, _Herregud_!... Well, there it was; but a terrible
strange thing. And Inger had never said a word.

He stepped inside, and there first thing of all was the
packing-case--the famous packing-case that he had carried home slung
round his neck in front; there it was, hung up by a string at each end
from the ceiling, a cradle and a bedplace for the child. Inger was up,
pottering about half-dressed--she had milked the cow and the goats, as
it might have been just an ordinary day.

The child stopped crying. "You're through with it already?" said Isak.

"Ay, I'm through with it now."

"H'm."

"It came the first evening you were gone."

"H'm."

"I'd only to get my things off and hang up the cradle there, but it
was too much for me, like, and I had to lie down."

"Why didn't you tell me before?"

"Why, I couldn't say to a minute when it'd be. 'Tis a boy."

"Ho, a boy."

"And I can't for the life of me think what we're to call him," said
Inger.

Isak peeped at the little red face; well shaped it was, and no
hare-lip, and a growth of hair all thick on the head. A fine little
fellow for his rank and station in a packing-case; Isak felt himself
curiously weak. The rugged man stood there with a miracle before him;
a thing created first of all in a sacred mist, showing forth now in
life with a little face like an allegory. Days and years, and the
miracle would be a human being.

"Come and have your food," said Inger....

* * * * *

Isak is a woodman, felling trees and sawing logs. He is better off now
than before, having a saw. He works away, and mighty piles of wood
grow up; he makes a street of them, a town, built up of stacks and
piles of wood. Inger is more about the house now, and does not come
out as before to watch him at his work; Isak must find a pretext now
and then to slip off home for a moment instead. Queer to have a little
fellow like that about the place! Isak, of course, would never dream
of taking any notice--'twas but a bit of a thing in a packing-case.
And as for being fond of it ... But when it cried, well, it was only
human nature to feel just a little something for a cry like that; a
little tiny cry like that.

"Don't touch him!" says Inger. "With your hands all messed up with
resin and all!"

"Resin, indeed!" says Isak. "Why, I haven't had resin on my hands
since I built this house. Give me the boy, let me take him--there,
he's as right as can be!"