Now all grew still. Father smoked a pipe and took a stroll in the
moonlight through the orchard, where he had always something to look
after or to do. Indoors the broom went steadily over the floor; whole
kettlefuls of water were poured out and swept away and rubbed dry. Then
the stove was lit; and, while mother blacked the shoes, father made the
coffee. They mumbled a bit together--about to-morrow's doings, about the
children, the work, the hard times and their troublesome landlord, the
farmer of the woodside--when there came a noise from the little bedroom
and the door creaked softly. Horieneke suddenly appeared in the middle of
the floor in her little nightgown; and, before father and mother had got
over their surprise, the child was on her knees, asking:

"Forgive me, father and mother, for all the wrong that I have done you in
my life; and I promise you now to be always good and obedient...."

Mother was furious at first; and then, at the sight of the kneeling
figure and the sound of the tearful little voice, her anger fell and she
felt like crying. Father hated all that sentimental rubbish:

"Come, you baggage, quick to bed!... Forgive you? What for?... Nonsense,
nonsense!"

The child kept on weeping:

"Father, please, it's my first communion to-morrow and we must first
receive forgiveness: Sister at school said so...."

"The sisters at school are mad! And they'll make you mad too! To bed with
you now, d'you hear?"