can go on ships, and study there
all about them. That will be a good thing for your calling." For Erick
had not forgotten that Edi intended to sail around the whole world, and
that Ritz too wanted to be something on the sea.

The grandfather was already entering the travelling coach, when Erick
was held back by 'Lizebeth; he had pressed into her hand a valuable
paper, but she had put her apron to her eyes and had begun to sob aloud
behind it, and now she was holding Erick and said: "I think the Sir
Grandfather, he means it well as far as he sees things; but that he
takes the dear boy away from us,--to take one's little boy simply
away--"

"I will come back again, 'Lizebeth, every year when the storks return.
Therefore, good-bye, 'Lizebeth, until I come again."

Saying this, Erick quickly jumped into the carriage, and he wore the
same velvet suit in which he had come. For a long, long time he saw the
white handkerchiefs wave, and he waved his in answer, until the
carriage, down below at the foot of the hill, turned around the corner
and disappeared into the woods. But when the fleet horses, soon after,
reached the first houses of the Middle Lot, there was another halt.

From the moment that Erick had disappeared, Churi had looked like a
picture of horror. He had grown white and grayish looking, and at every
sound that he heard, he trembled, for he thought: "Now they are coming
to fetch you, to put you into prison." Churi had heard that someone who
had thrown another boy into the water had been fetched by two gendarmes
and had been put into prison, where he had been kept for twenty years in
chains. Churi saw this picture always before him and for fear, he could
no longer eat nor sleep; and he dared look at no one. And when the
report came that Erick had turned up again, then his fear increased. For
now, so he thought, it would surely come out that he had done the deed;
and now he was sure that the police would come to get him. But when on
Sunday, the story went round like lightning that Erick, in looking for
berries, had fallen into the water, then it all at once was clear to
Churi, that Erick had not told about him and that he again could go
about quite free and without fear. A great, oppressive weight fell from
Churi's heart, and he was so touched by Erick's kindness and generosity
that he did not sleep from thinking what he could possibly do for Erick
to show him his gratitude.

It had really been so. Erick had t