They did not miss him at the building, far from it. Isak had Sivert back again, and Sivert was worth a host of his brother at that work; he could keep at it from morning to night. It did not take them long to get the framework up; it was only three walls, as they were building out from the other. And they had less trouble with the timber; they could cut their planks at the sawmill, which gave them the outside pieces for roofing at the same time. And one fine day there was the house all finished, before their eyes, roofed, floored, and with the windows in. They had no time for more than this between the seasons; the boarding and painting would have to wait. And now came Geissler with a great following across the hills from Sweden. And the men with him rode on horseback with glossy-coated horses and yellow saddles; rich travellers they must be no doubt; stout, heavy men; the horses bowed under their weight. And among all these great personages came Geissler on foot. Four gentlemen and Geissler made up the party, and then there were a couple of servants each leading a packhorse. The riders dismounted outside the farm, and Geissler said: "Here's Isak--here's the Margrave of the place himself. _Goddag_, Isak! I've come back again, you see, as I said I would." Geissler was the same as ever. For all that he came on foot, his manner showed no consciousness of inferiority to the rest; ay, his threadbare coat hung long and wretched-looking down over his shrunken back, but he put on a grand enough air for all that. He even said: "We're going up into the hills a bit, these gentlemen and myself--it'll do them good to get their weight down a bit." The gentlemen themselves were nice and pleasant enough; they smiled at Geissler's words, and hoped Isak would excuse their coming rioting over his land like this. They had brought their own provisions, and did not propose to eat him out of house and home, but they would be glad of a roof over their heads for the night. Perhaps he could put them up in the new building there? When they had rested a while, and Geissler had been inside with Inger and the children, the whole party went up into the hills and stayed out till evening. Now and again in the course of the afternoon, the folks at Sellanraa could hear an unusually heavy report from the distance, and the train of them came down with new bags of samples. "Blue copper," they said, nodding at the ore. They talked long and learnedly, and consulting a sort of map they had drawn; there was an engineer among them, and a mining expert; one appeared to be a big landowner or manager of works. They talked of aerial railways and cable traction. Geissler threw in a word here and there, and each time as if advising them; they paid great attention to what he said. "Who owns the land south of the lake?" one of them asked Isak.