Now we will go on." So it was done, and soon after they were playing again with great glee, and Erick was forgotten.
Not far from their playground stood a blind man with a barrel-organ playing his melodies.

When Erick had heard the first notes, he had freed himself and had run away.

Now he stood at a little distance from the organ grinder and listened with strained attention to all the melodies.
When the man left, the boy went quietly toward the cottage, and when Marianne saw him come, she said to herself: "I had hoped that the children would make him merry again, and now it seems to me that he is sadder than he was before." From that time on Kaetheli looked every evening, when the games began, to see whether Erick was standing near the hedge, and when she saw him there she ran to get him.

Erick now played every day with the children and when he was in the spirit of the game, he looked quite happy.

But almost every evening the same thing occurred as on the first.