"Certainly not!" said Jon Esserson. "I shall only say that their son has been of great help to you on several occasions—when you were trying to find me—and that therefore we have come to ask if we can't do them a service in return, since I'm a rich man now and have more than I need, thanks to the mine I discovered up in Lapland."
"I know, father, that you can say the right thing in the right way," Osa commended. "It is only that one particular thing that I don't wish you to mention."
They went into the cabin, and the boy would have liked to hear what they talked about in there; but he dared not venture near the house. It was not long before they came out again, and his father and mother accompanied them as far as the gate.
His parents were strangely happy. They appeared to have gained a new hold on life.
When the visitors were gone, father and mother lingered at the gate gazing after them.
"I don't feel unhappy any longer, since I've heard so much that is good of our Nils," said his mother.
"Perhaps he got more praise than he really deserved," put in his father thoughtfully.
"Wasn't it enough for you that they came here specially to say they wanted to help us because our Nils had served them in many ways? I think, father, that you should have accepted their offer."
"No, mother, I don't wish to accept money from any one, either as a gift or a loan. In the first place I want to free myself from all debt, then we will work our way up again. We're not so very old, are we, mother?" The father laughed heartily as he said this.
"I believe you think it will be fun to sell this place, upon which we have expended such a lot of time and hard work," protested the mother.
"Oh, you know why I'm laughing," the father retorted. "It was the thought of the boy's having gone to the bad that weighed me down until I had no strength or courage left in me. Now that I know he still lives and has turned out well, you'll see that Holger Nilsson has some grit left."
The mother went in alone, and the boy made haste to hide in a corner, for his father walked into the stable. He went over to the horse and examined its hoof, as usual, to try to discover what was wrong with it.
"What's this!" he cried, discovering some letters scratched on the hoof.
"Remove the sharp piece of iron from the foot," he read and glanced around inquiringly. However, he ran his fingers along the under side of the hoof and looked at it carefully.
"I verily believe there is something sharp here!" he said.
While his father was busy with the horse and the boy sat huddled in a corner, it happened that other callers came to the farm.
The fact was that when Morten Goosey-Gander found himself so near his old home he simply could not resist the temptation of showing his wife and children to his old companions on the farm. So he took Dunfin and the goslings along, and made for home.
There was not a soul in the barn yard when the goosey-gander came along. He alighted, confidently walked all around the place, and showed Dunfin how luxuriously he had lived when he was a tame goose.
When they had viewed the entire farm, he noticed that the door of the cow shed was open.
"Look in here a moment," he said, "then you will see how I lived in former days. It was very different from camping in swamps and morasses, as we do now."
The goosey-gander stood in the doorway and looked into the cow shed.
"There's not a soul in here," he said. "Come along, Dunfin, and you shall see the goose pen. Don't be afraid; there's no danger."
Forthwith the goosey-gander, Dunfin, and all six goslings waddled into the goose pen, to have a look at the elegance and comfort in which the big white gander had lived before he joined the wild geese.
"This is the way it used to be: here was my place and over there was the trough, which was always filled with oats and water," explained the goosey-gander.
"Wait! there's some fodder in it now." With that he rushed to the trough and began to gobble up the oats.
But Dunfin was nervous.
"Let's go out again!" she said.
"Only two more grains," insisted the goosey-gander. The next second he let out a shriek and ran for the door, but it was too late! The door slammed, the mistress stood without and bolted it. They were locked in!
The father had removed a sharp piece of iron from the horse's hoof and stood contentedly stroking the animal when the mother came running into the stable.
"Come, father, and see the capture I've made!"
"No, wait a minute!" said the father. "Look here, first. I have discovered what ailed the horse."
"I believe our luck has turned," said the mother. "Only fancy! the big white goosey-gander that disappeared last spring must have gone off with the wild geese. He has come back to us in company with seven wild geese. They walked straight into the goose pen, and I've shut them all in."
"That's extraordinary," remarked the father. "But best of all is that we don't have to think any more that our boy stole the goosey-gander when he went away."
"You're quite right, father," she said. "But I'm afraid we'll have to kill them to-night. In two days is Morten Gooseday[1] and we must make haste if we expect to get them to market in time."
[Footnote 1: In Sweden the 10th of November is called Morten Gooseday and corresponds to the American Thanksgiving Day.]
"I think it would be outrageous to butcher the goosey-gander, now that he has returned to us with such a large family," protested Holger Nilsson.
"If times were easier we'd let him live; but since we're going to move from here, we can't keep geese. Come along now and help me carry them into the kitchen," urged the mother.
They went out together and in a few moments the boy saw his father coming along with Morten Goosey-Gander and Dunfin—one under each arm. He and his wife went into the cabin.
The goosey-gander cried:
"Thumbietot, come and help me!"—as he always did when in peril—although he was not aware that the boy was at hand.
Nils Holgersson heard him, yet he lingered at the door of the cow shed.
He did not hesitate because he knew that it would be well for him if the goosey-gander were beheaded—at that moment he did not even remember this—but because he shrank from being seen by his parents.
"They have a hard enough time of it already," he thought. "Must I bring them a new sorrow?"
But when the door closed on the goosey-gander, the boy was aroused.
He dashed across the house yard, sprang up on the board-walk leading to the entrance door and ran into the hallway, where he kicked off his wooden shoes in the old accustomed way, and walked toward the door.
All the while it went so much against the grain to appear before his father and mother that he could not raise his hand to knock.
"But this concerns the life of the goosey-gander," he said to himself—"he who has been my best friend ever since I last stood here."
In a twinkling the boy remembered all that he and the goosey-gander had suffered on ice-bound lakes and stormy seas and among wild beasts of prey. His heart swelled with gratitude; he conquered himself and knocked on the door.
"Is there some one who wishes to come in?" asked his father, opening the door.
"Mother, you sha'n't touch the goosey-gander!" cried the boy.
Instantly both the goosey-gander and Dunfin, who lay on a bench with their feet tied, gave a cry of joy, so that he was sure they were alive.
Some one else gave a cry of joy—his