"Look here! I've got two fine babies."
A titter runs through the room.
_"Ja, Men'eer,"_ says one of the women, "congratulations!
They are _lievelingen_--darlings!"
"Silence!" growls the commandant amiably. "None of your impudence,
you women. Look here! These two children--I want somebody to adopt
them, or at least to take care of them. I will pay for them. Their
names are Hendrik and--"
A commotion at the lower end of the room. A thin, dark little
woman is standing up, waving her piece of sewing like a flag, her
big eyes flaming with excitement.
"Stop!" she cries, hurrying and stumbling forward through the
crowd of women and girls. "Oh, stop a minute! They are mine--I lost
them--mine, I tell you--lost--mine!"
She reaches the head of the table and flings her arms around the
boy, crying: "My Hendrik!"
The boy hesitates a second, startled by the sudden wildness of
her caress. Then he presses his hot little face in her neck.
_"Lieve moeder!"_ he murmurs. "Where was you? I looked."
But the thin, dark little woman has fainted dead away.
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