"On your not being angry with her." "I angry with her?" "Well, well, you needn't make excuses!" Johannes does not reply. He will soon convince his brother of better things--and closing his eyes, he buries his head once more in the waving foliage. A gleam of light causes him to look up. Trude is standing on the threshold, holding a lamp and looking ashamed of herself. Her charming, childlike face is bathed in a red glow and the drooping lashes cast long, semi-circling shadows on her full cheeks. "What a ridiculous creature you are!" says Martin, stroking her ruffled hair tenderly. "Won't you go to rest, Johannes?" she asks with great seriousness, though there is still the sound of suppressed laughter in her voice. "Good-night, brother!" "Wait, I am coming too!" Johannes shakes hands with his sister-in-law, while she turns her face aside with a furtive smile. Martin takes the lamp from her and precedes his brother up the stairs. At the top he takes his hand and gazes silently and deeply into his eyes, like one who cannot yet contain his happiness; then he softly closes the door. Johannes sighs and stretches himself, pressing both hands to his breast. His heart is heavy for very joy. He feels as if he must go after his brother and relieve his feelings by a few loving, grateful words, but already he hears his steps downstairs in the entrance. It is too late. But his mind must be calmer before he can attempt to sleep. He puts out the lamp and pushes open a window. The night air cools his brow.--How soothing it is--how it wafts peace! He bends over the window-ledge, whistles a song to himself and looks out into the night. The apple-tree beneath him is in full bloom--a waving sea of blossoms. How often as a child he has climbed up there, how often, tired with play, he has leant, dreaming, against its trunk, while its rustling leaves told him fairy stories. And when in autumn a gust of wind swept through the branches, it brought down a shower of rosy-cheeked apples, which fell almost into his lap.--What ecstasy that was! How many things enter one's thoughts as one whistles! Each note awakens a new song, each melody conjures up new reminiscences. And with the old songs there returns the old longing and flies on butterfly's wings through a vast empire between the moon and the morning sun!-- And as he looks down upon the earth melting into darkness, he sees how a window is softly opened and an upturned face bends far out. From out of a pale, gleaming oval, framed in a background of shadowy hair, two dark eyes glanced up at him, slyly and mischievously. Abruptly he stops whistling; then a teasing laugh greets his ears, and his sister-in-law's merry voice cries: "Go on, Johannes!" And when he will not do her bidding, she points her own lips and attempts a few very imperfect notes. Then Martin's deep bass voice becomes audible in the house, saying in a tone of paternal reproof: "None of your nonsense, Trude! Let him sleep!"