or, The Silver Skates 283

“Ts it you, Meitje?” he asked faintly. “I have been
asleep, hurt, I think. Where is little Hans? ”

“Here I am, father!” shouted Hans, half mad with joy.
But the doctor held him back.

“He knows us!” screamed Dame Brinker. “ Great God!
he knows us!_ Gretel, Gretel, come see your father!”

In vain Dr. Boekman commanded “silence!” and tried to
force them from the bedside. He could not keep them off.

Hans and his mother laughed and cried together as they
hung over the newly awakened man. Gretel made no sound,
but gazed at them all with glad, startled eyes. Her father
was speaking in a faint voice, —

‘Ts the baby asleep, Meitje?”’

“The baby!” echoed Dame Brinker. ‘ O Gretel, that is
you! And he calls Hans, ¢ little Hans.” Ten years asleep !
O mynheer! you have saved us all. He has known nothing
for ten years. Children, why don’t you thank the meester ? ”

The good woman was beside herself with joy. Dr. Boek-
man said nothing; but, as his eyes met hers, he pointed
upward. She understood. So did Hans and Gretel.

With one accord they knelt by the cot, side by side. Dame
’ Brinker felt for her husband’s hand even while she was pray-
ing. Dr. Boekman’s head was bowed. The assistant stood
by the hearth with his back toward them.

“Why do you pray?” murmured the father, looking feebly
from the bed as they rose. ‘Is it God’s day?”

It was not Sunday; but his vreww bowed her head: she
could not speak.

“Then we should have a chapter,’ said Raff Brinker,
speaking with difficulty. “I do not know how it is. I am
very, very weak. Mayhap the minister will read to us?”