr. Clapp, but said they could not stop.
"We had a splendid breakfast at home," said Rob, triumphantly.
When Mr. Clapp went back to his room, he said to his wife:—
"Poor little things, indeed! You wouldn't have called them so, if you'd seen them. Their eyes shone like diamonds, and their cheeks were just like roses; and they looked as full of frolic as kittens. I declare I do envy March those children. That Nelly's going to make a most beautiful woman."
Rob and Nelly reached Mr. Kleesman's door at eight o'clock. His curtains were down; no sign of life about the place.
"I say, Nell, aren't the Rosita people lazy!" exclaimed Rob. "What'll we do now?"
"Sit down here on the step and wait," said Nelly. "He always comes out here, the first thing, and looks off down into the valley, and at the mountains. I used to see him when we were at the hotel."
How long it seemed before they heard steps inside the house; and then how much longer still before the door opened! When Mr. Kleesman saw the little figures sitting on his door-step he started.
"Ach, my soul!" he exclaimed: "it is the little one. Good morning! good morning!" And he stooped over and kissed Nelly's forehead.
"This is my brother, sir," said Nelly. "We are all done our work, and have come to see you make the assay. You said you would show us."
"Ach! ach!" cried the old gentleman; and he looked very sorry. "It is one tousand of pities: it cannot be that I show you to-day. My chimney he did do smoke; and a man will come now this hour to take out my furnace the flue. It must be made new. Not for some day I make the assay more."
Nelly and Rob looked straight in his face without speaking: they were too disappointed to say one word. Kind old Mr. Kleesman was very sorry for them.
"You shall again come: I will show the very first day," he said.
"Thank you, sir," said Nelly. "We always come into town Tuesdays and Fridays. We can come to your house any time." And she took hold of Rob's hand, and began to go down the steps.
"Vait! vait!" exclaimed Mr. Kleesman: "come in, and I show you some picture. You will not have seen picture of Malacca. I did live many years in Malacca."
Rob bounded at these words. His whole face lighted up.
"Oh, thank you! thank you!" he said: "that is what I like best in all the world."
"Vat is dat you like best in all the world: Malacca?" said the old gentleman. "And vy like you Malacca?"
Rob looked confused. Nelly came to his rescue.
"He doesn't mean that he likes Malacca, sir," she said: "only that he likes to hear about strange countries,—any countries."
"Ach!" said Mr. Kleesman: "I see. He vill be one explorer."
"Indeed I will that!" said Rob. "Just as soon as I'm a man I'm going all round this world."
Mr. Kleesman had lived ten years in Malacca. He had been in charge of tin mines there. He was an artist too, this queer old gentleman; and he had painted a great many small pictures of things and places he saw there. These he kept in an old leather portfolio, on a shelf above his bed. This portfolio he now took down, and spread the pictures out on the bed, for Rob and Nelly to look at. There was a picture of the house he lived in while he was in Malacca. It was built of bamboo sticks and rattan, and looked like a little toy house. There was a picture of one of the queer boats a great many of the Malay people live in. Think of that: live in a boat all the time, and never have a house on land at all. These boats are about twenty feet long, and quite narrow; at one end they have a fireplace, and at the other end their bedroom. The bedroom is nothing but a mat spread over four poles; and under this mat the whole family sits by day and sleeps by night. They move about from river to river, and live on fish, and on wild roots which they dig on the banks of the rivers.
"My servant lif in that boat," said Mr. Kleesman. "He take wife, and go lif in a boat. His name Jinghi. I write it for you in Malay."
Then Mr. Kleesman wrote on a piece of paper some queer characters, which Nelly said looked just like the letters on tea-chests.
"Could you write my name in Malay?" asked Nelly, timidly.
"Yes, yes," said Mr. Kleesman: "I write." And he handed Nelly a card with the following marks on it:—
"Dear me!" said Nelly: "is that all it takes to write 'Nelly'? It is a quicker language than ours: isn't it? May I have the paper?"
"I write you better," said Mr. Kleesman; and wrote it over again on a card, which Nelly wrapped up carefully and put in her pocket.
Rob wanted to ask for his name too, but he did not dare to; and Mr. Kleesman did not think of it. He meant to be kind to Rob; but he was thinking most of the time about Nelly. Nelly seemed to him, as he said, like a little girl of Germany, and not of America; and he loved to look at her, and to hear her talk.
There were dozens of pictures in the portfolio; more than I could tell you about: pictures of streets in Malacca; pictures of the people in their gay-colored clothes,—they looked like negroes, only not quite so black; pictures of palm-trees, with cocoanuts growing on them; pictures of pineapples growing; and pictures of snakes, especially one of a deadly snake,—the cobra.
"Him I kill in my own house, close by my veranda," said Mr. Kleesman: "and I draw him with all his colors, while he lie dead, before he are cold."
While they were talking, there came in a man in rough clothes, a miner, carrying a small bag of stout canvas. He opened it, and took out a handful of stones, of a very dark color, almost black.
"Would you dig where you found that?" he said, holding out the stones to Mr. Kleesman.
Mr. Kleesman took them in his hand, looked at them attentively, and said:—
"Yes, that is goot mineral. There might be mine vere dat mineral is on top. We haf proverb in our country, 'No mine is not wort not'ing unless he haf black hat on his head.'"
The man put his stones back in his bag, nodded his head, and went out, saying:—
"I reckon we'll buy that claim. I'll let you know."
