Kaetheli was ready at once to carry out the plan, and the children ran
together toward the parsonage.

It was only a little while before, that Edi and Ritz had arrived home
panting for breath. In the garden on the bench under the large
apple-tree, Mother and Auntie were sitting mending and conversing over
the bringing-up of the children; for Auntie knew many a good advice,
quite new and not worn out. Now they heard hasty running, and Edi and
Ritz came rushing along.

"May we--in the Middle Lot--to the Middle Lot--people have arrived--a
wagon and a piano--a terribly rich woman and a--"

Both shouted in confusion, breathlessly and incomprehensibly.

"Now," the aunt cried into the noise, "if you behave like two canary
birds who suddenly have become crazy, no human being can understand a
word. One is to be silent and the other may talk, or still better both
be silent."

But Ritz and Edi could do neither. If Edi began to report, then Ritz had
to follow. It always had been so, and to be silent at this moment of
excitement, that could not be expected; therefore both began afresh and
would no doubt have continued thus for some time if Sally and Kaetheli
had not arrived on the scene. They made everything clear in a short
time.

But the mother did not like to have her children run to the Middle Lot
for the sake of staring at strange people who had arrived there, and to