Page:Tales from the Fjeld.djvu/303

Rh the wedge and let the upper millstone down on him, so that he was caught fast by the hands between the stones. Then out came the cat-o'-nine-tails again, and he fell to flogging him as fast as he could.

"This is the lad who sold the pig!" he cried out till he was hoarse.

And when he had flogged him as much as he could, he went home to his mother; and as time went on, and he thought the man had come to himself again, he said to her—

"Yes, now I dare say that man will be coming to whom I sold the pig; and now I know no other trick to screen me any longer from him, unless I dig a hole here south of the house, and there I will lie all day; and you must mind and say to him just what I tell you."

So the lad told his mother all she was to say and do.

Then he dug such a hole as he had said, and took with him a long butcher's knife, and lay down in it; and his mother covered him over with boughs and leaves and moss, so that he was quite hidden. There he lay by day; and after a while the man came travelling along and asked for the lad.

"Ay, ay!" said his mother, "he was a man, that he was; though he never got from me more than one sow pig. For he became both a doctor and a master-builder, and he was hanged after that, and rose again from the dead; and yet I never heard anything but ill of him. Here he came flying home the other day, and then he gave me the greatest joy I ever had of him, for he laid him down and died. As for me, I did not care enough for him to spend money on a priest and Christian