re on such terms with her that she
believed she had only to choose between them. One was waiting for an
increase of salary, which might happen any day; the other had a nice
little lawsuit on concerning an inheritance, and might at any moment be
master of a few thousand thalers, enough at least to make a good start.
They were, in short, both gentlemen of the fairest prospects; and a
little widow who thought about marrying again could afford to go out of
her way to feed them well and make them comfortable. They were both of
the right age, neither too old nor too young.

So they looked up in considerable astonishment at their
boarding-mistress, who seemed entirely unmoved by their ill-humor, and
was very calmly putting away her hat and cape in the lavender-perfumed
chest of drawers. What could have come to her?

They waited and waited. The little widow was positively dawdling over
the preparations for supper. And when at last it came, she set it in
front of them not with the charming manner to which they were
accustomed, but quite indifferently. And the sausage was not as fresh
and crisp as usual.

The young woman took her seat by the window and began to spin. This was
the time when they had always been accustomed to discuss the program of
the meals for the next day. At supper-time they had thus a double
peaceful pleasure, by virtue of their imagination and its creative
powers. But this also was missing tonight. She spun and smiled dreamily
to herself; and the two boarders at their supper had ceased to exist
for her. She was keeping house at the fine farm up on the hillside; she
was wandering in spirit through stable and kitchen, she was changing
the places of the furniture in the sitting-room to suit her taste, and
feeling herself at last in her proper place.

Suddenly there resounded at the house-door a loud and peculiar knock.
When the little widow reascended the stairs, the boarders heard
hesitating footsteps following her. She came in showing some
excitement, and after her came a visitor for whom the boarders were not
prepared--a childish, red-haired girl. She wore a shawl over her head,
half covering her hair; but it overflowed in ringlets and stray
strands.

The soft figure, neither tall nor short, the tender, rosy countenance,
the sharply-marked dark eyebrows, all these made the apparition which
remained silently at the door so visionary and remarkable that Herr
Oehmchen and Herr Leinhose stopped with their m