CHAPTER XVI.
"To be Gretchen, you must count the leaves of your daisies," he said to her, as he painted,--painted her just as she was, with her two little white feet in the wooden shoes, and the thick green leaves behind; the simplest picture possible, the dress of gray--only cool dark gray--with white linen bodice, and no color anywhere except in the green of the foliage; but where he meant the wonder and the charm of it to lie was in the upraised, serious, child-like face, and the gaze of the grave, smiling eyes.
It was Gretchen, spinning, out in the open air among the flowers.
Gretchen, with the tall dog-daisies growing up about her feet, among the thyme and the roses, before she had had need to gather, one to ask her future of its parted leaves.
The Gretchen of Scheffer tells no tale; she is a fair-haired, hard-working, simple-minded peasant, with whom neither angels nor devils have anything to do, and whose eyes never can open to either hell or heaven.

But the Gretchen of Flamen said much more than this: looking at it, men would sigh from shame, and women weep from sorrow.
"Count the daisies ?" echoed Bebee.

"Oh, I know what you mean.

A little--much--passionately--until death--not at all.

What the girls say when they want to see if any one loves them?
Is that it ?" She looked at him without any consciousness, except as she loved the flowers.
"Do you think the daisies know ?" she went on, seriously, parting their petals with her fingers.