To think--all the time I was sitting here last night, fretting and angry at him, he was loving me and praising me! Dear, dear, if we could only know! Then we shouldn't ever go wrong; but we are only poor, dumb beasts groping around and making mistakes.

I shan't ever think of last night without a pang." She was like all the rest; it seemed as if nobody could open a mouth, in these wretched days, without saying something that made us shiver.

They were "groping around," and did not know what true, sorrowfully true things they were saying by accident.
Seppi asked if Nikolaus might go out with us.
"I am sorry," she answered, "but he can't.

To punish him further, his father doesn't allow him to go out of the house to-day." We had a great hope! I saw it in Seppi's eyes.

We thought, "If he cannot leave the house, he cannot be drowned." Seppi asked, to make sure: "Must he stay in all day, or only the morning ?" "All day.