Hansei cried: "Let me go too; let me go!"
"Hush, no; it is dark where I go."
"Is there no sun at the other side of the hill?"
"Yes, yes; but we who make lace sit in darkness."
Hansei asked: "Why must there be lace?"
The mother stared into the dusk. "Because," she said slowly, "there are princesses and great ladies down there who must be beautiful."
"What is beautiful?"
"I don't know."
Always through the dusky summer evenings they sat together on the doorstep, the mother with her bent head resting on her hand, and Hansei staring up at the great sky and clouds and stars above him. Sometimes the mother told strange stories, but oftener they sat silent.
When winter came it seemed to Hansei that half of all the joy and light and life went out of the world. There were no birds nor bugs nor bees left; the flowers were gone, and the days were short and gray. It was cold, and he could only stay in the dim little house, playing with small sticks and stones, or tracing the frostwork on the one little window. Frost was like lace, his mother had told him.