“I’ll run out and fetch something to work on,” she said, “then I’ll be able to follow you better.” But it was a good while before she came back with that work.
“The fourteenth was a girl named Deborah. She was always so nice about giving me a hand with the bread-making. She never got married and never left home, for she had to stay at the deanery and help me and her mother with the little ones. Sometimes she was kind of queer, though, and then she’d say she liked the Catholic religion because it didn’t allow its priests to marry.”
A slight noise was heard down by the door. Herr Tyberg had slipped out so softly no one noticed it till he was gone.
“The fifteenth was a girl, and her name was Martha. She was the greatest beauty you ever set eyes on! But she, too, was a bit queer. When she came seventeen she married a dean who was two-and-sixty, just because she wanted to get away from home.”
Here Anna and Johan stood up. They must go fetch a light, they said. It was some little time before that light was brought.
“The sixteenth was called Mary. She was homely, and she used to say she’d never be able to catch a parson or a gentleman; but she was that eager to leave home she took up with a farm-hand, and went off and got married.”
Mamselle Lovisa remained faithfully at her post, where she had gone sound asleep; but this the jungfru had not noticed.
“The seventeenth was hardly eighteen when she moved away from the deanery. She used to help the missus write letters to all the brothers and sisters; for that was more than any one body could do.”
The door opened ever so little and shut again.
“The eighteenth,” droned the jungfru, “was but fifteen when he declared he was going to America because he couldn’t put up with so many relatives.