The clock in the steeple struck eleven as the two children ran once
more through the deserted street and began a search for food in their
empty house.
They found that the invaders had been as thorough within the house as
without. Not only had they carried away the grain which their mother
had worked so hard to thresh, but they had cleaned the cupboard as
well. The hungry children found nothing but a few crusts of bread, a
bit of cheese, and some milk in the cellar, but with these and two
eggs, which Jan knew where to look for in the straw in the barn, they
made an excellent breakfast. They gave Fidel the last of the milk, and
then, much refreshed, made ready to start upon a strange and lonely
journey the end of which they did not know. They tied their best
clothes in a bundle, which Jan hung upon a stick over his shoulder, and
were just about to leave the house, when Marie cried out, "Suppose
Mother should come back and find us gone!"
"We must leave word where we have gone, so she will know where to look
for us, of course," Jan answered capably.
"Yes, but how?" persisted Marie. "There's no one to leave word with!"
This was a hard puzzle, but Jan soon found a way out. "We must write a
note and pin it up where she would be sure to find it," he said.
"The very thing," said Marie.
They found a bit of charcoal and a piece of wrapping-paper, and Jan was
all ready to write when a new difficulty presented itself. "What shall
I say?" he said to Marie. "We don't know where we are going!"
"We don't know the way to any place but Malines," said Marie; "so we'll
have to go there, I suppose."
"How do you spell Malines?" asked Jan, charcoal in hand.
"Oh, you stupid boy!" cried Marie. "M-a-l-i-n-e-s, of course!"
Jan put the paper down on the kitchen floor and got down before it on
his hands and knees. He had not yet learned to write, but he managed to
print upon it in great staggering letters:--
"DEAR MOTHER