"We don't care to enter that place, because those who live there are stingy and cruel. It is their fault that we two must go out on the highways and beg."
"That may be so," said the boy, "but all the same you should go there.
You shall see that it will be well for you."
"We can try, but it is doubtful that they will even let us enter," observed the two little girls as they walked up to the house and knocked.
The master was standing by the fire thinking of the horse when he heard the knocking. He stepped to the door to see what was up, thinking all the while that he would not let himself be tempted into admitting any wayfarer. As he fumbled the lock, a gust of wind came along, wrenched the door from his hand and swung it open. To close it, he had to step out on the porch, and, when he stepped back into the house, the two little girls were standing within.
They were two poor beggar girls, ragged, dirty, and starving—two little tots bent under the burden of their beggar's packs, which were as large as themselves.
"Who are you that go prowling about at this hour of the night?" said the master gruffly.
The two children did not answer immediately, but first removed their packs. Then they walked up to the man and stretched forth their tiny hands in greeting.
"We are Anna and Britta Maja from the Engärd," said the elder, "and we were going to ask for a night's lodging."
He did not take the outstretched hands and was just about to drive out the beggar children, when a fresh recollection faced him. Engärd—was not that a little cabin where a poor widow with five children had lived? The widow had owed his father a few hundred kroner and in order to get back his money he had sold her cabin. After that the widow, with her three eldest children, went to Norrland to seek employment, and the two youngest became a charge on the parish.
As he called this to mind he grew bitter. He knew that his father had been severely censured for squeezing out that money, which by right belonged to him.