“I do not know,” she said and shook her head softly. “I love our little boy and love to have him with me. Don’t I, Cordt?”
“Yes.”
“But he is much happier with old Marie. He prefers to be with her. He puts out his little hands to me when I come in. But, when I have had him in my arms for a while, he wants to go back to Marie. He is so small still.”
“Yes.”
“Sometimes he will not kiss me on any account. He always kisses old Marie.”
“When she comes to die, we will put a tombstone on her grave,” he said. “And on the stone we will write, ‘Here lies one whom the children in the house kissed.’”
Fru Adelheid folded her hands behind her neck and looked up at the ceiling:
“At one time, you used to tell me about your mother ... that is long, long ago, Cordt. You talked of her so often, in those days ... why do you never do so now?”
“I think only of you.”
She moved nearer to him and laid her head on his knee: