Magnus made no reply, but the wis-wis of the rope was louder.
"It's true he doesn't know everything. He doesn't know that his father left nothing behind him but the debt to the bank, and that the bank has been so hard----"
"Mother, if you go on talking like that I shall never get this rope finished. I don't want anybody to help me to pay my way, and the bank shall have its money every Christmas if hard work can make it."
"You'll work yourself to death--that's what you'll do, Magnus. You sent Asher away in the winter, although he was so good at feeding the beasts when the snow was on the ground, and now that the hay has to be cut and the lambs killed, you're discharging Jon Vidalin."
"We'll have to thin down somewhere, and the sooner we begin the better--it's too late to spare when you see the bottom of the meal-barrel, you know."
"That's what you call thinning down--sending everybody away who can help you with the farm and keeping a houseful of women who are of no use for anything."
"Why, which of them is of no use, mother?"
"Gudrun for one. She only milks the cows in the morning and the ewes in the evening, and I could do both myself and save her keep and wages."
"Nonsense, mother! You're not young enough now to get up at four o'clock winter and summer and I won't hear of it for a moment."
"Then there's Maria--she's old enough for anything, and what's the use of her?"