It was a special confidence to his grown-up sister, for powder and gun were most strictly forbidden him, which did not prevent his having his arsenals of his father's coarse-grained cartridge powder hidden in various places in the hills.
And then she must be with Thea and find out all about the garden, and with her father on his walks here and there; they went up by the cow-path, with its waving ferns, white birch stems, and green leaves, over the whole of the sloping ridge of Gilje.
It was like a happy, almost giddy, intoxication of home-coming for three or four days.
It came to be more like every-day life, when Ma began to talk about this and that of the household affairs and to make Inger-Johanna take part in her different cares and troubles.
What should be done with Jörgen? They must think of having him go to the city soon. Ma had thought a good deal about writing to Aunt Alette and consulting with her. Father must not be frightened about spending too much money. If Aunt Alette should conclude to take him to board, then it wouldn't involve the terrible immediate outlay of money. They could send many kinds of provisions there, butter and cheese, fladbröd, dried meat, and bacon as often as there was an opportunity.
She must talk with father about this sometime later in the winter, when she had heard what Aunt Alette thought.
And with Thinka they had gone through a great deal. Ma had had all she could do to keep father out of it—you know how little he can bear annoyances—and she had found it a matter almost of life and death on Wednesdays to intercept Jörgen, when he brought the mail, to get hold of Thinka's letters. This spring Ma had written time after time, and represented to her what kind of a future she was preparing for herself, if she, in weakness and folly, gave way to her rash feelings for this clerk, Aas.
But in the beginning, you see, there came some letters back, which were very melancholy. One could live even in poorer circumstances, she wrote,—it seems that there was a rather doubtful prospect of his getting a situation as a country bailiff that she had set her hopes on.
Ma had placed it seriously before her how such a thing as that might end. Suppose he was sick or died, where would she and perhaps a whole flock of children take refuge?