A small piece of the stone had fallen on the floor. Nelly eyed it like a hawk. She was trying to remember where she had seen stones just like it. She knew she had seen them somewhere; she recollected thinking at the time how very black the stones were. She picked up the little piece of stone, and asked Mr. Kleesman if it were good for any thing.
"Oh, no, for not'ing," he said, and turned back to the pictures. Nelly's interest in the pictures had grown suddenly very small. The little black stone had set her to thinking. She put it in her pocket, and told Rob it was time to go home.
"Ven vill you again come?" said Mr. Kleesman.
"Next Tuesday," replied Nelly. "That is our day."
"Perhaps it vill be done den; perhaps not: cannot tell. But ven it is done, I show you all how I make mine assay," said Mr. Kleesman, and kissed Nelly again as he bade them good-by.
"Now we'll go down to Ulrica's," said Nelly, "and eat our lunch on her porch. I wonder what she thought when she saw the flowers."
When the children reached Ulrica's house, they found the door open, and Ulrica sitting on the door-step, picking the feathers off a white hen. As soon as she saw Nelly, she jumped up and dropped the hen. The feathers flew in all directions; but Ulrica did not mind: she darted up to Nelly, and threw her arms round her neck, and spoke so fast,—half in Swedish, half in broken English,—that Nelly could not understand what she said. However, she knew she was thanking her for the flowers; and so she replied:—
"I am glad you like them, Ulrica. But are you not ashamed to be asleep at six o'clock? And Rob and I had walked all the way from the valley, and you were asleep! and Jan too!"
Then Ulrica told them about the dance; and how they had been up so late it had made them sleepy. And then she whisked up the white hen again, and began tearing off its feathers in the greatest hurry.
"Vat is it you came so soon?" she said. "You must to dinner stay. I kill dis for you,—for your dinner, I not tink you come till sun high."
"Oh, stay! stay, Nell, let's stay!" cried Rob, who had tasted Ulrica's stewed chicken once before, and had never forgotten how good it was. Ulrica always boiled her chickens with a few cranberries, as they cook it in Sweden. You would not think it would be good: but it is delicious.
Nelly thought a minute.
"It will not make us any later than if we stayed at Mr. Kleesman's," she said. "Yes, I think we will stay."
Ulrica clapped her hands when Nelly said this.
"Goot! goot!" she said, "mine child." And she looked at Nelly with tears in her eyes, as she so often did. Then she gave Rob the book of Swedish pictures to look at, and he threw himself at full length on the floor with it. You could have eaten off the boards of Ulrica's house, she kept them so clean. Nelly sat in the wooden rocking-chair, and watched Ulrica getting the dinner. Pretty soon Nellie began to nod; and in a few minutes she was fast asleep. Ulrica took her up in her great, strong arms, as easily as if she were a baby, and carried her across the room and laid her on the bed.
"Hullo!" said Rob, when he looked up from his book and saw Ulrica carrying Nelly: "what's the matter with Nell?"
"Sh! sh! make not noise," whispered Ulrica. "She haf sleep. She haf tire in the sun."
"We got up before four o'clock," whispered Rob: "but I ain't sleepy a mite."
"Dat iss, that you are man and not girl," said Ulrica; which pleased Rob immensely.
After Ulrica had laid Nelly on the bed, she went to the big chest in the corner, and took out a fine red woollen blanket, with bright blue figures in the corners. This she spread over Nelly; and then she stood looking at her for some minutes. Nelly's face, when she was asleep, looked much older than it really was. Her eyes were large, and her mouth was large, and her cheek-bones were high.
"Mine child! mine child!" muttered Ulrica, under her breath, and brushed the tears out of her eyes with the back of her hard hand, as she went back to her work.
When Nelly waked up, dinner was all ready; and Jan and Ulrica were discussing whether they should wake Nelly or not.
"Oh!" exclaimed Nelly, sitting up and rubbing her eyes, "how came I here? Where's Rob?"
Ulrica sprang to her, and took her little hand in hers.
"Mine child, you haf sleep in chair. I bring you in mine arms here. Haf you rest? Come eat." And she picked her up again, and ran laughing back and forth two or three times across the room with her in her arms.
"She is like baby in arms: she is so light," said Ulrica to Jan in Swedish. "She has too much work."
"No, no," said Jan: "she is all right. She is at the age to be thin." But Ulrica shook her head.
How good that dinner was, and how nice it looked! There was no cloth on the table; but the wood was white as pine wood could be. On one end stood Nelly's pyramid of bright flowers; and, on the other, the great platter of stewed chicken, with the red cranberries floating in the white gravy. Then there was a big plate of rye cakes, baked in the ashes; and two pitchers of milk, one of cow's and one of goat's. Jan always bowed his head down and said a short blessing in Swedish, before they began to eat; and Nelly and Rob liked this, because, as Nelly said:—
"It makes you feel as if Jan were just as good as papa: doesn't it, Rob?"
And Rob said, "Yes;" but in a minute afterward he added: "Don't you suppose any bad men say grace, Nell?"
"No," said Nelly; "not real grace, real earnest, like papa and Jan. Perhaps they make believe say grace."
After dinner, Nelly showed Ulrica and Jan her little card on which Mr. Kleesman had written her name in Malay. As she took it out of her pocket, the black stone fell out and rolled away on the floor. She sprang to catch it.
"What's that?" said Rob.
"A piece of black stone," replied Nell.
"What's it for?" said Rob.
"Oh, I just wanted it," said Nelly.
"But what did you want it for, Nell?" persisted Rob.