“Mama!  Papa! come away! the house is going to fall down! everything is going to pieces!” In his excitement he almost pulled Jule off his seat, to make him come with him, as he ran out of the door.  Presently they heard him outside repeating, “The house will tumble down; Jule said it would!”

“Some evil spirit has certainly taken possession of the children,” said the astonished father, “The twins look as if they were sitting on pins, and little Hunne is acting like a mad-man.”

At these words Julius broke out into inextinguishable laughter; for it suddenly dawned upon him what the little boy had in his mind.  The unusual timidity and silence of the twins was caused, no doubt, by their having already begun in secret the work of destruction; and at any moment now the house might fall in ruins upon the assembled family.  Jule explained with repeated outbursts of laughter, the meaning of Hunne’s fright.  In vain the mother called the little boy to come in; he was jumping up and down before the house door, stamping, and calling to his father and mother and Jule and everyone to come out.  At last his father lost patience, and said decidedly that the door must be closed, and that the dinner should be ended in peace.  After dinner they all went into the garden, where Hunne joined them.  When he saw them all seated in safety under the apple-tree, he said with a sigh,

“I wish some one would bring me my pudding, before the house falls down.”

His mother drew him to her, and explained to him that big Jule and little Hunne, were two very foolish fellows; the first to invent such silly stuff, and the second to believe it.  She begged him to think a bit how impossible it would be for two children like Wili and Lili to pull down a great strong stone house like theirs.  But it was a long time before the impression was effaced from the child’s imagination.

Dora had been standing by the hedge, as usual, hoping that the children would come into the garden, when Wili and Lili appeared with the bow.  She had watched the progress of their undertaking with the greatest interest.  At last, off flew the arrow; and in a second, the sharp point pierced the little girl’s bare arm.  Dora groaned aloud with pain.  The arrow fell to the ground; it had not penetrated deep enough to hold at all; but the blood followed, and trickled along her arm and hand, and down upon her dress.  At this sight Dora forgot her pain in her fear.  Her first thought was, “How Aunt Ninette will scold!” She tried to hide what had happened.  She twisted her handkerchief about the wounded arm, and she ran to the spring before the house, to wash out all signs of blood.  It was useless; the blood flowed out under the bandage in a stream, and soon her dress was spotted all over with the red drops.

“Dora!  Dora!” called some one from above.  It was her aunt; there was no help for it; she must show herself.  In fear and trembling, she mounted the stairs and stood before her aunt, hiding the bandaged arm behind her.  Her pretty Sunday dress was stained with blood, and her face too; for in her eagerness to wash it off she had spread it everywhere.