ness, but in the correct calculation that the orphan would
be serviceable to him, the deposed farmer who was her guardian; and the
burden of her maintenance, which would amount to more than her wages,
would fall on others and not on him.

The young couple looked at each other, and the man said:

"Bring your bundle to our house tomorrow--you can live with us."

"Very well," said Amrei, "tomorrow I will bring my bundle. But now I
should like to take my bundle with me; give me a bottle of wine, and
this meat I will wrap up and take to Marianne and my Damie."

They let Amrei have her way; but old Farmer Rodel said to her secretly:

"Give me back my sixpence--I thought you were going to give it up."

"I'll keep that as an earnest from you," answered Amrei slyly; "you
shall see, I will give you value for it." Farmer Rodel laughed to
himself half angrily, and Amrei went back to Black Marianne with money,
wine, and meat.

The house was locked; and there was a great contrast between the loud
music and noise and feasting at the wedding house, and the silence and
solitude here. Amrei knew where to wait for Marianne on her way home,
for the old woman very often went to the stone-quarry and sat there
behind a hedge for a long time, listening to the tapping of chisels and
mallets. It seemed to her like a melody, carrying her back to the times
when her John used to work there too; and so she often sat there,
listening and watching.

Sure enough, Amrei found Black Marianne there, and half an hour before
quitting time she called Damie up out of the quarry. And here among the
rocks a wedding feast was held, more merry than the one amid the noise
and music. Damie was especially joyful, and Marianne, too, was
unusually cheerful. But she would not drink a drop of the wine, for she
had declared that no wine should moisten her lips until she drank it at
her John's wedding. When Amrei told with glee how she had got a place at
young Farmer Rodel's, and was going there tomorrow, Black Marianne
started up in furious anger; picking up a stone and pressing it to her
bosom, she said:

"It would be better a thousand times that I had this in me, a stone like
this, than a living heart! Why cannot I be alone? Why did I ever allow
myself to like anybody again? But now it's all over forever! You false,
faithless child! Hardly are you able to raise your wings, than off you
fly! But it is well. I am alone, and my John shall be alone, too, when
he