ig one, "I'm always praying that you may
go to heaven."

[Pg 116]

"Really?" He was touched. "That's very nice of you."

"Mother also prays that you may go to heaven, father."

Mr. Tiralla was also very touched to hear that. Oh, yes, she was a
splendid little woman was his Sophia, and loved him even if she didn't
always show it, especially lately. Ugh, how cold and forbidding she was
sometimes; she made you freeze. But she was a pious woman. Then
knitting his brows together, as though something were tormenting him,
he said to the child, "When you are married, my dear Rosa, always try
to please your husband; he'll like that." He gave a little sigh,
but then he laughed. "When Mikolai comes back from the army and
marries, I'll rub it into him, too, 'Take a complaisant wife.' Ha, ha,
his mother, my late wife, Hanusia, was complaisant enough, that's
certain--ha, ha."

"Will Mikolai soon be coming back from the army?" inquired Rosa. She
had been such a stupid little thing when he had gone away three years
before. But now she was wiser, and she realized how nice it was to have
a little brother. The only time he had come home on furlough during all
those years she had been very ill with scarlet fever, and he hadn't
been allowed to come to her on account of the infection. She was,
therefore, doubly glad to see him now. How she would love him. "Will my
little brother soon be coming back?" she repeated anxiously.

"H'm, a nice little brother!" laughed her father. "Do you really think
they could do with a 'little brother' in the horse guards? He's a big
brother, I can tell you, an enormous fellow. He was as tall as I when I
went to see him last autumn. And what fists he has got. He won't want a
team of oxen to pull [Pg 117] the cart, he'll do it himself. But he'll
be good to his little sister. Who wouldn't be good to you, my wee one?"
He took hold of her little face with his big hand and stroked it
tenderly and carefully.

Rosa smiled. "I'll love him," she cried enthusiastically, "and he'll
love me. We're all to love each other, Jesus bids us do so."

"Yes, that's what I think, too," said her father, "we're all to love
each other." He suddenly thought of his wife, from whom he had neither
received kiss nor friendly look that day. So instead of inspecting his
corn, as he had intended doing, he returned home with his daughter.

They walked hand in hand. Their figures--his thick-set, a massive
tree-trunk, hers a delicate le