They went out to look, and Isak was in his underclothes, but that was no matter. They looked and looked the cow all over carefully, in every part, and noted all the markings, head and shoulders, buttocks and thighs, where it was red and white, and how it stood.
"How old d'you think she might be?" asked Isak cautiously.
"Think? Why, she's just exactly a tiny way on in her fourth year. I brought her up myself, and they all said it was the sweetest calf they'd ever seen. But will there be feed enough here d'you think?"
Isak began to believe, as he was only too willing to do, that all was well. "As for the feed, why, there'll be feed enough, never fear."
Then they went indoors to eat and drink and make an evening together.
They lay awake talking of Cow; of the great event. "And isn't she a
dear cow, too? Her second's on the way. And her name's Goldenhorns.
Are you asleep, Isak?"
"No."
"And what do you think, she knew me again; knew me at once, and followed me like a lamb. We lay up in the hills a bit last night."
"Ho?"
"But she'll have to be tied up through the summer, all the same, or she'll be running off. A cow's a cow."
"Where's she been before?" asked Isak at last.