The Emperor of Portugalia eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 229 pages of information about The Emperor of Portugalia.

The Emperor of Portugalia eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 229 pages of information about The Emperor of Portugalia.

The child slept the whole time; so for all of her he could have stood there and waited as long as he liked.  But the worrisome person was Katrina!  Every other minute she would ask him whether any one had come along yet and if he thought it prudent to keep the infant out in the damp air any longer.

Jan turned his eyes up toward Great Peak, rising high above the little groves and garden-patches of the Ashdales, like a watch tower atop some huge fortress, keeping all strangers at a distance.  Still it might be possible that some great lady, who had been up to the Peak, to view the beautiful landscape had taken the wrong path back and strayed in the direction of Ruffluck.

He quieted Katrina as well as he could.  The child was safe enough, he assured her.  Now that he had stood out there so long he wanted to wait another minute or so.

Not a soul hove in sight, but he was confident that if he just stuck to it, the help would come.  It could not be otherwise.  It would not have surprised him if a queen in a golden chariot had come driving over mountains and through thickets, to bestow her name upon his little girl.

More moments passed, and he knew that dusk would soon be falling.  Then he would not be let stand there longer.  Katrina looked at the clock, and again begged him to come inside.

“Just you be patient a second!” he said.  “I think I see something peeping out over west.”

The sky had been overcast the whole day, but at that moment the sun [Note:  In Swedish the sun is feminine.] came bursting out from behind the clouds, and darted a few rays down toward the child.

“I don’t wonder at your wanting to have a peek at the li’l’ lassie before you go down,” said Jan to the sun.  “She’s something worth seeing!”

The sun came forth, clearer and clearer, and shed a rose-coloured glow over both the child and the hut.

“Maybe you’d like to be godmother to ’er?” said Jan of Ruffluck.

To which the sun made no direct reply.  She just beamed for a moment, then drew her mist-cloak about her and disappeared.

Once again Katrina was heard from.  “Was any one there?” asked she.  “I thought I heard you talking to somebody.  You’d better come inside now.”

“Yes, now I’m coming,” he answered, and stepped in.  “Such a grand old aristocrat just went by!  But she was in so great a hurry I had barely time to say ‘go’day’ to her, before she was gone.”

“Goodness me!  How provoking!” exclaimed Katrina.  “And after we’d waited so long, too!  I suppose you didn’t have a chance to ask what her name was?”

“Oh, yes.  Her name is Glory Goldie Sunnycastle—­that much I got out of her.”

Glory Goldie Sunnycastle!  But won’t that name be a bit too dazzling?” was Katrina’s only comment.

Jan of Ruffluck was positively astonished at himself for having hit upon something so splendid as making the sun godmother to his child.  He had indeed become a changed man from the moment the little girl was first laid in his arms!

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The Emperor of Portugalia from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.