On winter evenings, when, at Farmer Rodel’s, there was spinning and singing, Barefoot would venture to sing with them, and although she had a clear, high voice, she always took the second part. Rose, the farmer’s unmarried sister, who was a year older than Barefoot, sang always the first part, and it was understood, as a matter of course, that Barefoot’s voice must help hers. Rose was a proud, imperious person, who looked upon and treated Amrie almost like a beast of burden, but less before people than in secret; and as, in the whole village, Amrie was considered of the greatest service,—the person who kept every thing in the farmer’s establishment in complete order,—it was the principal concern of Rose to glorify herself by telling people how much patience was necessary to get along with Barefoot; how the goose-girl in every thing imitated her; and how she bore with her merely out of compassion, and that she might not expose herself to others.
One great object of banter, and of not always well-chosen jokes, was Barefoot’s shoes. She continued to go barefoot, or in winter only she wore low-cut peasant’s boots; yet she took every half-year the customary addition to her wages, of two pairs of welted shoes. They stood upon a shelf in her chamber, while Amrie bore herself as proudly as though she wore them all at the same time. Her shoes numbered six pairs, since Dami left her. They were filled with straw, and from time to time oiled to keep them soft.
Barefoot was now completely grown up; not very tall, but well-proportioned, strong, and active. She always dressed herself in poor materials, but neatly and gracefully, for taste is the ornament of poverty, that costs nothing, and that cannot be purchased. But as Farmer Rodel held it for the honor of his family, he insisted, on Sundays, that she should put on a better dress to be seen by the village. After church, Amrie quickly changed it again, and went to sit with Mariann in her every-day working-dress, or she stood over her flowers, which she cherished in pots at her garret-window, where pinks and the Rose Mariè flourished admirably. Although she had taken from them many grafts to plant upon the graves of her parents, they always doubled their growth afterwards. The pinks, indeed, hung down in pretty spiral tufts to the arbor-walk that went round the whole house. The wide, inclined, straw-roof of the house, formed an excellent protection for the flowers. Barefoot never failed, when a warm summer shower fell, to carry her flower-pots into the garden and leave them near the rain-softened, motherly earth; in particular a little Rose Mariè, that grew in an extremely graceful manner, like a little tree. Barefoot would close her right hand, and strike the palm of the other hand over it, and say to herself,—“when the wedding of my nearest friend comes,—yes, when my Dami is married, then I will lay thee out.” Another thought, one at which she would have blushed in her sleep, sent the red blood to her cheeks as she bent over the Rose Mariè. She drew in her breath as though there met her a faint perfume from the future. But she would not suffer the thought to dwell a moment; wildly and hastily thrusting the rose behind the other larger plants, so that she could not see it, she closed the window.
An alarm-bell sounded! “Fire! at Schecken’s in Hirlingen!” they soon cried. The fire-engine was drawn out, and Barefoot went upon it, and the firemen following.
“My Dami! my Dami!” she cried inwardly, all the way; but it was day, and people are not burnt in the day-time. And, in fact, as they reached Hirlingen, the house was already burnt to the ground. At some distance from the house stood Dami, in an orchard, fastening two beautiful well-formed horses to a tree; while all around were collected horses, oxen, cows, and heifers.
Barefoot got down, exclaiming, “Thank God, thou art safe.” She ran to her brother, but he would not speak to her, and with both hands laid upon the neck of the horse, he concealed his face.
“What is the matter? Why do you not speak? Have you met with any injury?”
“Not I—but the fire!”
“What has happened, then?”
“All my things are burnt; my clothes and the little money I had saved. I have nothing now but the clothes I have on.”