you were the wife of some rich farmer, and you might well be, you
are such a good manager. Drink your coffee, or it will get cold. Is it
sweet enough?"

"Oh! more than enough;" and Annele's words were like a loaf of sugar in
the cup.

"I should like to stay with you, and to hear some of your pleasant
talk, but I must go back into the public room, for one of us must be
there. Come back soon, and then I will sit with you."

"Oh! what a dear, good girl that is!" exclaimed Franzl when Annele left
the room. "You have heaven on earth in this house."

"We have our cares also. She is our last remaining child, and we often
wish we could see her well provided for."

Franzl opened her eyes very wide, then smiled in shy surprise, but she
did not venture to say a word.

The Landlady laughed and rattled her cup, and Franzl thought it her
duty to laugh also. She knows what is proper when you go to drink
coffee with a friend; indeed, the natives of Kunslingen, be they where
they will, are sure to fall on their feet. The Landlady, however, did
not try to enlighten Franzl further, clever as she was, and she had her
reasons for that.

"Tell me, Franzl, have you any fancy for looking at fine linen?"

"Nothing in the world that I like so much. If I were rich I would have
at least seven chests full of linen. Do you know the wife of the
balancemaker at Kunslingen? she has ..."

"There, just look!" said the Landlady, throwing open the doors of a
huge press, where everything was heaped up to the top by dozens, tied
up with blue, green, and red silk ribbons.

"Is this all for the use of your inn?" asked Franzl, when she had taken
breath after all her exclamations of admiration.

"Heaven forbid! This is part of the dowry of my Annele; from their
seventh year I have laid by a stock like this, for each of my three
daughters. You never can tell with girls how soon such things may be
wanted, and then I should have no occasion to apply either to the
weaver, or the sempstress. I should like, however, if the trousseau of
one daughter at all events should remain in this village, and that we
should keep one child near us. My children are all, thank God! doing
well, and more than well, but to see with your own eyes is better than
hearing."

To Franzl all this was like a sudden revelation; the press with all its
linen danced before her eyes, and the blue, red, green, and yellow
ribbons, seemed to melt into one bright rainbow. "May I venture t