them
that Josef Klasson almost forgot his pain in telling them about his
winter in the lumber camp, and the long dark night, when for over a month
there was not even a glimpse of the sun, and no light except that of the
moon and the frosty stars.

It seemed but a very short time before Gerda was crying, "I can see the
Sea-gull Light, and Karen is out on the rocks."

Then came all the excitement of landing. The twins told Karen about
finding her brother, and the reindeer, and the midnight sun, and the logs
in the river, all in one breath; while Lieutenant Ekman explained Josef's
accident to the lighthouse keeper and his wife, who had both hurried down
to the wharf to find out the meaning of the return of the government
boat.

Then, after Josef had been welcomed with loving sorrow because of his
injury, and they had carried him up to the house and made him
comfortable, Gerda told about her desire to take Karen home with her.

At first the father and mother would not hear of such a thing; but when
Herr Ekman told of the medical gymnastic exercises that might cure her
lameness, Josef spoke from his cot.

"Let her go," he said. "It is a terrible thing to be lame. These few days
that I have been helpless are the worst I have ever known. If there is a
chance to make Karen well, let her go."

And so Karen and Erik both went to Stockholm on the boat with Herr Ekman
and the twins.

"You know I told you that I never see my brothers very long at one time,"
Karen said to Gerda, after the children had been greeted and gladly
welcomed by Fru Ekman, and they had all tried to make the strangers feel
at home among them.

"Yes," said Gerda; "but when you next see Josef you may be so well and
strong that you can go off to the lumber camp with him and help him saw
down the trees."

Karen shook her head sadly. She could not believe that she would ever
walk without a crutch, and it was the first time that she had been away
from her mother in all her life. She turned to the window so that Gerda
might not see the tears that came into her eyes, and looked down at the
strange city sights.

Just then Lieutenant Ekman came into the room. "Oh, Father, may we take
Erik to the Djurgard to-morrow?" Birger asked. "I want to show him the
Lapp tent and the reindeer out there. He seems to be rather homesick for
the forest, and says that we live up in the air like the birds in their
nests."

When the four children were asleep for the night,