Apollonie stared at her master at first as if she could not comprehend his words.

“Tell me what you think of it?  Are you willing to do it?” he asked again.

“Am I willing? am I willing?  Oh, Baron, of course I am, and you cannot know how happy I am,” she cried out with frank delight.  “I can come to-morrow morning, Baron, to-morrow, but now—­I wonder what you’ll say.  You see, I am living with my daughter’s child, who is twelve years old.  She is a very good child, but is scarcely old enough yet to help much in the house and garden.”

“How splendid!  When Apollonie will be too old to do the work, we shall have a young one to carry it on,” said the Baron.  “When you move up here tomorrow, you will know which quarters to choose for yourself, I know.”

The Baron sank back with evident comfort into his pillows, and Apollonie wandered home with a heart overflowing with happiness.  At the first rays of the sun next morning she was already in front of her cottage, packing only the most necessary things for herself and the child into a cart, as she intended to fetch the rest of them later.  Loneli had just heard the great news, because she had been asleep when her grandmother returned the night before.  She was so absolutely overcome by the prospect of becoming an inmate of the castle that she stood still in the middle of the little chamber.

“Come, come,” the grandmother urged, “we have no time for wondering, as we shall have to be busy all day.”

“What will Kurt and Mea say?” was Loneli’s first exclamation.  She would have loved to run over to them right away, for whenever anything happened to her she always felt the wish to tell her two best friends.

“Yes, and think what Mrs. Rector will say,” Apollonie added.  “But let us quickly finish up here, for we must get to the castle as soon as possible.  You are not going to school for the next two days and on Sunday I hope to be all done.”

Apollonie rapidly tied up her bundle and locked the cottage door.  Then quickly setting out, they did not stop till they had reached the iron-grated door.  Mr. Trius, after letting them wait a while, appeared with dragging steps.

“Why not before daybreak?” he growled.

“Because you might have been still in bed and could not have unlocked the door.  But for that I should have come then,” Apollonie quickly retorted.

So he silently led the way, for he had had to realize that Apollonie was not in the least backward now that she had the master’s full support.  She first sought out her old chamber, and Loneli was extremely puzzled to see her grandmother wiping her eyes over and over again.  The whole thing was like a beautiful fairy story to the child, and she loved the charming room with the dark wainscoting along the wall.