“Did you know Mr. Dietman in Germany?” she asked.  This was the name of the farmer to whose house he had been sent on an errand.  They were new-comers into the town, since spring.

“No!” replied Wilhelm, with another strange, sharp glance at Carlen.  “I saw him not before.”

“Have they children?” she continued.  “Are they old?”

“No; young,” he answered.  “They haf one child, little baby.”

Carlen could not contrive any other questions to ask.  “It must have been a letter,” she thought; and her face grew sadder.

It was a late bedtime when the family parted for the night.  The astonishing change in Wilhelm’s manner was now even more apparent than it had yet been.  Instead of slipping off, as was his usual habit, without exchanging a good-night with any one, he insisted on shaking hands with each, still talking and laughing with gay and affectionate words, and repeating, over and again, “Good-night, good-night.”  Farmer Weitbreck was carried out of himself with pleasure at all this, and holding Wilhelm’s hand fast in his, shaking it heartily, and clapping him on the shoulder, he exclaimed in fatherly familiarity:  “Dis is goot, mein son! dis is goot.  Now are you von of us.”  And he glanced meaningly at John, who smiled back in secret intelligence.  As he did so there went like a flash through his mind the question, “Can Carlen have spoken with him to-day?  Can that be it?” But a look at Carlen’s pale, perplexed face quickly dissipated this idea.  “She looks frightened,” thought John.  “I do not much wonder.  I will get a word with her.”  But Carlen had gone before he missed her.  Running swiftly upstairs, she locked the door of her room, and threw herself on her knees at her open window.  Presently she saw Wilhelm going down to the brook.  She watched his every motion.  First, he walked slowly up and down the entire length of the field, following the brook’s course closely, stopping often and bending over, picking flowers.  A curious little white flower called “Ladies’-Tress” grew there in great abundance, and he often brought bunches of it to her.

“Perhaps it is not for me this time,” thought Carlen, and the tears came into her eyes.  After a time Wilhelm ceased gathering the flowers, and seated himself on his favorite rock,—­the same one where John and Carlen had sat the night before.  “Will he stay there all night?” thought the unhappy girl, as she watched him.  “He is so full of joy he does not want to sleep.  What will become of me! what will become of me!”

At last Wilhelm arose and came toward the house, bringing the bunch of flowers in his hand.  At the pasture bars he paused, and looked back over the scene.  It was a beautiful picture, the moon making it light as day; even from Carlen’s window could be seen the sparkle of the brook.