k. "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!_"

She raised her burning eyes and answered fiercely: "_Skoal!_"

* * * * *

The barn supper began at six o'clock and lasted for two hilarious
hours. Yense Nelson had made a wager that he could eat two whole
fried chickens, and he did. Eli Swanson stowed away two whole
custard pies, and Nick Hermanson ate a chocolate layer cake to the
last crumb. There was even a cooky contest among the children, and
one thin, slablike Bohemian boy consumed sixteen and won the prize,
a ginger-bread pig which Johanna Vavrika had carefully decorated
with red candies and burnt sugar. Fritz Sweiheart, the German
carpenter, won in the pic