Pelle could not rest, nor control his thoughts any longer; he must be off! “If you’ll give me what the fare comes to, as I’ve helped you,” he told Sort, “then I’ll start this evening….”
Sort gave him thirty kroner.
“That’s the half of what we took. There’s not so much owing to me,” said Pelle. “You are the master and had the tools and everything.”
“I won’t live by the work of other hands—only by that of my own,” said Sort, and he pushed the money across to Pelle. “Are you going to travel just as you stand?”
“No, I have plenty of money,” said Pelle gaily. “I’ve never before possessed so much money all at once! One can get quite a lot of clothes for that.”
“But you mustn’t touch the money! Five kroner you’ll need for the passage and the like; the rest you must save, so that you can face the future with confidence!”
“I shall soon earn plenty of money in Copenhagen!”
“He has always been a thoughtless lad,” said Lasse anxiously. “Once, when he came into town here to be apprenticed he had five kroner; and as for what he spent them on, he could never give any proper account!”
Sort laughed.
“Then I shall travel as I stand!” said Pelle resolutely. But that wouldn’t do, either!