The old woman was quite embarrassed. "I am
sorry; he doted upon the lass at one time, and at last--oh, heavens,
fraeulein, one has been young too, and if two people love each
other--see, Fraeulein, it is just as if one had drunk deadly hemlock. I
mean no offence, but you will know it yet some day, and, if God will,
may the handsomest and best man in the world come to Buetze and take you
home!"

The old woman had spoken affectingly, and looked at her young mistress
with brightening eyes. Only she would have dared to touch on this point.
She had been Anna Maria's nurse, and a remnant of tenderness toward her
was still hidden somewhere in the girl's heart.

"Brockelmann, you cannot keep from talking," she cried, serenely. "You
know I shall _never_ marry. What would the master do without me? Is
supper ready?"

"The master!" said the good woman, without regarding the last question.
"He ought to marry too! As if it were not high time for him; he will be
thirty-three years old at Martinmas!"

CHAPTER II.

A few days afterward Edwin Stuermer came to Buetze. Anna Maria was
standing just on the lower staircase landing, in the great stone-paved
entrance-hall, a basket of red-cheeked apples on her arm, and
Brockelmann stood near her with a candle in her hand. The unsteady light
of the flickering candle fell on the immediate surroundings, and, like
an old picture of Rembrandt's, the fair head of the girl stood out from
the darkness of the wide hall. Round about her there was a great hue and
cry; all the children of the village seemed to be collected there, and
sang with a sort of scream, to a monotonous air, the old Martinmas
ditty:

"Martins, martins, pretty things,
With your little golden wings,
To the Rhine now fly away,
To-morrow is St. Martin's Day.
Marieken, Marieken, open the door,
Two poor rogues are standing before!
Little summer, little summer, rose's leaf,
City fair,
Give us something, O maiden fair!"

They were just beginning a new song when the heavy entrance-door opened,
and Baron Stuermer came in. Anna Maria did not see him at once, for,
according to an old custom of St. Martin's Eve, she was throwing a
handful of apples right among the little band, who pounced upon them
with cries and shouts. Only when a man's head rose up straight before
her, by the heavily carved banister, she glanced up, and looked into a
pale face framed by dark hair and beard, and in