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Updated: May 27, 2025
As he did so there went like a flash through his mind the question, "Can Carlen have spoken with him to-day? Can that be it?" But a look at Carlen's pale, perplexed face quickly dissipated this idea. "She looks frightened," thought John. "I do not much wonder. I will get a word with her." But Carlen had gone before he missed her.
If it weren't for you I'd have been gone long ago." "I wouldn't leave mother and father for all the world, John," cried Carlen, warmly, "and I don't think it would be right for you to! What would father do with the farm without you?"
As they stood close together, John holding the candle high over Carlen's head, she bending over the tangled yarn, the kitchen door opened suddenly, and their father came in, bringing with him a stranger, a young man seemingly about twenty-five years of age, tall, well made, handsome, but with a face so melancholy that both John and Carlen felt a shiver as they looked upon it.
"I too am old enough to have a home of my own," she said, with a gentle dignity of tone, which more impressed John with a sense of the change in Carlen than all else which had been said. It was time to return to the house. As he had done when he was ten, and she nine, John stood at the bottom of the steepest rock, with upstretched arms, by the help of which Carlen leaped lightly down.
Has he never told you anything about himself, Carlen?" "Once," she answered, "I took courage to ask him if he had relatives in Germany; and he said no; and I exclaimed then, 'What, all dead! 'All dead, he answered, in such a voice I hardly dared speak again, but I did. I said: 'Well, one might have the terrible sorrow to lose all one's relatives.
As Carlen passed him her eyes involuntarily rested on his bowed head, a world of pity, perplexity, in the glance. John saw it, and frowned. "Come with me," he said sternly, "come down in the pasture; I want to speak to you." Carlen looked up apprehensively into his face; never had she seen there so stern a look. "I must help mütter with the supper," she said, hesitating. John laughed scornfully.
At John's angry exclamation she raised her hand in warning. "Do not loud spraken," she whispered; "Carlen will hear." "Well, then, she shall hear!" cried John, half beside himself. "It is high time she did hear from somebody besides you and father! I reckon I've got something to say about this thing, too, if I'm her brother.
Carlen grew cold with fear; surely this meant but one thing. Nothing else, nothing less, could have thus in an hour rolled away the burden of his sadness. Later in the evening she said timidly, "Did you hear any news in the village this afternoon, Wilhelm?" "No; no news," he said. "I had heard no news."
There are men, you know, who love that way and never smile again." Short-sighted John, to have dreamed that he could forestall any conjecture in the girl's heart! "I have thought of that," she answered meekly; "it would seem as if it could be nothing else. But, John, if she be really dead " Carlen did not finish the sentence; it was not necessary.
As he seated himself on one of the rocks, he saw a figure gliding swiftly down the hill. It was Carlen. As she drew near he looked at her without speaking, but the loving girl was not repelled. Springing lightly to the rock, she threw her arms around his neck, and kissing him said: "I saw you coming down here, John, and I ran after you. Do not be angry with me, brother; it breaks my heart."
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