Maria paused irresolutely a moment; but when the child snatched the gay cap and put it on her own curls, she thought she must check her and exclaimed warningly:  “Why, Bessie, that is no plaything for children.”

The soldier turned, stood still a moment in astonishment, raised his hand to his forehead, and then, with a few hurried bounds, sprang down the stairs and rushed up to the burgomaster’s wife.  Maria had started back in surprise; but he gave her no time to think, for stretching out both hands he exclaimed in an eager, joyous tone, with sparkling eyes:  “Maria!  Jungfrau Maria!  You here!  This is what I call a lucky day!” The young wife had instantly recognized the soldier and willingly laid her right hand in his, though not without a shade of embarrassment.

The officer’s clear, blue eyes sought hers, but she fixed her gaze on the floor, saying:  “I am no longer what I was, the young girl has become a housewife.”

“A housewife!” he exclaimed.  “How dignified that sounds!  And yet!  Yet!  You are still Jungfrau Maria!  You haven’t changed a hair.  That’s just the way you bent your head at the wedding in Delft, the way you raised your hands, lowered your eyes—­you blushed too, just as prettily.”

There was a rare melody in the voice which uttered these words with joyous, almost childlike freedom, which pleased Maria no less than the officer’s familiar manner annoyed her.  With a hasty movement she raised her head, looked steadily into the young man’s handsome face and said with dignity: 

“You see only the exterior, Junker von Dornburg; three years have made many changes within.”

“Junker von Dornburg,” he repeated, shaking his waving locks.  “I was Junker Georg in Delft.  Very different things have happened to us, dear lady, very different things.  You see I have grown a tolerable, though not huge moustache, am stouter, and the sun has bronzed my pink and white boyish face—­in short:  my outer man has changed for the worse, but within I am just the same as I was three years ago.”

Maria felt the blood again mounting into her cheeks, but she did not wish to blush and answered hastily:  “Standing still is retrograding, so you have lost three beautiful years, Herr von Dornburg.”

The officer looked at Maria in perplexity, and then said more gravely than before: 

“Your jest is more opportune, than you probably suppose; I had hoped to find you again in Delft, but powder was short in Alfen, so the Spaniard will probably reach your native city sooner than we.  Now a kind fate brings me to you here; but let me be honest—­What I hope and desire stands clearly before my eyes, echoes in my soul, and when I thought of our meeting, I dreamed you would lay both hands in mine and, instead of greeting me with witty words, ask the old companion of happy hours, your brother Leonhard’s best friend:  ‘Do you still remember our dead?’ And when I had told you:  ‘Yes, yes, yes, I have never forgotten him,’ then I thought the mild lustre of your eyes—­Oh, oh, how I thank you!  The dear orbs are floating in a mist of tears.  You are not so wholly changed as you supposed, Frau Maria, and if I loyally remember the past, will you blame me for it?”