CORNELLI
replied. “Matthew took me out to the stable as soon as it was born. You can certainly go to see it as long as it is in our own stable. Just go there as much as you like! Nobody can forbid you that.”
“My teacher is coming,” Cornelli now exclaimed, “and I have to go.”
“Yes, child, but do keep up your spirits. There are lots of pleasant things still left for you to enjoy. Just wait till you taste the strawberry tarts I am going to make to-day.”
With these words Esther smacked her lips to express the great succulence of the promised dish.
“I wouldn’t even care if you baked nettle tarts; I wish I didn’t have to eat at table and could just eat berries in the garden and drink milk in the stable.”
Cornelli ran towards the house, for she had forgotten to walk sedately, as she had been told to do.
While Cornelli had her lessons upstairs in the living room, in the jessamine arbor both ladies were sitting on a garden bench.
“It would be so pleasant and agreeable
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