Sometimes he used to carry home parcels for ladies who had made large purchases, and very often he received presents from them. With the regular customers the handsome little fellow was a great favorite.
One day, as Paul and the mother sat in the stall together, talking of the dear Fatherland so far away, they saw a very queer-looking Spanish woman approaching. She seemed bowed down with age and infirmities, and leaned heavily upon her staff as she hobbled along with the greatest difficulty.
After the Spanish fashion her head was covered with a shawl, from which peered her thin sharp face, quite furrowed with wrinkles. Her bleared eyes were red, and her long hooked nose nearly met her pointed chin. Altogether she was very unpleasant in her appearance.
All the time she kept her toothless mouth moving as she mumbled indistinctly to herself.
She came directly up to dame Waltenburger’s stall, and entering it, threw herself down upon the bench, exclaiming: “This is what comes of growing old, nothing but weariness, care, and aching of bones,” and she began rubbing her knees and muttering to herself.
Little Paul stood looking at her, his eyes dilated with wonder, and the compassion of his heart made them blue as the cloudless sky.
“Ah!” exclaimed the old woman, looking into his innocent face with a hideous grimace, “what are you staring at, with your great round owl-eyes? Do you think it is a fine thing to be old, and lame, and poor? You will have to come to it. Ah! yes, there is a comfort in that.”
“Old Father Time will take care of you. Yes! yes! yes!” And she shook her long bony fingers, and chuckled in such a horrible way, that the child retreated behind the mother’s chair, and hid his face upon her protecting shoulder.
“Go quickly, boy, and bring me some fresh water,” said the old woman, “I am very thirsty,” she added, looking at the mother.
Little Paul took a glass and ran away to the well and drew a bucket of water, so clear and sparkling that it glistened in the sunlight like the dew of the morning.