Brede Olsen has rented the house; an outbuilding it had been, belonging to the storekeeper, but done up now with two sitting-rooms and two bedrooms; none so bad, and in a good situation. The place is well frequented by coffee-drinkers and folk from round about the village going by the boat. Brede seems to have been in luck for once, found something suited to him, and he may thank his wife for that. 'Twas Brede's wife had hit on the idea of a coffee-shop and lodging-house, the day she sat selling coffee at the auction at Breidablik; 'twas a pleasant enough thing to be selling something, to feel money in her fingers, ready cash. Since they had come down here they had managed nicely, selling coffee in earnest now, and housing a deal of folk with nowhere else to lay their heads. A blessing to travellers, is Brede's wife. She has a good helper, of course, in Katrine, her daughter, a big girl now and clever at waiting--though that is only for the time, of course; not long before little Katrine must have something better than waiting on folk in her parents' house. But for the present, they are making money fairly well, and that is the main thing. The start had been decidedly favourable, and might have been better if the storekeeper had not run short of cakes and sweet biscuits to serve with the coffee; here were all the feast-day folk calling for cakes with their coffee, biscuits and cakes! 'Twas a lesson to the storekeeper to lay in a good supply another time. The family, and Brede himself, live as best they can on their takings. A good many meals are nothing but coffee and stale cakes left over, but it keeps them alive, and gives the children a delicate, sort of refined appearance. 'Tis not every one has cakes with their coffee, say the village folk. Ay, Bredes are doing well, it seems; they even manage to keep a dog, that goes round begging among the customers and gets bits here and there and grows fat on it. A good fat dog about the place is a mighty fine advertisement for a lodging-house; it speaks for good feeding anywhere. Brede, then, is husband and father in the house, and apart from that position, has got on variously beside. He had been once more installed as Lensmand's assistant and deputy, and had a good deal to do that way for a time. Unfortunately, his daughter Barbro had fallen out with the Lensmand's wife last autumn, about a trifling matter, a mere nothing--indeed, to tell the truth, a flea; and Brede himself is somewhat in disfavour there since. But Brede counts it no great loss, after all; there are other families that find work for him now on purpose to annoy the Lensmand's; he is frequently called upon, for instance, to drive for the doctor, and as for the parsonage, they'd gladly send for Brede every time there's a pig to be killed, and more--Brede says so himself.