become loose, matters not, down fell the
picture, and lay face downward before Aunt Rosamond.

"Let it lie, aunt, I beg you!" called Anna Maria's voice at this moment;
and before the old lady could collect herself, the girl had bent her
slender form, and handed her the picture.

"_Merci, ma petite!_" she cried kindly, and looked into her niece's
face; and, indeed, if Aunt Rosamond missed the spring without, now it
had come, bodily, into her room.

Anna Maria still had on a dark-blue riding-habit which closely fitted
her fine, strong figure, and the young face looked out from behind the
blue veil with such a spring-like freshness, that it quite warmed Aunt
Rosamond's heart.

"Have you been riding, Anna Maria?" asked the old lady, as the girl
endeavored to find the fallen nail.

"Yes, aunt, I rode with Klaus for an hour on the Dambitz cross-road;
afterward we met Stuermer by chance, and took a cup of coffee at Dambitz
Manor."

"Indeed!" Aunt Rosamond seemed quite indifferent to this, although she
looked searchingly at the reddening face of her niece, who, apparently,
was very attentively regarding the rescued nail in her hand.

"Are the snow-drops in bloom already at Dambitz?" inquired the old lady.
"Well, the garden lies well protected. But what do you say, Anna Maria,
will you stay and rest with me? I think we will sit down a little
while--_n'est-ce pas, mon coeur_?"

Anna Maria stood irresolute; she looked over at her aunt, who had
already seated herself on the straight-backed, gayly flowered sofa, and
pointed invitingly to an easy-chair. It was so comfortable in this cosey
old room; the rococo clock with the Cupid bending his bow told its low
tick-tack, and a sudden shower beat against the window panes; it was a
little hour just made for chatting of all sorts of possible things, of
the past and of the future.

Anna Maria slowly seated herself in the chair; she neither leaned back
gracefully and comfortably nor rested her fair head on the cushions.
Always straight as a candle, she carried herself perfectly, and so she
remained now. But sudden blushes and deep pallor interchanged on her
face, which turned with an expression of perfect, modest maidenliness
toward the old lady's face. One could see that she wished to say
something, and that her severe, unsympathetic nature was struggling with
an overflowing heart.

Her aunt did not seem to notice it at all; she had taken up a book whose
once green velvet bind