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he had shown her his name. It was always quiet
there, as though other couples didn't know this path.
Then they walked up the slope to the ditch where
the cows were lying in the meadow. Wijntje would
ask him if he had been good, whether he had remem-
bered not to worry too much* And he would tell
her what he had been thinking about to the minutest
detail; how in the office he had been sitting think-
ing of a Fairtide long ago, when he had stolen money
from Stien's savings, how he had suffered over it,
and that now, in recalling it, he didn't even feel
regret. It was a sin, he said, which had been
charged against him once. But it seemed to
him that he was beginning to feel that there was
at least a chance of salvation, if one's will was good.
Wijntje, walking beside him, was silent, gazing at
the dark path in front of her, but he knew well that
it was she he had to thank that he was able to say
this. Sometimes they stood still under the dark
trees. They could hear the bells in the town faintly.
* My Uncle Frans,' he said, * has such faith in those
bells; he says they tell us that we can always hope
again.'—' Yes,' she said, c I think that too.'