She examined him; what a fine fellow Wolfgang had grown. But he held himself so badly, he bent forward so. "Hold yourself up, for goodness'

sake," she exhorted, and she straightened her own rush-like figure.

"Why do you make such a round back? And you blink your eyes as if you were short-sighted. Hm, you should be with my employer--oh my, she would make you sit up." She chuckled to herself, her whole slender figure shook with a secret inclination to laugh.

"You're so happy," he said slowly.

"Well, why shouldn't I be? Do you think such an old dragon can spoil my good humour? Come, that would be stupid. When she scolds I lower my head, I don't say a word, but I laugh to myself. Ha ha!" Her clear voice sounded very gay.

How pretty she was. The boy's dark eyes were fixed on Frida Lamke as though he had never seen her before. The sun was shining on her fair hair, which she no longer wore in a long plait, but in a thick knot at the back of her head. Her face was so round, so blooming.

"You never come to see me now," he said.

"How can I?" She shrugged her shoulders and a.s.sumed an air of importance. "What do you think I have to do? Into town with the car before eight in the morning, and then only two hours for my dinner always in and out and in the evening I'm hardly ever at home before ten, often still later. Then I'm so tired, I sleep as sound as a top.

But on Sundays mother lets me sleep as long as I like, and in the afternoon I go out with Artur and Flebbe. We----"

"Where do you go?" he asked hastily. "I could go with you some time."

"Oh, you!" She laughed at him. "You mayn't, you know."

"No." He bowed his head.

"Come, don't look so glum," she said encouragingly, stroking his chin with her fore-finger, and disclosing a hole in her shabby kid glove. "You go to college, you see. Artur is to be apprenticed too, next autumn. Mother thinks to a hairdresser. And Flebbe is already learning to be a grocer--his father can afford to do that--who knows?

perhaps he may have a shop of his own in time."

"Yes," said Wolfgang in a monotonous voice, breaking into her chatter. He stood in the street as though lost in thought, his books pressed under his arm. Oh, how far, far this girl, all three of them, had gone from him all at once. Those three, with whom he had once played every day, whose captain he had always been, were already so big, and he, he was still a silly school-boy.

"Oh, hang it all!" He hurled his pile of books away from him with a violent gesture, so that the strap that held them together came undone.

All the books and exercise-books flew apart, and lay spread out in the dust of the street.

"Oh dear, Wolfchen!" Frida stooped down, quite terrified, and gathered them all up.

He did not help her to collect them. He stared in front of him with an angry look.

"There--now you've got them again," said the girl, who had grown quite red with stooping so busily. She blew off the dust and pressed them under his arm again.

"I don't want them." He let them fall again.

"Hm, you're a nice fellow. What can you be thinking of?--those expensive books." She felt really quite angry with him. "Don't you know that they cost money?"

"Pooh!" He made a gesture as if to say, what did that matter? "Then some new ones will be bought."

"Even if your father has sufficient money," she said, firing up, "it's still not right of you to treat these good books like that."

He did not say a word to that, but took them up and fastened the strap round them again. They stood together, both feeling embarra.s.sed.

She glanced sideways at him: how he had changed. And he felt vexed that he had got into a pa.s.sion: what would she think of him now?

"I shall have to go now," she said all at once, "or I shan't even get my dinner eaten ugh, how hungry I am!" She put her hand on her stomach. "How good it'll taste! Mother has potatoes in their jackets and herrings to-day."

"I shall go too." Suiting his step to hers he trotted beside her as she tripped hastily along.

She got quite red: what would her mother say if she brought Wolfgang with her? No, that would really not do, this was just the day when their room had not been tidied. And she had told a fib too: there were no herrings, only onion sauce with the potatoes in their jackets.

She felt ashamed that Wolfgang should find it out.

"No, you go home," she said, intrenching herself behind a pout. "As you've not been to see us for so long, you needn't come to-day either.

I'm angry with you."

"Angry with me--me? What have I done? I wasn't allowed to come to you, I mightn't--that's not my fault, surely. Frida!"

She commenced to run, her face quite scarlet; he ran beside her.

"Frida! Frida, surely you can't be angry with _me_? Oh, Frida, don't be angry. Frida, let me go with you. At last I've met you, and then you behave like this?"

There was sorrow in his voice. She felt it, but she was angry all the same: why should he cling to her like that? Flebbe would not like it at all. And so she said in a pert voice: "We don't suit each other and never shall. You go with your young ladies. You belong to them."

"Say that once more--dare to do it!" He shouted in a rough voice, and raised his hand as though he would strike her. "Affected creatures, what are they to me?"

He was right--she had to confess it in her heart--he had never taken any notice of the young girls who lived in the villas around him. She knew very well that he preferred them to them all, and her vanity felt flattered; she said soothingly, but at the same time evasively: "No, Wolfchen, you can't go with me any more, it's not proper any more." And she held out her hand: "Good-bye, Wolfgang."

They were among the bushes in a small public garden in which there were benches, the villas lying at a good distance from it, quite hidden behind their front gardens. There was n.o.body in sight in the quiet radiance of the noonday sun. But even if somebody had come, it would not have made any difference; he seized hold of her with both hands in a kind of rage. "I am going with you--I shall not let you go."

She resisted forcibly: what was the stupid boy thinking of? "Let me go," she said, spitting at him like a little cat, "will you let me go at once? You hurt me. Just you wait, I'll tell Flebbe about it, he'll be after you. Leave me in peace."

He did not let her go. He held her clasped in his arms without saying a word, his books were again lying in the dust.

Did he want to kiss or strike her? She did not know; but she was afraid of him and defended herself as best she could. "You runaway!"

she hissed, "hm, you're a nice one. Runs away from home, hides himself in the wood. But they got you all the same--and it served you right."

All at once he let her go; she stood in front of him mocking him.

She could easily have run away now, but she preferred to stand there and scold him: "You runaway!"

He got very red and hung his head.

"How could you think of doing such a thing?" she continued with a certain cruelty. "So silly. Everybody laughed at you. We positively could not believe it at first. Well I never, said I, the boy runs away without money, without a cap, without a piece of bread in his pocket.

You wanted to go to America like that, I suppose, eh?" She eyed him from top to toe and then threw her head back and laughed loudly: "To think of doing such a thing."

He did not raise his head, only murmured half to himself: "You shouldn't laugh at it, no, you shouldn't."

"Come, what next? Cry, perhaps? What does it matter to me? Your mother cried enough about it, and your father ran about as if he were crazy. All the rangers in the district were on their legs. Tell me, didn't you get a good thrashing when they dragged you home by the collar?"

"No." He suddenly raised his head and looked straight into the eyes that were sparkling a little maliciously.

There was something in his glance--a mute reproach--that compelled her to lower her lids.

"They didn't beat me--I wouldn't have stood it either--no, they didn't beat me."

"Shut you up?" she asked curiously.

He did not answer; what was he to say? No, they had not shut him up, he might go about as he liked in the house and garden, in the street, to school--and still, still he was not free.

Tears suddenly started to his eyes. "You--you shouldn't--shouldn't taunt me--Frida," he cried, stammering and faltering. "I'm so--so----"