When they reached the house it was shut up: the curtains down, and the door locked. Ulrica had gone away for the day, to do washing at somebody's house; and Jan had taken his dinner to the mill. The children sat on the doorstep and ate their lunch, much disappointed. Then they tried to think of some way to let Ulrica know they had been there. "If we only had a card such as ladies used to leave for mamma when she was away," said Rob, "that would be nice." "I'll tell you," said Nelly: "we'll prick our names on two of the cottonwood leaves in the top of your hat: they'll do for cards." Rob always put a few green leaves in the top of his hat, to make his head cool. It keeps out the heat of the sun wonderfully. One variety of the cottonwood leaf is a smooth, shining leaf, about as large as a lilac leaf, and much like it in shape. This was the kind Rob had in his hat. Nelly picked out the two biggest ones, and then with a pin she slowly pricked "Nelly" on one and "Rob" on the other. "There!" she said, when they were done: "aren't those nice cards? Now I'll pin them on the door, close above the handle, so that Ulrica can't open the door without seeing them." "What fun!" said Rob. "I say, Nell, you're a capital hand to think of things." Nelly laughed. "Why, Rob," she said, "sometimes you find fault with me just because I do 'think of things,' as you call it." "Oh, those are different things," said Rob. "You know what I mean: bothers. Such things as these cards are fun." When Ulrica came home at night from her washing, she was very tired; and she put her hand on the handle of her door and turned it almost without looking, and did not at first see the green leaves. But, as the door swung in, she saw them. "Ah, den! vat is dat?" she exclaimed. "Dem boys at deir mischiefs again!" And she was about to tear the leaves down angrily, when she caught sight of the fine-pricked letters. She looked closer, and made out the word "Nelly;" then on the other one "Rob." "Ach! mine child! mine child!" she exclaimed. "She haf been here: she make that the green leaf say her name to me. Mine blessed child!" And Ulrica took the leaves and laid them away in a little yellow carved box, in the shape of a tub, which she had brought from Sweden. When Jan sat down at his supper, she took them out, and laid them by his plate, and told him where she found them. Jan was much pleased, and looked a long time curiously at the pricked letters. Then he laid the leaves back in the box, and said to Ulrica:-- "Why do you not make for the child a gown, such as the Swede child wears, of the blue and the red? Think you not it would please her?" "Not to wear," said Ulrica. "She would not like that every one should gaze." "Oh, no, not to wear for people to see," said Jan; "but to keep because it is strange and different from the dress of this country. The rich people that did come travelling to Sweden did all buy clothes like the Swede clothes, to take home to keep and to show."