"Ho, a boy."
"And I can't for the life of me think what we're to call him," said
Inger.
Isak peeped at the little red face; well shaped it was, and no hare-lip, and a growth of hair all thick on the head. A fine little fellow for his rank and station in a packing-case; Isak felt himself curiously weak. The rugged man stood there with a miracle before him; a thing created first of all in a sacred mist, showing forth now in life with a little face like an allegory. Days and years, and the miracle would be a human being.
"Come and have your food," said Inger….
* * * * *
Isak is a woodman, felling trees and sawing logs. He is better off now than before, having a saw. He works away, and mighty piles of wood grow up; he makes a street of them, a town, built up of stacks and piles of wood. Inger is more about the house now, and does not come out as before to watch him at his work; Isak must find a pretext now and then to slip off home for a moment instead. Queer to have a little fellow like that about the place! Isak, of course, would never dream of taking any notice—'twas but a bit of a thing in a packing-case. And as for being fond of it … But when it cried, well, it was only human nature to feel just a little something for a cry like that; a little tiny cry like that.
"Don't touch him!" says Inger. "With your hands all messed up with resin and all!"
"Resin, indeed!" says Isak. "Why, I haven't had resin on my hands since I built this house. Give me the boy, let me take him—there, he's as right as can be!"
* * * * *
Early in May came a visitor. A woman came over the hills to that lonely place where none ever came; she was of Inger's kinsfolk, though not near, and they made her welcome.