Then he opened the piano. It had landscapes painted on the
inside of the lid. It was very hoarse but the old man could play on it
and he sang a song too.
"I will go to the wars! I will go to the wars!" shouted the toy
soldier as loudly as he could, and he threw himself off the cabinet
right down on the floor.
Where was he? The old man looked, and the little boy looked, but the
soldier was away and he stayed away.
"I shall find him!" said the old man, but he never did. The floor was
too open. The toy soldier had fallen through a crack, and there he
lay.
The little boy went home, and that week passed, and several weeks too.
The windows were frosted; the little boy had to breathe on them to get
a peep over at the old house; and snow covered the carved heads over
the windows. The old house looked very cold, but now there was no one
at home in it. And when the spring came they pulled the house down.
After a while a fine house was built in its place with large windows
and smooth white walls. Before it, where part of the old house had
stood, a garden was laid out and there were grape vines running along
the walks. Birds built their nests in the vines and chattered away to
each other, but not about the old house, for they could not remember
it, so many years had passed.
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