If we could think away all the results of crime committed, there would be very little left of what we call conscience.
But Walter consoled himself with the thought that it wasn't a thimble this time. The testament will not be missed at once, he reflected, because Sunday was a long way off, and no one would ask about it during the week.
No, it was not a thimble, or a knitting-needle, or a sugar-bowl, or anything in daily use.
When our hero got home, he stuck his greasy Glorioso under Leentje's sewing-table--the same Leentje who had sewed up his breeches after that wonderful leap, so that his mother never found out about it. She went down to her grave in ignorance of these torn breeches.
But Leentje was employed to patch breeches and such things. She received for this seven stivers a week, and every evening a slice of bread and butter.
Long after the Habakkuk period, Walter often thought of her humble "Good-evening, Juffrouw; good-evening, M'neer and the young Juffrouwen; good-evening, Walter," etc.
Yes, Walter's mother was called Juffrouw, on account of the shoe-business. For Juffrouw is the title of women of the lower middle classes, while plain working women are called simply Vrouw. Mevrouw is the title of women of the better classes. And so it is in the Netherlands till to-day: The social structure is a series of classes, graduated in an ascending scale. Single ladies are also called Juffrouw, so that Juffrouw may mean either a young lady or a young matron--who need not necessarily be so young. The young Juffrouwen were Walter's sisters, who had learned how to dance. His brother had been called M'neer since his appointment as assistant at the "intermediate school," a sort of charity school now no longer in existence. His mother had spliced his jacket that he might command the respect of the boys, and remarked that the name "Stoffel" scarcely suited him now. This explains why Leentje addressed him as M'neer. To Walter she simply said Walter, for he was only a small boy. Walter owed her three stivers, or, to be exact, twenty-six doits, which he never did pay her. For, years afterward, when he wanted to return the money to her, there were no more doits; and, besides, Leentje was dead.