Hans Brinker, or the Silver Skates / Серебряные коньки. Книга для чтения на английском языке

Oh! I will toil for you all my life, if you will but cure my father!”

What was the matter with the old doctor? A brightness like sunlight beamed from his face. His eyes were kind and moist; the hand that had lately clutched his cane, as if preparing to strike, was laid gently upon Hans’s shoulder.

“Put up your money, boy, I do not want it. We will see your father. It’s hopeless, I fear. How long did you say?”

“Ten years, mynheer,” sobbed Hans, radiant with sudden hope.

“Ah! a bad case, but I shall see him.

Let me think. Today I start for Leyden, to return in a week, then you may expect me. Where is it?”

“A mile south of Broek, mynheer, near the canal. It is only a poor, broken-down hut. Any of the children thereabout can point it out to your honor,” added Hans with a heavy sigh. “They are all half afraid of the place; they call it the idiot’s cottage.”

“That will do[74 - That will do – (разг.) Хватит; достаточно],” said the doctor, hurrying on with a bright backward nod at Hans.

“I shall be there. A hopeless case,” he muttered to himself, “but the boy pleases me. His eye is like my poor Laurens’s. Confound it, shall I never forget that young scoundrel!” And, scowling more darkly than ever, the doctor pursued his silent way.

Again Hans was skating toward Amsterdam on the squeaking wooden runners; again his fingers tingled against the money in his pocket; again the boyish whistle rose unconsciously to his lips.

Shall I hurry home, he was thinking, to tell the good news, or shall I get the wafles and the new skates first? Whew! I think I’ll go on!

And so Hans bought the skates.

Introducing Jacob Poot and His Cousin

Hans and Gretel had a fine frolic early on that Saint Nicholas’s Eve. There was a bright moon, and their mother, though she believed herself to be without any hope of her husband’s improvement, had been made so happy at the prospect of the meester’s visit, that she yielded to the children’s entreaties for an hour’s skating before bedtime.

Hans was delighted with his new skates and, in his eagerness to show Gretel how perfectly they “worked,” did many things upon the ice that caused the little maid to clasp her hands in solemn admiration. They were not alone, though they seemed quite unheeded by the various groups assembled upon the canal.