“The girl? She has gone this year with the other fishergirls to Ringkjoebing, to be hired for the hay and corn harvest; we thought we could do without her at home. But now, God willing! I must travel on.” Cordially he shook Otto’s hand, and pursued his slow journey.
The brothers of the eelman were active fishermen, as their father had been before them; and although they were all married they lived together. The swarm of children was not insignificant; young and old formed one family, in which the old grandmother had the first voice.
Otto approached the dwelling; before it lay a little plot of land, planted with potatoes and carrots, and also beds of onions and thyme. Two large bull-dogs, with sharp teeth and wicked eyes, rushed toward Otto. “Tyv! Grumsling!” shrieked a voice, and the dogs let fall their tails and drew back, with a low growl, toward the house. Here at the threshold sat an old woman in a red woolen jacket, with a handkerchief of the same material and same color about her neck, and upon her head a man’s black felt hat. She spun. Otto immediately recognized the old blind grandmother.
“God’s peace be in the house!” said he.
“That voice I have not heard for a year and a day!” replied the old woman, and raised her head, as if she would see him with her dead eyes. “Are not you Major Thostrup’s Otto? You resemble him in the voice. I thought, truly, that if you came here you would pay us a visit. Ide shall leave the baits and put on the kettle, that you may have a cup of coffee. Formerly you did not use to despise our entertainment. You have not grown proud with your journey, have you? The coffee-vetch [Author’s Note: Astragalus baeticus is used as a substitute for coffee, and is principally grown upon the sand-hills west of Holmsland. It is first freed from the husk, and then dried and roasted a little.] is good; it is from Holmsland, and tastes better than the merchant’s beans.” The dogs still growled at Otto. “Cannot you stupid beasts, who have still eyes in your heads to see with, recognize that this is the Major’s Otto?” cried she wrathfully, and gave them several good blows with her hand.
Otto’s arrival created a great stir in the little household that he was welcome, you might see by every countenance.
“Yes,” said the grandmother, “now you are grown much wiser in the town, could, very likely, were it needful, write an almanac! You will very likely have found for yourself a little bride there, or will you fetch one out of Lemvig? for no doubt she must be from a town! Yes, I have known him ever since he was a little fellow; yonder, on the wall, he made, out of herrings’ heads, the living devil, just as he lives and breathes. He thrust our sucking-pig into the eel-cart, between the casks. We sought a whole day after the sucking-pig without finding him, and he was forced to make the journey with them to Holstebro. Yes, he was a wild fellow! Later, when he was obliged to learn so much, he became sad. Yes, yes, within the last years his books have overdone him!”
“Yes, many a time has he put out to sea with my husband!” pursued one of the daughters-in-law. “One night he remained out with him. How anxious the French Mamsell at the hall was about him!”
“He was never haughtty,” said the grandmother. “He nibbled his dried fish with the fresh fish, and drank a little cup of water, although he was used to better things at home. But to-day we have white bread, fresh and good; it came yesterday from Lemvig.”
The brandy-glass, with its wooden, red-painted foot, was placed before Otto. Under the bed there was an anker of brandy,—“a little stock,” as all stranded goods are here called.