e road because everything was so white with snow; time
after time they wandered too close to the edge and sank deep into a
drift. Nevertheless, they managed to make their way clear to the
huge stone that had once been hurled by a giant at Svartsjoe church.
Jan had already got past it when Katrina, who was a little way
behind him, gave a shriek.

"Jan!" she cried out. And Jan had not heard her sound so frightened
since the day Lars threatened to take their home away from them.
"Can't you see there's some one sitting here?"

Jan turned and went back to Katrina. And now the two of them came
near taking to their heels; for, sure enough, propped against the
stone and almost covered with rim frost sat a giant troll, with a
bristly beard and a beak-like nose!

The troll, or whatever it was, sat quite motionless. It had become
so paralyzed from the cold that it had not been able to get back to
its cave, or wherever else it kept itself nowadays.

"Think that there really are such creatures after all!" said Katrina.
"I should never have believed it, for all I've heard so much about
them."

Jan was the first to recover his senses and to see what it was they
had come upon.

"It's no troll, Katrina," he said. "It's Agrippa Praestberg."

"Sakes alive!" gasped Katrina. "You don't tell me! From the look of
him he could easily be mistaken for a troll."

"He has just fallen asleep here," observed Jan. "He can't be dead,
surely!"

They shouted the old man's name and shook him; but he never stirred.

"Run back for the sled, Katrina," said Jan, "so we can draw him
home. I'll stay here and rub him with snow till he wakes up."

"Just so you don't freeze to death yourself!"

"My dear Katrina," laughed Jan, "I haven't felt as warm as I feel
now in many a day. I'm so happy about the little girl! Wasn't it
dear of her to send us out here to save the life of him who has
gone around spreading so many lies about her?"

A week or two later, as Jan was returning from his work one
evening, he met Agrippa Praestberg.

"I'm right and fit again," Agrippa told him. "But I know well
enough that if you and Katrina had not come to the rescue there
wouldn't have been much left of Johan Utter Agrippa Praestberg by
now. So I've wondered what I could do for you in return."

"Oh, don't give that a thought my good Agrippa Praestberg!" said
Jan, with that upward imperial sweep of the hand.

"Hush now, while I tell you!" spoke Praestberg. "When