Josenhans's had let himself
be appointed guardian of the orphan children by the Village Council. He
made the less objection for the reason that Josenhans had, in former
days, served as second-man on his farm. His guardianship, however, was
practically restricted to his taking care of the father's unsold
clothes, and to his occasionally asking one of the children, as he
passed by: "Are you good?"--whereupon he would march off without even
waiting for an answer. Nevertheless a strange feeling of pride came over
the children when they heard that the rich farmer was their guardian,
and they looked upon themselves as very fortunate people, almost
aristocratic. They often stood near the large house and looked up at it
expectantly, as if they were waiting for something and knew not what;
and often, too, they sat by the plows and harrows near the barn and read
the biblical text on the house over and over again. The house seemed to
speak to them, if no one else did.

It was the Sunday before All Souls' Day, and the children were again
playing before the locked house of their parents,--they seemed to love
the spot,--when Farmer Landfried's wife came down the road from
Hochdorf, with a large red umbrella under her arm, and a hymn-book in
her hand. She was paying a final visit to her native place; for the day
before the hired-man had already carried her household furniture out of
the village in a four-horse wagon, and early the next morning she was to
move with her husband and her three children to the farm they had just
bought in distant Allgau. From way up by the mill Dame Landfried was
already nodding to the children--for to meet children on first going out
is, they say, a good sign--but the children could not see her nodding,
nor could they see her sorrowful features. At last, when she drew near
to them, she said:

"God greet ye, children! What are you doing here so early? To whom do
you belong?"

"To Josenhans--there!" answered Amrei, pointing to the house.

"Oh, you poor children!" cried the woman, clasping her hands. "I should
have known you, my girl, for your mother, when she went to school with
me, looked just as you do--we were good companions; and your father
served my cousin, Farmer Rodel. I know all about you. But tell me,
Amrei, why have you no shoes on? You might take cold in such weather as
this! Tell Marianne that Dame Landfried of Hochdorf told you to say, it
is not right of her to let you run about like this!