lowed it. The apple was mashed over his whole face; and while he was wiping it away, she sprang down and was scaling the fence before he could reach her. She would have cleared it had she not been so terrified lest he was at her heels, that she let go instead of calmly working her way over. When he caught hold of her she set up a scream; it rang out with such a shrill, wailing, piercing sound that he grew alarmed, and loosed his grasp. At her signal of terror, the people outside the paling uplifted their voices, too; and hearing this she at once gathered courage.
“Let me go, or I will tell my mother!” she threatened, and was now all flash and fire.
Then he recognized her face, and shrieked, “Your mother? Who is your mother?”
“Gunlaug on the hill-side, fisher Gunlaug,” the girl repeated, triumphantly, for she saw his dismay.
Near-sighted as he was, he had never noticed her before now; he was the only one in town who did not know who she was; he did not so much as know that Gunlaug was in the place. Like one possessed he cried out:—
“What is your name?”
“Petra!” the girl shouted, still louder than before.
