Soon he looked up again, and spoke in a cheerful voice: "I should know her, vrouw," he said, holding the sweet young face between his hands, and gazing at it as though he were watching it grow. "I should know her. The same blue eyes, and the lips, and, ah! me, the little song she could sing almost before she could stand. But that was long ago," he added, with a sigh, still looking at her dreamily, "long ago; it's all gone now." "Not so, indeed," cried Dame Brinker, eagerly. "Do you think I would let her forget it? Gretel, child, sing the old song thou hast known so long!" Raff Brinker's hands fell wearily and his eyes closed, but it was something to see the smile playing about his mouth, as Gretel's voice floated about him like an incense. It was a simple air; she had never known the words. With loving instinct she softened every note, until Raff almost fancied that his two-year-old baby was once more beside him. * * * * * As soon as the song was finished, Hans mounted a wooden stool and began to rummage in the cupboard. "Have a care, Hans," said Dame Brinker, who through all her poverty was ever a tidy housewife. "Have a care, the wine is there at your right, and the white bread beyond it." "Never fear, mother," answered Hans, reaching far back on an upper shelf, "I shall do no mischief." Jumping down, he walked toward his father, and placed an oblong block of pine-wood in his hands. One of its ends was rounded off, and some deep cuts had been made on the top. "Do you know what it is, father?" asked Hans. Raff Brinker's face brightened. "Indeed I do, boy; it is the boat I was making you yest--alack, not yesterday, but years ago." "I have kept it ever since, father; it can be finished when your hand grows strong again." "Yes, but not for you, my lad. I must wait for the grandchildren. Why, you are nearly a man. Have you helped your mother, boy, through all these years?" "Aye, and bravely," put in Dame Brinker. "Let me see," muttered the father, looking in a puzzled way at them all, "how long is it since the night when the waters were coming in? 'Tis the last I remember." "We have told thee true, Raff. It was ten years last Pinxter-week." "Ten years--and I fell then, you say. Has the fever been on me ever since?" Dame Brinker scarce knew how to reply. Should she tell him all? Tell him that he had been an idiot, almost a lunatic? The doctor had charged her on no account to worry or excite his patient. Hans and Gretel looked astonished when the answer came. "Like enough, Raff," she said, nodding her head, and raising her eyebrows, "when a heavy man like thee falls on his head, it's hard to say what will come--but thou'rt well _now_, Raff. Thank the good Lord!" The newly-awakened man bowed his head.