Happy Times in Norway

7

AFTER THAT THE CHRISTMAS HOLIDAYS PASSED quickly with an abundance of fun and good things all around—except quiet and order in the house. Every morning there was the same Jerusalem disturbance . It took time to get that herd of children to the breakfast table. And afterward, it took still more time to get them rigged out in their coats and caps and steered out the door. It was necessary to search out the least wet of their garments from all the things that were drying all over the house. And someone was alwayssiting down to crack nuts and nibble at a cooky insteadof lacing his, or her, boots, or changing from indoor clothes into ski clothes. Then there would be scolding and fussing. "Worse youngsters than you I think could not be found if one searched the whole world round—until one got back here again," Thea stormed. All the grownups were tired and cross—though in 55 7 H A P P Y TIMES IN N O R W A Y good humor at heart—when at long last the flock was ready to be driven out into the snow. On the slope between the house and the kitchen garden, Anders had made a fine ski course that was just right for little children to practice on, and he had built two jumps, one tiny one and one a little higher. Some friends of Hans's and some friends the girls had made on a previous visit at Mother's, played on the hill all day long, coming to the kitchen door to ask for a drink of water—meaning pop and cookies!—every once in a while. Thea scolded, because they disturbed her in her dinner preparations, and Ingeborg, the maid, and Mari Moen, who came every day now to help Ingeborg with the ironing and the care of all the children 's clothes, were surly and cross over all the trouble those youngsters made. But the children cared not one bit about the womenfolks' fussing—they got everything they wanted anyway. Anders usually disappeared between meals. The other children were so much younger than he that he stayed elsewhere with his companions. Only when Brit was out rolling in the snow, herself a little white ball in her white kidskin coat, washe there to ski down the little "baby hill" with her in front of him standing on his skis. One day he dug out of the attic a pair of tiny skis that he himself had gotwhen he was twoyears 56 M E R R Y C H R I S T M A S old. For a few hourshe kept it up—wildly eager to teach his little niece to ski. He led her around and around down on the lawn, picking her up and brushing heroff every time she fell, replacing her skis as fast as she lost them, and scolding severely, his face scowling, when Brit cried because she had snow up her sleeves. "Shame, shame on you! I thought you were a fine little Norwegian girl, Bitta." Next day he was entirely willing to let whosoever wished take over the task of teaching Brit to ski! So then Hans and die girls had something to quarrel about. "I think it would be a fine idea for you to remember she is my niece," Hans said, greatly annoyed. "You are not Brit's uncle, are you?" "Uncle!" Siri-Kariand Anne-Lotte jeered in unison. "We'd have to be aunts, anyway!Wouldn't you like us to be your aunts, Brit?" "Poor littleAunt Tulla," said Brit mournfully, shaking her head. Her mother had taught her to say that when she patted Tulla good night and good morning. "There, you see!" Hans cried triumphantly. "Brit knows very well that only Tulla is her aunt." Little as she was, Brit was a finished coquette. She knew full well that Hans was miserablewhen she pretended shewould rather have Siri-Kari and Anne-Lotte 57 HAPPY TIMES IN NORWAY pull her around on her skis. But when Hans sought comfort in the company of Little Signe or Ulla, she ran away from the girls and came to him, demanding that he pay attention to her. "You wouldn't come over and say good morning to this ugly man, would you, Brit?" Uncle Godfather said to her one morning. And now she shouted "Ugly Man...