" And pausing by the hedge, she asked again:
"On a stick he has his head, And his jacket it is red, And filled with
stone is he--Now who may he be?"
The boy bethought himself very gravely, and cried "Stop! You mustn't
tell me what it is!--Why, its a hip!"
The girl nodded assentingly, and made a face as if this were the first
time she had ever given him the riddle to guess; as a matter of fact,
however, she had given it to him very often, and had used it many times
to cheer him up.
The sun had dispersed the mist, and the little valley stood in
glittering sheen, as the children turned away to the pond to skim flat
stones on the water. As they passed the house the girl pressed the latch
once more; but again the door did not open, nor was anything to be seen
at the window. And now the children played merrily beside the pond, and
the girl seemed quite content that her brother should be the more clever
at the sport, and that he should boast of it and grow quite excited over
it; indeed, she manifestly tried to be less clever at it, than she
really was, for the stones she threw almost always plumped down to the
bottom as soon as they struck the water--for which she got properly
laughed at by her companion. In the excitement of the sport the children
quite forgot where they were and why they had come there--and yet it was
a strange and sorrowful occasion.
In the house, which was now so tightly locked up, there had lived, but a
short time before, one Josenhans, with his wife and their two children,
Amrei (Anna Marie) and Damie (Damien).
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