Part 13 (1/2)

”No--we had better go down right away. We shall have to defend ourselves from Soren, the mason.”

”Yes, perhaps he will say that we set the waterfall on his pigs on purpose.”

When we got home, there stood Father on the door-steps and Soren, the mason, down in the yard.

Oh! how Soren looked! He was wringing his hands and crying and threatening. Father had a deep wrinkle between his eyes. That's always a sign that he is angry.

”What is this I hear? Have you drowned two young pigs of Soren's?”

”The waterfall went into his pig-pen instead of over our ground,”

whimpered Karsten.

”Explain how it happened,” said Father to me; and I explained the whole of it exactly as it was. I tell you it was lucky for us that we _had_ come down from the hilltop!

”Here are ten crowns to pay for your little pigs, Soren,” said Father, ”and I hope that will make it all right between us.”

But for Karsten and me it wasn't all right by any means--for I had to break open my savings-bank and pay Father back for the pigs. And I had been saving ever since Christmas and had over seven crowns in it. Ugh!

it is horrid that young pigs are such tender little creatures! And all that afternoon I was kept under arrest up in the trunk-room on account of the waterfall disaster.

Karsten got a whipping. He had to give up his savings, too, but there were only fifteen ore in his bank, for Karsten shakes the money out of the slit of his savings-bank almost as soon as he has put it in.

That was the last time in my whole life that I made a waterfall.

CHAPTER XI

LOCKED IN

Right below our old house on the hillside stands the church. It is a little wooden church, white-painted and low, with irregular windows, one low and another high, over the whole church. The doors are low and even the tower is low; the spire scarcely reaches up over the big maple-trees, as we can see from our windows. But then the maple-trees are tremendously big.

Every one in town says that the bells in our church tower are remarkable. They are considered unusually musical, and I think they are, too; and nothing could be more fun than to stand up in the tower when those great bells are being rung!

It is awfully thrilling--exactly as if your ear-drums would be split.

When you put your fingers in your ears, draw them quickly out, stuff them in again--it is like a roaring ocean of sound. You should just hear it!

It is great fun to slip in after old Peter, the bellows-blower, when he is going up to ring the bells; to grope your way up the steep worm-eaten stairs with cobwebs in every corner,--and the higher you go the narrower and steeper are the stairs; to hide yourself back of the timbers and in the corners so that Peter sha'n't see you; to stand there in that tremendous bell-clanging and then to rush down over the old stairs as if you were crazy, before Peter has shut the tower windows again and shuffled his way down.

Peter would be furious if he saw us, you know. However, he has seen us sometimes, for all our painstaking, though he can't hear us--he is deaf as a post--and he certainly can scold; and when he scolds he threatens us with all the worst things he knows of--telling the minister and the dean and everybody.

But his scolding doesn't make much difference. Our clambering up into the tower certainly can't do the least harm to any one; so, even after he has scolded us, the next time we see him slinking along and squeezing himself in through the church door (he never opens it wider than just enough to push himself through exactly like a little black mouse creeping through a crack), we are right after him, you may be sure.

Sometimes there will be ten or twelve of us, without his knowing a thing about it.

But once I got rather the worst of it when I stole up to the church tower after Peter. It was grewsome, I can tell you, for only think, I got locked in the church! I have been up in the tower since, just the same, only I don't dare to go alone any more, though I wasn't exactly alone that time I'm telling you about, either; I had my little brother, Karl, with me. But as he was only a little bit of a fellow, he wasn't any help.

It was one Sat.u.r.day afternoon. Every Sat.u.r.day at five o'clock the church bells are rung to ring the Sabbath in. Karl and I were just pa.s.sing the church when Peter came slinking along with his trousers turned up as usual. It was an afternoon towards autumn, not dark yet--far from it--but not so very light either. And how the wind blew that day! almost a gale. The big maple-trees creaked and groaned. All at once I had an overwhelming desire to run up into the tower and hear how the bells sounded when the wind bl.u.s.tered and howled so around the church.

”You go home now, Karl,” said I, ”run as fast as you can. Just let me see how fast you can run.” Oh no! indeed, he wouldn't. He just clung fast to me and wanted to go with me. Oh well--pooh!--I could just as well take him along. It would be fun for him, too, to hear the bells.