"But, Minna, you cannot mean what you say!"
I was quite intoxicated by this sweet flattery. It was the first time in my life that my physical vanity had been tickled. Formerly, on the contrary, I had always had to hear about my "beak of a nose," and about being a little underhung—really not much, it seemed to me—and now! That this pretty girl should find something attractive in me, and just in these peculiarities—it was like a fairy tale. I felt myself in the seventh heaven, and God only knows how foolishly I should have behaved, had not the children come running to tell us that beautiful ripe raspberries were to be found—in this seventh heaven!
The wood became less dense, with low shrubs between big moss-covered stones. The road we had followed now narrowed down to a path, at the side of which we stopped beneath the shadow of a baby rock, while the little girls crawled about between the bushes. Minna took off her hat, lay down on her back, and looked up into the deep sky. Suddenly she burst out into brief laughter.
"What is it?"
She half got up, and, supporting herself on one arm, said—
"Do you remember, Harald, there are on the Zwinger some tiny children—fauns I think they are called—with goat-legs, quite plump, you know; they also have a small tail?"
"Well?"
"It struck me if such a little chap came jumping along how sweet it would be. I would take him on my lap and pet him."
"Yes, I should like to see that. How funny you are!"
"Am I?" she asked with a comical little stress on the "I."
