"Come, Fritz," said Paul as he took a bite out of his roll, "eat your roll and come with us. It is no use to stay here."
"Oh, my hunger is gone, and how can I forget my loss when I need my money every day?"
"But what is the use of fretting over it?" said Franz, impatiently. "The money is gone, and crying will not bring it back, so you may as well make the best of it."
"Yes, Franz, it is easy for you to talk that way when you have your money in your pocket. But mine is gone. Even the few nickels that were in my vest pocket were taken by the miserable thief," and tears streamed from the boy's eyes.
"I do feel sorry for you," said the saleswoman. "Had you much money in your pocketbook?"
"Yes, I had two silver dollars and a ten-mark gold piece with the face of Kaiser Frederick upon it. My father got it in trade, and he put it on the Christmas tree for me. It was new and bright and beautiful, and now it is gone. Besides I had two marks, and the nickels in my vest pocket—and—"
"What is the use of calling them all over?" complained Franz. "This is the third time you have called them. They will not come back like tame birds that know their names."
"Just think of the lines we repeat in school: 'Happy are we if we forget what we cannot change,'" Paul said by way of comfort.
"Yes, Paul, that is all right when people are not in trouble, but it will not bring back my beautiful, bright gold-piece and my—"
"It was not very smart of you to allow yourself to be robbed," rejoined Paul quickly. "No thief would have gotten the chance to fool me that way. I would not have been so friendly with a strange man as to allow him the chance to get his fingers in my pocket."