"Well I never!" ejaculated Katrina. "Why should you stay up? Why can't you go to bed as well as I?"
But Jan did not reply to her questions. "It's strange I haven't seen Agrippa Prästberg pass by yet," he said.
"Is it him you're waiting for!" snapped Katrina. "He hasn't been so extra nice to you that you need feel called upon to sit up and freeze on his account!"
Jan put up his hand with a sweep of authority—this being the only mannerism acquired during his emperorship which had not been dropped. There was no fear of Prästberg coming to them, he told her. He had heard that the old man had been invited to a drinking bout at a fisherman's but here in the Ashdales, but so far he had not seen him go by.
"I suppose he has had the good sense to stay at home," said Katrina.
It grew colder and colder. The corners of the house creaked as if the freezing wind were knocking to be let in. All the bushes and trees were covered with such thick coats of snow and rim frost they looked quite shapeless. But bushes and trees, like humans, had to clothe themselves as well as they could, in order to be protected against the cold.
In a little while Katrina observed: "I see by the clock it's only half after five, but all the same I'll put on the porridge pot and prepare the evening meal. After supper, you can sit up and wait for Prästberg or go to bed, whichever you like."
All this time Jan had stood at the window. "It can't be that he has come this way without my seeing him?" he said.
"Who cares whether a brute like him comes or doesn't come!" returned Katrina sharply, for she was tired of hearing about that old tramp.
Jan heaved a deep sigh. Katrina was more right than she herself knew. He did not care a bit whether or not old "Grippie" had passed. His saying that he was expected was merely an excuse for standing at the window.