"Now, Vreneli," said the old farmer next morning, when the cows had been let out of the stalls, and were already climbing the well-known mountain path to the music of their jingling bells—"now, Vreneli, do your duty faithfully, and take good care of my herds, and if the produce of the mountain farm be richer than that yielded in the days of my former herdswomen, I will not be stingy about a reward."
Vreneli blushed, and cast a stolen glance at Tony, who stood behind his father; she could not but think of the reward which he had promised her. She assured the farmer that she would do her duty, shook hands with the whole household, and then turned to follow the herds.
Tony went with her; he wanted to show her everything in the senner's cottage, and to point out the richest pastures on which the herds were to graze, taking a different place each day, till at last they returned to the first, which by that time would be covered with a fresh growth of grass.
It was a lovely spring morning. The distant glacier was radiant with sunlight, the bells tinkled softly on the necks of the cattle, and wild flowers bloomed at the edge of the torrent which rushed foaming over the moss-grown rocks. But what was all this external beauty in comparison with the blooming world in their own hearts?
They exchanged looks, and words, and happy smiles. Not till the herds had been milked and led to rest on the night pasture did Tony say good-bye. Vreneli stood at the door of the cottage, her hands clasped, and her eyes brimming with happy tears, and watched him till a turn of the road hid him from her view.
Inside, in the cosy cottage, it seemed to her, all the time that she was filling the milk vessels and putting everything in order, as if she still heard his caressing words, and as if his brown eyes looked out on her from every corner. Love and hope quickened her hands, so that her work seemed mere child's play. Then when everything was done, and the fire had died out on the hearth, she stepped out again to the door.
Like a faithful senner she looked first at the night pasture where the herds were resting peacefully. Now and then one of the beautiful animals would lift its head, and the bell at its throat would tinkle softly; the night-wind moved gently among the lofty trees, making the long moss of their stems wave to and fro like dark soft veils. Then Vreneli's eyes sought the valley, and to the moonbeams which hastened, in their glittering robes, down the rocky path to the village she entrusted tender messages of love. And when she turned back into the cottage she knelt at her mossy couch beside the hearth, and mingled with her evening prayer words of joyful thanksgiving. Her last thought before she fell asleep was this, that she was the happiest herdswoman and her Tony the handsomest and truest fellow in the whole land of the Tyrol.
Sunny days succeeded to nights filled with golden dreams. When the first sunbeams flashed from the summit of the glacier, the goat-bells sounded below in the valley, and the goat-herd led his flock to seek the juicy plants that grew on heights inaccessible to less sure-footed herds.
Then Vreneli ran joyfully to meet him, for he always brought some message from Tony, or some other token of his love. With joy-quickened energy she went then about her daily toil. The cows left their nightly resting-place, and came to Vreneli to be milked, and then she led them to some new pasture.
And while the cattle grazed there, she leant against a rock and carefully watched each step of the animals entrusted to her care, lest any one of them should go too near a precipice, or, enticed by the plants that grew most richly beside the torrent, be hurried away in its mad whirl. And when evening sank on the mountain, and clothed the ice-columns in a splendour of red and purple, the goat-herd led his flock back to the valley, and received every evening from Vreneli's hand a bunch of mountain violets for her beloved Tony.