"Perhaps he could interest himself in the school again," thought Karl, "if there were a new staff of teachers." He spoke of this to Fru Rendalen. She would try to find out, and began by talking to Tomas about the observatory which they had arranged in a small way in the tower. They had been obliged to stop for want of money. By next summer she hoped to have the means to set it going.
"God knows where I shall be then," he answered, and hurried away. "If I were to speak plainly to the teachers," thought his indefatigable mother, "if I could induce them to beg his pardon." She assembled them one day just before Christmas, and told them, betraying emotion as she did so, that her son had repeatedly let fall remarks which showed that he intended to go away. There was a movement of dismay.
Fröken Lote, on whom all eyes were fixed, at last broke the silence. She had not meant it in that way, she had only meant--she had really not meant anything--but she was so dreadfully nervous. She thought he was not pleased with her. The drawing and needle-work mistress, a clear-headed, tall, fair woman, coloured furiously. The Spenser method of drawing which Rendalen had introduced was not clear to begin with, she said, but he was always beyond her; but for all that she ought not to have said anything, indeed she ought not. She began to cry.
The teachers all protested that they felt the greatest gratitude; he had, of course, seen and heard so much on every subject, but it was most embarrassing that he treated them like dirt beneath his feet.
Fru Rendalen took off her spectacles, wiped them, and put them on again; pulled them off again, rubbed them, and put them on.
Well then, Miss Hall would say what was the matter. It was that he treated everything and everybody so unevenly. This made the teachers uncertain, and destroyed the children's sense of justice, and that was almost the greatest loss that a child could sustain. She would so gladly have spoken to Rendalen, said the little American, but he made himself so unapproachable. To-day, too, she felt nervous.
This destroyed Fru Rendalen's plan; she did not know what to answer. All further negotiations were meanwhile broken off.
A loud chorus of joyous girls' voices sounded from the steps, and they all hurried to the window. It was Nora and her pupils. These last few days before Christmas, the pupils had but few lessons to do, and therefore had employed themselves in practising some part songs, the practice always concluding out on the steps--one of Nora's many fancies.
This gave such immense pleasure, that not only all the little ones, who did not join in the singing, waited up there till the great moment, but people would collect in the avenue. As soon as the girls came racing round the corner in walking dress and mounted the steps, the crowd in the avenue increased and drew nearer; Fru Rendalen and the teachers had put on their things, and were now standing at the open windows. The girls had arranged themselves from top to bottom of the steps; the little ones, who did not sing, occupied the sides. Right at the bottom stood Nora, with her fair hair turned back under the hood which was always on the back of her neck.
She had adopted Rendalen's method of conducting--the only thing that restless being did quietly; he merely moved his right wrist, and gave the sign with his left hand. Nora carefully held her right hand in the same place as he did, before her breast. She heard about it often enough.