The work at the mine goes on, but there are whisperings of something wrong, the yield is not as good as it had promised.  The mining expert, who had gone back home, came out again with another expert to help him; they went about blasting and boring and examining all the ground.  What was wrong?  The copper is fine enough, nothing wrong with that, but thin, and no real depth in it; getting thicker to the southward, lying deep and fine just where the company’s holding reached its limit—­and beyond that was Almenning, the property of the State.  Well, the first purchasers had perhaps not thought so much of the thing, anyway.  It was a family affair, some relatives who had bought the place as a speculation; they had not troubled to secure the whole range, all the miles to the next valley, no; they had but taken over a patch of ground from Isak Sellanraa and Geissler, and then sold it again.

And what was to be done now?  The leading men, with the experts and the foremen, know well enough; they must start negotiations with the State at once.  So they send a messenger off at full speed to Sweden, with letters and plans and charts, and ride away themselves down to the Lensmand below, to get the rights of the fjeld south of the water.  And here their difficulties begin; the law stands in their way; they are foreigners, and cannot be purchasers in their own right.  They knew all about that, and had made arrangements.  But the southern side of the fjeld was sold already—­and that they did not know.  “Sold?”

“Ay, long ago, years back.”

“Who bought it then?”

“Geissler.”

“What Geissler?—­oh, that fellow—­h’m.”

“And the title-deeds approved and registered,” says the Lensmand.  “’Twas bare rock, no more, and he got it for next to nothing.”

“Who is this fellow Geissler that keeps cropping up?  Where is he?”

“Heaven knows where he is now!”

And a new messenger is sent off to Sweden.  They must find out all about this Geissler.  Meanwhile, they could not keep on all the men; they must wait and see.

So Gustaf came down to Sellanraa, with all his worldly goods on his back, and here he was, he said.  Ay, Gustaf had given up his work at the mine—­that is to say, he had been a trifle too outspoken the Sunday before, about the mine and the copper in the mine; the foreman had heard of it, and the engineer, and Gustaf was given his discharge.  Well, good-bye then, and maybe ’twas the very thing he wanted; there could be nothing suspicious now about his coming to Sellanraa.  They set him to work at once on the cowshed.

They worked and worked at the stone walls, and when a few days later another man came down from the mine, he was taken on too; now there were two spells, and the work went apace.  Ay, they would have it ready by the autumn, never fear.