"No."
"But I did; and I heard Babi, the root girl, say that the crazy woman from the farm would never come back again. Now Babi's crazy and Irmgard isn't, but still it frightened me. I don't know--but it seems to me that our home will seem empty, if we don't have Irmgard with us. She's become one of us."
When they had returned to the house and were sitting together in the front room, Hansei said:
"Don't you remember how she advised me to place the table differently, and how she helped to arrange everything, and told uncle to shorten the legs of the chairs, so that they might fit better to the table? I've never seen a farmer's room that looked so beautiful as ours; and she was a great help to you in everything."
Hansei had much to arrange about the house, and Walpurga would often come to him, with one of the children, and exchange a few words with him, while at work. She did not care to be alone. She missed Irma, and yet was happy to know that she was safe in her lonely retreat.
CHAPTER VIII.
The day did not clear. At noon, the mist changed into heavy rain.
"I wonder if it rains as hard up there, too; she'll be terribly wet," thought Walpurga to herself, and, indeed, it was raining just as heavily up the mountain. Wild, rapid little streams ran across the road and bubbled and splashed down the mountain side.
With the aid of a mountain staff which Hansei had given her, Irma walked on courageously. To protect her against the rain, the little pitchman had given her his great woolen rug, in which there was only a hole to slip the head through. He managed to cover himself with empty corn sacks. He walked at her side, and often said:
"Shall I carry you?"