f
again by then, paid liberally for his keep, and gave little Rebecca a
shining _Krone_.

He made a speech to Isak, and said: "It doesn't matter in the least if
nothing came of the deal this time, it'll come all right later on. For
the present, I'm going to stop the working up there and leave it a
bit. As for those fellows--children! Thought they would teach me, did
they? Did you hear what they offered me? Twenty-five thousand!"

"Ay," said Isak.

"Well," said Geissler, and waved his hand as if dismissing all
impertinent offers of insignificant sums from his mind, "well, it
won't do any harm to the district if I do stop the working there a
bit--on the contrary, it'll teach folk to stick to their land. But
they'll feel it in the village. They made a pile of money there last
summer; fine clothes and fine living for all--but there's an end of
that now. Ay, it might have been worth their while, the good folks
down there, to have kept in with me; things might have been different
then. Now, it'll be as I please."

But for all that, he did not look much of a man to control the fate of
villages, as he went away. He carried a parcel of food in his hand,
and his white waistcoat was no longer altogether clean. His good wife
might have equipped him for the journey up this time out of the rest
of the forty thousand she had once got--who could say, perhaps she
had. Anyhow, he was going back poor enough.

He did not forget to look in at Axel Stroem on the way down, and give
the results of his thinking over. "I've been looking at it every way,"
said he. "The matter's in abeyance for the present, so there's nothing
to be done just yet. You'll be called up for a further examination,
and you'll have to say how things are...."

Words, nothing more. Geissler had probably never given the matter a
thought at all. And Axel agreed dejectedly to all he said. But at last
Geissler flickered up into a mighty man again, puckered his brows, and
said thoughtfully: "Unless, perhaps, I could manage to come to town
myself and watch the proceedings."

"Ay, if you'd be so good," said Axel.

Geissler decided in a moment. "I'll see if I can manage it, if I can
get the time. But I've a heap of things to look after down south. I'll
come if I can. Good-bye for now. I'll send you those machines all
right."

And Geissler went.

Would he ever come again?

Chapter VI

The rest of the workmen came down from the mine. Work is stopped. The
fj