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[1] A small two-oared boat.

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_THE HULDREFISH_

[Illustration: _THE HULDREFISH_.]

THE HULDREFISH[1]

It was such an odd trout that Nona hauled in at the end of his
fishing-line. Large and fat, red spotted and shiny, it sprawled and
squirmed, with its dirty yellow belly above the water, to wriggle off
the hook. And when he got it into the boat, and took it off the hook, he
saw that it had only two small slits where the eyes should have been.

It must be a huldrefish, thought one of the boatmen, for rumour had it
that that lake was one of those which had a double bottom.

But Nona didn't trouble his head very much about what sort of a fish it
was, so long as it was a big one. He was ravenously hungry, and bawled
to them to row as rapidly as possible ashore so as to get it cooked.

He had been sitting the whole afternoon with empty lines out in the
mountain lake there; but as for the trout, it was only an hour ago since
it had been steering its way through the water with its rudder of a
tail, and allowed itself to be fooled by a hook, and already it lay
cooked red there on the dish.

But now Nona recollected about the strange eyes, and felt for them, and
pricked away at its head with his fork. There was nothing but slits
outside, and yet there was a sort of hard eyeball inside. The head was
strangely shaped, and looked very peculiar in many respects.

He was vexed that he had not examined it more closely before it was
cooked; it was not so easy now to make out what it really was. It had
tasted first-rate, however, and that was something.

But at night there was, as it were, a gleam of bright water before his
eyes, and he lay half asleep, thinking of the odd fish he had pulled up.

He was in his boat again, he thought, and it seemed to him as if his
hands felt the fish wriggling and sprawling for its life, and shooting
its snout backwards and forwards to get off the hook.

All at once it grew so heavy and strong that it drew the boat after it
by the line.

It went along at a frightful speed, while the lake gradually diminished,
as it were, and dried up.

There was an irresistible sucking of the water in the direction the fish
went, which was towards a hole at the bottom of the lake like a funnel,
and right into this hole went the boat.

It glided for a long time in a sort of twilight along a subterranean
river, which dashed and splas