instantly his position became awkward, in surprise he looked down
himself; but in the same moment a small cry was heard, the projecting
branch swayed violently, the red end of the shawl disappeared in a
flash, the girl's face disappeared, and there was a rustling and
rustling further and further away behind the hazelbushes. Then he ran.
He did not know why, he did not think at all. The gay mood, which the
rainstorm had called forth, welled up in him again, and he ran after
the face of the little girl. It did not enter his head that it was a
person he pursued. To him it was only the face of a little girl. He
ran, it rustled to the right, it rustled to the left, it rustled in
front, it rustled behind, he rustled, she rustled, and all these
sounds and the running itself excited him, and he cried: "Where are
you? Say cuckoo!" Nobody answered. When he heard his own voice, he
felt just a little uneasy, but he continued running; then a thought
came to him, only a single one, and he murmured as he kept on running:
"What am I going to say to her? What am I going to say to her?" He was
approaching a big bush, there she had hid herself, he could just see a
corner of her skirt. "What am I going to say to her? What am I going
to say to her?" he kept on murmuring while he ran. He was quite near
the bush, then turned abruptly, ran on still murmuring the same, came
out upon the open road, ran a distance, stopped abruptly and burst out
laughing, walked smiling quietly a few paces, then burst out laughing
loudly again, and did not cease laughing all the way along the hedge.

It was on a beautiful autumn day; the fall of the foliage was going on
apace and the path which led to the lake was quite covered with the
citron-yellow leaves from the elms and maples; here and there were
spots of a darker foliage. It was very pleasant, very clean to walk on
this tigerskin-carpet, and to watch the leaves fall down like snow; the
birch looked even lighter and more graceful with its branches almost