"Get up!" I shouted, and stamped with my foot; "that chair belongs to us!"
The girl laughed, and after a while she said, still laughing:
"Nothing whatever belongs to you; everything has been seized from your people; all you have left is debts."
Then she sprang to her feet, pushed the chair back with such violence that it fell to the ground, and ran off.
I stood like one stunned and could not for a while understand what she had said; but then I remembered how often my mother cried, how sad my father looked, and all at once my veil of ignorance was lifted. I went back into the house, but as shyly and softly as if I were a criminal, and sat down silently on a chair. My mother sat at the table with the youngest child in her arms, and looked at me in surprise. I was generally very noisy, and upset a chair three times before I sat down.
"Have you quarrelled with someone?" she asked.
"No; but I should like to know whether what everyone says is true."
My mother got up from the chair and put the child on the bed; then she pulled the table-cover straight, and stared hard at an empty corner of the room.
"By-the-by," she said, as if she was really thinking of something quite different, "who said that?"
When I had told her she sighed deeply. No other sound was heard in the room.
"Should you like to go back to Langenau?" she asked after a while.
I felt surprised and delighted. Hilda, Leopoldine, the old church, and lots of other things came into my thoughts and made me long for them boundlessly.
"Oh, mother," I cried, "it would make me so happy!"
During the following week all our furniture was moved again and sent away. We were all frightfully excited; only my father was quiet, and looked grave and pale. We arrived at Langenau late in the evening, and drove to a new lodging. The whole village seemed to be asleep, and nobody saw our arrival. We had been away for a year.
I did not like the new lodging; it was underground, and the water dripped down the walls, leaving trails of a dark brown colour behind. I could hear my mother say that the lodging was damp and unhealthy, and that she had never thought one could become so poor. Then my father answered that she must not lose courage, but have a little patience, and he would try to find something better as soon as his business proved to be satisfactory. They spoke for a long time upon this subject, and I understood that the business in question was a new one, and that most probably it would take a little while to get customers.