But Inger saw through it also, and said: "Oh, I know you don't want to frighten me. But you must take Sivert with you all the same."
Isak only sniffed.
"You might be taken poorly of a sudden, taken ill out in the woods—you've not been over well lately."
Isak sniffed again. Ill? Tired, perhaps, and worn out a bit, but ill? No need for Inger to start worrying and making a fool of him; he was sound and well enough; ate, slept, and worked; his health was simply terrific, it was incurable! Once, felling a tree, the thing had come down on top of him, and broken his ear; but he made light of it. He set the ear in place again, and kept it there by wearing his cap drawn over it night and day, and it grew together again that way. For internal complaints, he dosed himself with treak boiled in milk to make him sweat—liquorice it was, bought at the store, an old and tried remedy, the Teriak of the ancients. If he chanced to cut his hand, he treated the wound with an ever-present fluid containing salts, and it healed up in a few days. No doctor was ever Sent for to Sellanraa.
No, Isak was not ill. A meeting with the Evil One might happen even to the healthiest man. And he felt none the worse for his adventure afterwards; on the contrary, it seemed to have strengthened him. And as the winter drew on, and it was not such a dreadful time to wait till the spring, he, the Man and the Leader, began to feel himself almost a hero: he understood these things; only trust to him and all would be well. In case of need, he could exorcise the Evil One himself!
Altogether, the days were longer and lighter now; Easter was past, Isak had hauled up all his timber, everything looked bright, human beings could breathe again after another winter gone.
Inger was again the first to brighten up; she had been more cheerful now for a long time. What could it be? Ho, 'twas for a very simple reason; Inger was heavy again; expecting a child again. Everything worked out easily in her life, no hitch anywhere. But what a mercy, after the way she had sinned! it was more than she had any right to expect. Ay, she was fortunate, fortunate. Isak himself actually noticed something one day, and asked her straight out: "Looks to me as if you're on the way again; what do you say yourself?"
"Ay, Lord be thanked, 'tis surely so," she answered.
They were both equally astonished. Not that Inger was past the age, of course; to Isak's mind, she was not too old in any way. But still, another child … well, well…. And little Leopoldine going to school several times a year down at Breidablik—that left them with no little ones about the place now—besides which, Leopoldine herself was grown up now.
Some days passed, and Isak resolutely threw away a whole week-end—from Saturday evening till Monday morning—on a trip down to the village. He would not say what he was going for when he set out, but on his return, he brought with him a girl. "This is Jensine," he said. "Come to help."