od eyes!

Lisbeth had, of course, expected to take care of Crookhorn,--Kjersti
and she both thought she ought to do that; but it had proved to be
impossible. Crookhorn had become so freakish that sometimes they almost
thought her out of her wits. In the building shared by the sheep and
goats she ranged back and forth from wall to wall, knocking against the
sheep and the other goats so hard as she went that their ribs rattled.
At last she had to be tied to one of the walls, and with the shortest
rope possible at that. Nor would she allow herself to be milked
peaceably in that building. The first time Lisbeth tried it, Crookhorn,
with a toss of the head, gave a kick that sent Lisbeth and the pail
rolling off in different directions. Afterward the milkmaid herself
took Crookhorn in hand at milking time; but even for her it was always
a feat of strength, and she had to have some one to help her by holding
the goat's horns.

When Crookhorn was let out with the other goats, would she ramble with
them over the fields and meadows, seeking food? No, indeed! She would
station herself poutingly by the cow-house door and stand there the
livelong day,--"bellowing like a cow" the farm boy said; and then in
the evening, when the other goats came home plump and well fed, there
Crookhorn would stand as thin and hungry as a wolf.

Lisbeth thought that Crookhorn, if provided with a stall in the cow
house, would act like a reasonable creature again. But neither Kjersti
nor the milkmaid would consent to the removal; they thought a goat
ought not to be humored in such unreasonable fancies.

Thus it was that Lisbeth had not had much to do during her first month
at Hoel Farm. The only thing that Kjersti had required of her was to
keep her own little room under the hall staircase in nice order, and
that she had done. Every day she had made the bed herself, and every
Saturday she had washed the floor and the shelf, and spread juniper
twigs about. Last Saturday Kjersti had come out to take a look at it,
and had said to her that she kept her room in better order than the
grown-up girls in the south chamber kept theirs; and Lisbeth knew that
this was true, for she had noticed it herself.

[Illustration: LISBETH'S ROOM UNDER THE STAIRS]

But now everything was going to be different. Kjersti Hoel had come to
Lisbeth's room the night before and said that the cows were to be let
out early in the morning, and that Lisbeth, like all the rest of the