have asked Sir Philip to let
me go with you when you leave Norway."

"Britta!" Thelma's astonishment was too great for more than this
exclamation.

"Oh, my dear! don't be angry with me!" implored Britta, with sparkling
eyes, rosy cheeks, and excited tongue all pleading eloquently together,
"I should die here without you! I told the _bonde_ so; I did, indeed I
And then I went to Sir Philip--he is such a grand gentleman,--so proud
and yet so kind,--and I asked him to let me still be your servant. I
said I knew all great ladies had a maid, and if I was not clever enough
I could learn, and--and--" here Britta began to sob, "I said I did not
want any wages--only to live in a little corner of the same house where
you were,--to sew for you, and see you, and hear your voice sometimes--"
Here the poor little maiden broke down altogether and hid her face in
her apron crying bitterly.

The tears were in Thelma's eyes too, and she hastened to put her arm
round Britta's waist, and tried to soothe her by every loving word she
could think of.

"Hush, Britta dear! you must not cry," she said tenderly. "What did
Philip say?"

"He said," jerked out Britta convulsively, "that I was a g-good little
g-girl, and that he was g-glad I wanted to g-go!" Here her two sparkling
wet eyes peeped out of the apron inquiringly, and seeing nothing but the
sweetest affection on Thelma's attentive face, she went on more
steadily. "He p-pinched my cheek, and he laughed--and he said he would
rather have me for your maid than anybody--there!"

And this last exclamation was uttered with so much defiance that she
dashed away the apron altogether, and stood erect in self-congratulatory
glory, with a particularly red little nose and very trembling lips.
Thelma smiled, and caressed the tumbled brown curls.

"I am very glad, Britta!" she said earnestly. "Nothing could have
pleased me more! I must thank Philip. But it is of father I am
thinking--what will father and Sigurd do?"

"Oh, that is all settled, Froeken," said Britta, recovering herself
rapidly from her outburst. "The _bonde_ means to go for one of his long
voyages in the _Valkyrie_--it is time she was used again, I'm sure,--and
Sigurd will go with him. It will do them both good--and the tongues of
Bosekop can waggle as much as they please, none of us will be here to
mind them!"

"And you will escape your grandmother!" said Thelma amusedly, as she
once more set her spinning-wheel in motion.