"Ho, are you? … yes." The wanderer stepped across the ditch, sat down by the wayside, and lit his pipe.
"And what's the news in the place? I've been here before, d'ye see, and used to know it well. But 'tis long since I heard anything from these parts."
"News?… H'm." The lad felt a pleasant sense of importance at being thus asked, and stepped down from his seat. "Well, you've heard, maybe, 'twas Mattila's Tytto won the first prize at the cattle show?"
"You don't say so? Mattila's Tytto?" echoed the stranger, with a laugh. "And what else?"
"Why, there's no more that I know of—let me see…." The wise little eyes grew thoughtful. "Oh, I forgot. Yes, Maya, she's married, and they're building a bit of a place over by the clearing there. Shoemaker, he was, and a good match, they say."
"I see. That'll be the place. Looks as good as could be."
"'Tis a fine place. Going to have a real stove, with a baking oven and all…. Then there's been another wedding besides, at Niemi—Annikki's it was. Only just married—though there's been plenty that asked her these years past, and rich men some of them too."
"Yes…." The wanderer felt as if something had struck him in the breast. Impatiently he went on:
"And how's things at Koskela?"
"Koskela—well, old man there he died last spring, and they say…."