Under Signe’s direction, Bergel warmed the milk and let it stand until the curds and whey could be separated. Then she dried the curds, crumbling them carefully with her hand, and set it all aside to ripen. Signe even let her add the caraway seed and salt.
When it was brought out some days later for inspection, Margret looked at it with approval. “We should save that for company,” she said, sniffing with appreciation.
Bergel nodded, looking very grown-up as she tasted it with a businesslike air and added a little more salt. Then she put it away in a covered jar to ripen further. “I hope the company will be Arne and Evart and some of the other boys,” she said, and though the other girls laughed, they agreed with her.
Down in the town, Arne was keeping busy, too. He had jobs of many kinds at home, running errands and getting in the wood for the old cookstove Besta preferred to Mother’s new electric range. And he had to help Besta cut the hay in the little patch of ground that sloped from their house up the mountain. It was fun to get in there with a scythe, and to help Besta and Mother hang the hay over the wooden hay fences to dry before it could mildew on the damp ground.
He helped around the packing house, too. There were errands there as well as at home, and there was cleaning to do, and packing. Sometimes he was allowed to go out with the fishermen. He especially liked to go with Ole to fish for torsk and herring and halibut. Sometimes they took a rowboat or a small sailboat up the fjord. Sometimes they took Ole’s big boat and went out to sea.
There was time for play, too, in the summer afternoons and long, light evenings. More than once Arne went away on a day’s jaunt with Oscar and Torger and half a dozen other boys. They sailed and swam and fished on the fjord, and took long hikes up and down the fjord path and up the mountainside.
But Arne never let any of his activities keep him from being right on the dock when the Laks was due. Each time he hoped to hear the glad news that he was to be on board when the ship weighed anchor. Each time he asked Gustav eagerly if he was to go on this trip.
When two or three weeks went by with no invitation for Arne, he began to lose hope. But then one day Gustav jumped off the gangplank calling out, “Where’s that Arne? You better go get some packing done, boy.”
“Really, Gustav? Do I go this time?” cried Arne.
“Looks that way,” answered Gustav. “The skipper says we’re bringing Suri back this trip, and you’d be a good one to have aboard to help with that.”