“Oh,” replied the child, “I can open trunks very well when they are not locked. But tell me, Monsieur Goefle, is it true that you have a kobold to wait upon you?”
“What, a kobold? Oh yes! I was thinking of something else. Do you believe in kobolds, my boy?”
“Yes, if there are any. Aren’t they wicked sometimes?”
“Never; especially as they do not exist.”
“Oh, but you said just now—”
“I only said that to laugh at that blockhead. As for you, Nils, I don’t want you to believe in any such nonsense. You know that I intend to make you something more than a mere servant; to educate you a little, and make you sensible, if I can.”
“But, Monsieur Goefle, my aunt Gertrude believes in them. She believes in good and bad spirits.”
“My housekeeper? She takes good care not to acknowledge it before me. She pretends to be strong-minded, when I have time to talk to her. No, no, you are mistaken; she doesn’t believe anything of the kind. She only says so to amuse you.”
“But it doesn’t amuse me at all; it makes me afraid, and keeps me awake all night.”
“In that case she is wrong. But what are you about? Is that the way that you unpack a trunk, throwing everything on the floor? Was it so that the pastor of Falun taught you to wait on him?”