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 finally. “Now you suddenly want to visit a strange family. You only know this boy and you do not hesitate about it and are not even shy about appearing in your present condition.”

“Dino knows me well and knows that I would come to see him alone. He will arrange everything for me so that I won’t have to see his mother or his sisters. He knows everything,” was Cornelli’s explanation.

“That has no sense at all,” the father said curtly, and gathering up his papers he went away.

Soon afterwards he entered Martha’s little house.

“Here I am again. I wonder what you will say to me?” he called to the surprised old woman. “Here is a letter with an invitation which came for Cornelli to-day. It is from a boy who stayed with you. Who is he? Who are his parents?”

This question made Martha fairly overflow with praises of the boy. She told Mr. Hellmut that she had never known a boy who was so polite and friendly to simple folks as this boy had been; he had been well brought up,