of her.

The clock had been hung up in the hall at Goodfields and its shining
brass pendulum was swinging with a slow and sure tick-tock. All the
ladies stood around and I was to present the clock.

"Oleana," said I, "we wanted to give you a clock;--and that's it."

Oleana looked as if the sky had fallen.

"Oh no, no, no!" she cried. "It isn't possible--of course not! Why
should I have that clock?"

"Because you have so many children," said I.

Just then the clock struck six clear strokes, and Oleana began to cry.

"I never knew there were such kind people in the world," said Oleana, as
she stood with folded hands, looking up at the clock through her tears.
"Never, never!"

She didn't know how she got home, she told us later, only she had felt
as if she were walking on air, she was so happy.

"And I didn't know enough to thank any one either. I was as if I had
clean gone out of my wits!"

The first few nights that the clock hung on the wall at Henrik-hut,
Oleana did not have much sleep, for every time the clock struck, she
awoke and called down blessings on all the guests at Goodfields.

"Everything goes by the clock with us now," said Oleana. "It's nothing
at all to do the work at Henrik-hut when you have a clock."

[Illustration: "Oleana," said I, "we wanted to give you a clock."--_Page
183._]

When the dark winter comes, when it snows and blows and the roads are
blocked, how pleasant it will be to think that Oleana Henrik-hut, away
up in the forest above Goodfields, has a clock ticking and ticking, and
striking the hours; and that she does not need now to get up in the
cold, dark nights, breathe upon the frosted panes and peep up at the
stars to find out the time!

CHAPTER XIV

A TRIP TO GOODFIELDS SAETER

Mother Goodfields had made us a regular promise,--and shaken hands on
it,--that we should go to the saeter some time during the summer.
Goodfields saeter lay about fourteen miles west in the mountains. Every
day I reminded Mother Goodfields of her promise so that she should not
forget it, you see. For it often seems to me that grown-up people forget
very easily.

We had decided beforehand that it was to be Petter Kloed, Karsten,
Andrine, and I who should go.

None of the grown-ups would join us. Mrs. Proet said she should have to
be well paid to go, and really, such fine, fashionable ladies as she
aren't fit for a saeter anyway. Miss Mangelsen was afraid there would be
fleas, and Mis