"What's your name?"
"Isak. You don't know of a woman body anywhere'd come and help?"
"No. But I'll say a word of it to all I meet."
"Ay, do that. Say I've creatures here, and none to look to them."
The Lapp went on his way. Isak—ay, he would say a word of that. The man on the hillside was no runaway; he had told his name. A runaway? He would have been found. Only a worker, and a hardy one. He set about cutting winter fodder for his goats, clearing the ground, digging a field, shifting stones, making a wall of stones. By the autumn he had built a house for himself, a hut of turf, sound and strong and warm; storms could not shake it, and nothing could burn it down. Here was a home; he could go inside and shut the door, and stay there; could stand outside on the door-slab, the owner of that house, if any should pass by. There were two rooms in the hut; for himself at the one end, and for his beasts at the other. Farthest in, against the wall of rock, was the hayloft. Everything was there.
Two more Lapps come by, father and son. They stand resting with both hands on their long staves, taking stock of the hut and the clearing, noting the sound of the goat-bells up on the hillside.
"Goddag" say the Lapps. "And here's fine folk come to live." Lapps talk that way, with flattering words.
"You don't know of any woman hereabouts to help?" says Isak, thinking always of but one thing.
"Woman to help? No. But we'll say a word of it."
"Ay, if you'd be so good. That I've a house and a bit of ground here, and goats, but no woman to help. Say that."