"Very well," she answered, somewhat flustered, and at once went off to the kitchen again to make fresh arrangements.
"Richard," said Garlan to his son; "you might make haste and run over and tell the manager to have a table reserved for us in the garden."
Richard hurried off, colliding in the doorway with his mother, who was just coming into the room. She sank down on the sofa as though exhausted.
"You can't believe," she said to Doctor Friedrich's wife; "how difficult it is to make Brigitta understand the simplest thing."
Frau Martin had gone and sat down beside her husband, at the same time throwing a glance towards Bertha, who was still standing silently with Elly beside the piano. Frau Martin stroked her husband's hair, laid her hand on his knee and seemed to feel that she was under the necessity of showing the company how happy she was.
"I'll tell you what. Aunt," said Elly suddenly to Bertha; "let's go into the garden for a while. The fresh air will drive your headache away."
They went down the steps into the courtyard, in the centre of which a small lawn had been laid out. At the back, it was shut off by a wall, against which stood a few shrubs and a couple of young trees, which still had to be propped up by stakes. Away over the wall only the blue sky was to be seen; in boisterous weather the rush of the river which flowed close by could be heard. Two wicker garden chairs stood with their backs against the wall, and in front of them was a small table. Bertha and Elly sat down, Elly still keeping her arm linked in her aunt's.
"Tell you what, Elly?"
"See, I am quite a big girl now; do tell me about him."
Bertha was somewhat alarmed, for it struck her at once that her niece's question did not refer to her dead husband, but to some one else. And suddenly she saw before her mind's eye the picture of Emil Lindbach, just as she had seen it in the illustrated paper; but immediately both the vision and her slight alarm vanished, and she felt a kind of emotion at the shy question of the young girl who believed that she still grieved for her dead husband, and that it would comfort her to have an opportunity for talking about him.