the deep blush that suffused her face. "Oh gracious!" she exclaimed.
"Revered! No one ever did that before. A stupid creature like me, who
can't do anything and doesn't understand anything, as mother tells me
every day--"

"You don't know your own worth, Reginchen, and that's the best proof of
it--I mean that it's no false worth. But excuse me for telling you this
so bluntly: It's the first--and last time. And of course you--if I
don't come back--will never give me another thought."

The prudent child seemed to know that silence is sometimes the best
answer. She coughed several times, and then said: "Where are you
going?"

"Wherever the winds and waves carry me!" he replied with sorrowful
pathos, and then paced heavily up and down the shop.

"So you're going to sea! Dear me, how frightened I should be! Do you
know, Herr Franzelius, I shall tremble every time that the east wind
blows and the window panes rattle and the gas lights flicker--and
you'll be on the angry sea--"

"Will you really do that, Fraeulein Reginchen?" he asked hastily,
pausing before her. "If you were in earnest--but no, why should you
give yourself useless anxiety about a man who can never--to be sure,
I--it will be a real cordial on my journey--and I wanted to say
something else: I should like to take a keepsake to remember you and
this hour."

"A keepsake?"--she involuntarily glanced at her knitting work, at which
he too was looking intently. "I'm just at the heel," she said, "and I
suppose you'll not wait till it's done."

"No, Fraeulein Reginchen," he replied, "don't think me so presuming as
to ask for such a gift--your own handiwork--so unceremoniously. But--if
I could find any of your father's work--but I've an ugly foot, which is
hard to fit with ready made boots--"

"I could take your measure."

"Yes, you might do that; but no, Reginchen, in the first place I would
not accept such a service from you--"

"I would do it willingly, besides, I'm accustomed to it."

"No, no! A creature like you, and such an unlucky mortal as I--but if I
could find a pair already made--"

He looked around the walls, sighed, passed his hand through his hair,
seemingly endeavoring to avoid her glance.

"You have not the smallest foot in the world," said the girl, looking
at his coarse boots with the eye of an connoisseur. "If it were only as
long in proportion as it's wide. But it's so short beyond the instep,
it would be hard--"

"Won't it? Two ele