UP THE MOUNTAIN TO ALM-UNCLE
with Peter after her, and the latter now stood still a while to watch what was going on.
“I wish you good-day, Uncle,” said Dete, as she walked towards him, “and I have brought you Tobias’ and Adelaide’s child. You will hardly recognize her, as you have never seen her since she was a year old.”
“And what has the child to do with me up here?” asked the old man curtly. “You there,” he then called out to Peter, “be off with your goats, you are none too early as it is, and take mine with you.”
Peter obeyed on the instant and quickly disappeared, for the old man had given him a look that made him feel that he did not want to stay any longer.
“The child is here to remain with you,” Dete made answer. “I have, I think, done my duty by her for these four years, and now it is time for you to do yours.”
“That’s it, is it?” said the old man, as he looked at her with a flash in his eye. “And when the child begins to fret and whine after you, as is the way with these unreasonable little beings, what am I to do with her then?”
“That’s your affair,” retorted Dete. “I know I had to put up with her without complaint when she was left on my hands as an infant, and with enough to do as it was for my mother and self. Now I have to go and look after my own earnings, and you are the next of kin to the child. If you cannot arrange to keep her, do with her as you like. You will be answerable for the result if harm happens to her, though you have hardly need, I should think, to add to the burden already on your conscience.”
[27]
