During the afternoon it was quiet on the farm. Most of the men were out somewhere, either at the inn or with the quarry-men at the stone-quarry. The master and mistress were out too; the farmer had ordered the carriage directly after dinner and had driven to the town, and half an hour later his wife set off in the pony-carriage —to keep an eye on him, people said.
Old Lasse was sitting in an empty cow-stall, mending Pelle’s clothes, while the boy played up and down the foddering passage. He had found in the herdsman’s room an old boot-jack, which he placed under his knee, pretending it was a wooden leg, and all the time he was chattering happily, but not quite so loudly as usual, to his father. The morning’s experience was still fresh in his mind, and had a subduing effect; it was as if he had performed some great deed, and was now nervous about it. There was another circumstance, too, that helped to make him serious. The bailiff had been over to say that the animals were to go out the next day. Pelle was to mind the young cattle, so this would be his last free day, perhaps for the whole summer.
He paused outside the stall where his father sat. “What are you going to kill him with, father?”
“With the hammer, I suppose.”
“Will you kill him quite dead, as dead as a dog?”
Lasse’s nod boded ill to the pupil. “Yes, indeed I shall!”
“But who’ll read the names for us then?”
The old man shook his head pensively. “That’s true enough!” he exclaimed, scratching himself first in one place and then in another. The name of each cow was written in chalk above its stall, but neither Lasse nor Pelle could read. The bailiff had, indeed, gone through the names with them once, but it was impossible to remember half a hundred names after hearing them once—even for the boy, who had such an uncommon good memory. If Lasse now killed the pupil, then who would help them to make out the names? The bailiff would never stand their going to him and asking him a second time.
“I suppose we shall have to content ourselves with thrashing him,” said Lasse meditatively.
The boy went on playing for a little while, and then once more came up to Lasse.