air of importance, "to buy
bread and meal."

"Well, listen now. Sit here by my side. Would you like to help your
grandfather? We will make him well and give him bread and money, so
that he can live without anxiety."

"Yes, but Grandfather wanted to make a hole under the earth for us both,
because it is so terribly cold in the forest."

"Very well; we will build him a strong hut."

"With a real fire-place like Lasaref has?"

"Yes, just like that."

The little girl clapped her hands in glee. "And I will always cook him
good broth. That is just what Grandfather has always told me, that one
should help the other, and then God helps all."

"Yes, certainly. We will help him too."

Anjuta clambered up on the box-seat. The peasant who held the reins gave
her a violent dig in the side and angrily hissed between his teeth,
"Stupid goose!"

"Stephan," said the stout official, "can the sledge go through the
wood?"

"No," was the sulky reply.

"Ah, but when you get something on your obstinate neck it can. Turn
round, rascal! In winter one can go everywhere."

Anjuta had become quite silent. Why was the kind gentleman so angry all
of a sudden? The sledge had already reached the wood.

"How pleased Grandfather will be!" she thought, and smiled again her
happy childish smile.

XII

Ivan the Runaway's heart sank when Anjuta had gone. "Not even can I pray
for her, sinner that I am!" he thought. "I would only bring down
misfortune on her."

Suppose a stray wolf attacked her, or she lost her way? There would be
no one to help her. His imagination continued to conjure up ever darker
and darker images. He saw her little body writhing under the claws of a
hungry wild beast, or sinking in the treacherous snow of a deep ravine;
he saw her wandering blindly in the thickets of the forest and heard her
childish voice crying, "Grandfather, Grandfather, I am frightened!"

Hour after hour passed. The hut seemed too narrow for him. He knew that
she would spend the night in the village, and yet he ventured out in the
cold, drawn by the hope that he would see her suddenly standing before
him laughing and happy with radiant eyes.

Over the white-clothed forest there brooded a foreboding silence; the
sky was overcast by dark clouds and the pine-trees towered gaunt and
forbidding. A feeling of terror slowly stole over him. Formerly he had
never known it in his solitude, but Anjuta had accustomed him to human
companionship. Was no