"Oh, is that how you are beginning to think!" exclaimed his sister in astonishment; and she warned him:
"I will excuse you this time, but don't entertain such thoughts again. Do you hear?"
"Yes."
She already wore long dresses; he was then just thirteen.
And now a number of annoyances began to fall to her lot: almost every time she entered her brother's work-room, boards and tools and blocks of all sorts fell at her feet, grazing her shoulder, her head, or hurting her hands. The hunchback always cautioned her by a cry of:
"Look out!"
But he was always too slow and the damage was done. Once, limping slightly, pale and very angry, she sprang at him, and shouted in his face:
"You do all this purposely, you freak," and she struck him in the face.
His legs were weak, he fell down, and, as he sat on the floor, quietly, without tears and without complaining, he said to her:
"How can you think that? You love me, don't you? Do you love me?"