She judged by my looks that her story shocked me, and I sat a long time frowning as if lost in thought. "It seems absolutely inconceivable!" I exclaimed at length with a deep sigh. "Absolutely inconceivable that I could have treated you in this way; and only—how long ago was it?"
"You came straight to Hanover from Göttingen."
"What was I doing there?"
"I don't know? At least, you were always so close you would never tell me anything."
"You saw a great deal of me, of course?"
"Well, naturally. I wasn't going to marry a man I never saw, I suppose."
"No, no, of course not. Oh dear, to think of it all!" I put a few more questions which she could easily answer, and when she was growing more glibly at ease I asked: "And how old is the child?"
"Eh? I don't know. Oh yes, I do, of course. Pops was nine last birthday."
"Nine!" I exclaimed. I might well be astonished, for they had muddled this part of the thing hopelessly. The child I had seen in the Thiergarten wasn't a day more than six, probably younger even. "Where was she born?"
This rattled her. "What does it matter where she was born, so long as she was born somewhere," she said, flushing so vividly that it showed under her rouge. Clearly she did not know where "our child" was supposed to have been born. "What does matter is what you're going to do about it."