"A whale's heart must be pretty big?"

"Why, yes, he's what you might call a large-hearted beast. About the size of a middling chest o' drawers or a chiffonier."

"Rough on a whale, then, if he got heart disease," laughed Garner.

"Why, as to that, I suppose it would be in proportion, as you might say. But he's built pretty well to scale in the other parts as well, with his main arteries about as big round as a chimney."

"I wonder you didn't go up with Nansen to the Pole."

"And what for, I'd like to know? Messing about among a lot of nasty Eskimos; no, thankye, I'd a better use for my time." And Bramsen went on again with his whaling yarns for a spell, until Garner found it was time to get back to the shop.

Outside the store shed sat a row of urchins fishing from the edge of the quay. Bramsen was a popular character among the waterside boys; he would chat and fish with them at off-times, or help them in the manufacture of a patent "knock-out" bait, from a recipe of his own, the chief ingredients being flour and spirits. There was always a shout of delight when the small fish appeared at the surface, belly upwards. But to-day the knock-out drops appeared to fail of their effect, whether because the fish had grown used to French brandy, or for some other reason. Bramsen soon left the boys to their own devices, and went back into the shed. Here, to his astonishment, he found Amanda, his daughter and only child, weeping in a corner.

Amanda was about fifteen, a lanky slip of a girl, with her hair in a thick plait down her back, twinkling dark brown eyes, and a bright, pleasant face.

"Saints and sea-serpents—you here, child? What's amiss now?"

"Mother—mother wants us to go to meeting this evening, and you promised we should go to the theatre and see Monkey Tricks, and they say it's the funniest piece."

Bramsen grew suddenly thoughtful. What if the child were to go getting ideas into her head, like Miss Holm, and want to go about singing with a hat—h'm, perhaps after all it might be as well to take her to the meeting with Andrine.

But the mere suggestion sent Amanda off into a fresh burst of tears.

"There, there, child, I'll take you to the theatre, then, but on one condition."

Amanda looked up expectantly. "Yes?"

"You're never to think of singing for money yourself, or going on the stage, or anything like that. You understand?"

The girl had no idea of what was in his mind, and answered mechanically, "No, father—and you'll take me to see Monkey Tricks after all?"

"All right! but don't let your mother know, that's all."

Amanda was out of the door like an arrow, and hurried home at full speed. That evening she and her father sat up in the gallery, thoroughly enjoying themselves. Bramsen, it must be confessed, had taken the title literally, and waited expectantly all through the piece for the monkey to appear, and was disappointed in consequence, but seeing Amanda so delighted with the play as it was, he said nothing about it. Had he been alone he would have demanded his money back; after all, it was rank swindling to advertise a piece as Monkey Tricks, when there wasn't a monkey.

Meanwhile, Andrine had gone to the meeting, and waited patiently for the others to appear—they had promised to come on after. Here, however, she was disappointed, as usual.

When the backsliders came home, they found her deploring the vanity of this world, the imperfections of our mortal life, and the weakness of human clay against the powers of evil.

Bramsen and Amanda let her go on, as they always did, exchanging glances the while; occasionally, when her back was turned, Bramsen would make the most ludicrous faces, until Amanda had to go out into the kitchen and laugh.

Bramsen was fond of his wife; she was indeed so good-hearted and unselfish that no one could help it; while Amanda, for her part, respected her mother as the only one who could keep her in order. And indeed it was needed, "with a father that never so much as thought of punishing the child."

Bramsen himself had never been thrashed in his life, except by his comrades as a boy, and had always conscientiously paid back in full. He had had no experience of the chastening rod, and could not conceive that anything of the sort was needed for Amanda. Consequently, the relation between father and daughter was of the nature of an alliance as between friends, and as the years went on, the pair of them were constantly combining forces to outwit Andrine.

Bramsen had no idea of the value of money, or its proper use and application, wherefore Andrine had, in course of time, taken over charge of the family finances, and kept the savings-bank book,—a treasure which Bramsen himself was allowed to view on rare occasions, and then only from the outside, its contents being quite literally a closed book to him. Amanda and he would often put their heads together and fall to guessing how much there might be in the book, "taking it roughly like," but the riddle remained unsolved.

Every month Bramsen brought home his pay and delivered it dutifully into Andrine's hands; he made no mention, however, of the ten-shilling rise that had been given him, but spent the money on little extras and outings for himself and Amanda, whom he found it hard to refuse at any time.

A month before, it had been her great wish to have an album "to write poetry in"; all the other girls in her class had one, and she simply couldn't be the only one without. Bramsen could not understand what pleasure there was to be got out of such an article; much better to get a song book with printed words and have done with it. But Amanda scorned the suggestion, and the album was duly bought. She had got two entries in it already, one from Verger Klemmeken of Strandvik, an old friend of her father's, who wrote in big straggling letters: