place she wanted to boast of the fact that she was going to get a husband, and, indeed, a first-rate one; and in the second place she was anxious to get Barefoot to manage her household affairs, about which she had until then scarcely bothered herself at all.  Now Barefoot would have been very glad to do this for a mistress who was kind to her, but not for Rose.  And besides, if she were to leave her present mistress, she did not intend to be a servant again anyway, but would work for herself, even if it were in a factory with her brother.

Barefoot was just going to bed, when her mistress called her and intrusted the secret to her, adding: 

“You have always had patience with Rose, and now while her suitor is here, have double patience, in order that there may be no disturbance in the house.”

“Yes, but I consider it wrong that she wants to milk the cows just this once; that’s deceiving the worthy man, for she can’t milk at all.”

“You and I cannot alter the world,” said the mistress.  “I think it’s hard enough for you to bear your own lot—­let others do what they will.”

Barefoot lay down, mournfully reflecting how people cheat one another without the least scruple.  She did not know who the suitor was who was going to be deceived, but she was inwardly sorry for the poor young man.  And she was doubly bewildered when she thought:  “Who knows, perhaps Rose will be just as much deceived in him as he in her?”

Quite early in the morning, when Barefoot was looking out of her window, she suddenly started back as if a bullet had struck her forehead.

“Heavens!  What is this?” She passed her hands over her eyes hastily, then opened them wide, and asked herself as if in a dream:  “Why, it’s the stranger of the wedding at Endringen!  He has come to the village!  He has come to fetch you!  No, he knows nothing of you!  But he shall know!—­but no, what are you saying!”

He comes nearer and nearer, but does not look up.  A fullblossomed carnation falls from Barefoot’s hand, but lands on the valise behind him; he does not see it, and it lies there in the road.  Barefoot hurries down and recovers the treacherous token.  And now the truth comes over her like the dawning of a terrible day.  This is the suitor for Rose—­this is he of whom she spoke last evening.  And is this man to be deceived?

In the barn, kneeling on the clover which she was going to feed the cows, Barefoot fervently prayed to Heaven to preserve the stranger from ever marrying Rose.  That he should ever be her own, was a thought she dared not entertain—­and yet she could not bear to banish it.

As soon as she had finished milking, she hurried across to Black Marianne; she wanted to ask her what she should do.  But Black Marianne was lying grievously ill; furthermore she had grown very deaf, and could hardly understand connected words.  Barefoot did not dare to shout the secret that she had half confided to her and that the old woman had half guessed, loudly enough for Marianne to understand it, for people in the street might hear her.  And so she came back, not knowing what to do.