"And Fritz was so angry. He spread them all out on the table, and was going to chop off all their heads with a knife, when he found out about the humps; and then he called mother up from the bakery and showed them to her."
"And what did she say?" asked Violet, deeply interested in Ella's recital.
"Fritz asked was that why they called thee Violet, because thou also hast a hump? and mother said, 'Hush, foolish boy.' Violet was like a little angel when she was born, and soon she would be an angel again. And then Fritz got his penknife and cut open all the humps, to see what was in them; and there wasn't anything to see, only things all folded up, and quite shining."
"Ah," murmured Violet faintly.
"And then Fritz gave a great cough, and away flew all the violets off the table—heads and tails, and humps and all; and mother had to hold Fritz by both the hands, for he coughed as if his head would have fallen off too."
Ella laughed heartily at the recollection, and letting go Violet's dress clambered up into the window, where, kneeling on the window-sill, she seized upon some of the wooden animals ranged along the ledges, and began with infinite pains to make the camel try to kiss the elephant. "Only I don't know where the elephant keeps his mouth," she said plaintively.
By-and-by she ceased playing and fell to singing, her round face pressed against the window-frame, and her eyes looking out towards the hill.
Evelina put down her knitting and listened. The child had the sweetest voice in all Edelsheim—clear, fresh, and true. She sang unconsciously a hymn about green pastures and lambs who followed their Shepherd by the side of still waters, and whom, when weary, he carried in his bosom tenderly and full of care.
Evelina looked across at Violet to express her admiration and amazement at the beauty and pathos of the child's voice; but Violet did not see her, for her eyes were fixed on the little cap beside her filled with the fresh hazel-nuts, with their pale green leaves, and rich with the odour of the trees which grew on the hill yonder still hanging about them. A great longing was beginning to fill her soul—to go out like all the other children and see the woods and the squirrels and the boughs laden with their fruit; to see the cattle and the fields and the little waterfall close by the road, at the foot of which Fritz had told her one could always find lovely damp moss with leaves which looked like trees. She had some of these leaves put away in mother's Bible, and she would like to see them and gather them for herself.
And now so deep was her reverie that she did not even notice Ella's descent from the window-sill, and was scarcely conscious of the parting kiss, given in some haste as Fritz had signalled to Ella to return home at once, and had held out to her view a tempting cake full of currants, and covered over with pink sugar.