The mother was silent; a very sad expression rested upon her face.  The children sympathized with her and said one after the other, sorrowfully, “What a pity, what a pity!” Little Hunne, however, who had listened very attentively to his mother’s story, put his arms lovingly around her, and said,

“Don’t be so sad, mamma dear!  I will go to America as soon as I am big enough, and bring your Lili back with me; that I will!”

Rolf and Wili had drawn near, to hear the story, and presently Rolf said, looking thoughtfully at a strip of paper which he held in his hand,

“Did your piece of paper with the poem look like a rebus, after you had cut it in two, Mamma?”

“Perhaps so, Rolf.  I should think it might look like one.  Why do you ask?”

“Look here! is this it?” replied the boy, holding up his strip of paper.

“Yes, yes, it certainly is it,” cried the mother in great excitement.  “I thought it had been lost long ago.  I kept it carefully put away for many years, and then in some way I lost sight of it.  I thought it was lost forever.  Lately I have not thought of it at all, but telling you the story of my early friendship, brought it again to my mind.  Where did you find it, my son?”

“We found it!” cried Wili and Lili triumphantly.  “It was in the old bible with the queer pictures.  We thought we would look at Eve, again, to see whether her face was scratched as it used to be.”  The twins talked both together as usual.

“Yes, that is another thing that brings my Lili to mind,” said their mother, smiling.  “She scratched that picture once when we were saying how lovely it would be if we were in Paradise together, and suddenly she felt so furious with Eve because she ate the apple, that she scribbled all over her face with a pencil, ‘to punish her,’ she said.  My old verses!  I cannot recall the other half, it is so long ago, over thirty years! only think, children, thirty years ago!”

She laid the paper carefully away in her work-basket, and bade the children put their things together and come into the house, for it was almost supper-time, and their father approved of punctuality above all things.

They gathered up their work and books, and returned slowly to the house under the triumphal arch that still spanned the garden-door of the house.

Dora had been peeping at them as they sat clustered about their mother in an attentive group under the apple-tree.  She had now a good chance to examine each child, as they walked slowly back to the house, and as the last one disappeared, she said, softly sighing, “Oh, if I could sit only just once with them under the apple-tree!”

At supper that evening Aunt Ninette said, “We have really had a few hours of quiet.  If it goes on so, we shall be able to stay here after all.  Don’t you think so, dear Titus?”

Dora listened breathlessly for the answer.

“The air in my room is very close, and I suffer more from giddiness than I did at home,” was the uncle’s reply.