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In reality he fell into amazement when he thought of the Herculean labors those fifteen pairs of hands had performed: of the cows they had milked, the butter they had made, the gardens they had planted, the children and grandchildren they had tended, the brooms they had worn out, the mountains of food they had cooked. It made him dizzy. Clara Vavrika smiled a hard, enigmatical smile at him and walked rapidly away. Nils’ eyes followed her white figure as she went toward the house. He watched her walking alone in the sunlight, looked at her slender, defiant shoulders and her little hard-set head with its coils of blue-black hair. "No," he reflected; "she’d never be like them, not if she lived here a hundred years. She’d only grow more bitter. You can’t tame a wild thing; you can only chain it. People aren’t all alike. I mustn’t lose my nerve. " He gave Hilda’s pigtail a parting tweak and set out after Clara. "Where to?" he asked, as he came upon her in the kitchen.

"I’m going to the cellar for preserves. "

"Let me go with you. I never get a moment alone with you. Why do you keep out of my way?"

Clara laughed. "I don’t usually get in anybody’s way. "

Nils followed her down the stairs and to the far corner of the cellar, where a basement window let in a stream of light. From a swinging shelf Clara selected several glass jars, each labeled in Johanna’s careful hand. Nils took up a brown flask. "What’s this? It looks good. "

"It is. It’s some French brandy father gave me when I was married. Would you like some? Have you a corkscrew? I’ll get glasses. "

When she brought them, Nils took them from her and put them down on the window sill. "Clara Vavrika, do you remember how crazy I used to be about you?"

Clara shrugged her shoulders. "Boys are always crazy about somebody or other. I dare say some silly has been crazy about Evelina Oleson. You got over it in a hurry. "

"Because I didn’t come back, you mean? I had to get on, you know, and it was hard sledding at first. Then I heard you’d married Olaf. "

"And then you stayed away from a broken heart," Clara laughed.

"And then I began to think about you more than I had since I first went away. I began to wonder if you were really as you had seemed to me when I was a boy. I thought I’d like to see. I’ve had lots of girls, but no one ever pulled me the same way. The more I thought about you, the more I remembered how it used to be—like hearing a wild tune you can’t resist, calling you out at night. It had been a long while since anything had pulled me out of my boots, and I wondered whether anything ever could again. " Nils thrust his hands into his coat pockets and squared his shoulders, as his mother sometimes squared hers, as Olaf, in a clumsier manner, squared his. "So I thought I’d come back and see. Of course the family have tried to do me, and I rather thought I’d bring out father’s will and make a fuss. But they can have their old land; they’ve put enough sweat into it. " He took the flask and filled the two glasses carefully to the brim. "I’ve found out what I want from the Ericsons. Drink skoal, Clara. " He lifted his glass, and Clara took hers with downcast eyes. "Look at me, Clara Vavrika. Skoal!"