The thin crackled shade was down at the front window, but the light shone behind it. Gusta pushed open the front door and rushed in. She took in the front room at a glance, seeking the evidence of change; but all was unchanged, familiar--the strips of rag carpet on the floor, the cheap oak furniture upholstered in green and red plush, the rough, coarse-grained surface of the wood varnished highly; the photograph of herself in the white dress and veil she had worn to her first communion, the picture of Archie sent from the Presidio, the colored prints of Bismarck and the battle of Sedan--all were there. The room was just as it had always been, clean, orderly, unused--save that some trinkets Archie had brought from Manila were on the center-table beside the lamp, which, with its round globe painted with brown flowers, gave the room its light.
Gusta had taken all this in with a little shock of surprise, and in the same instant the children, Katie and little Jakie, sprang forth to meet her. They stood now, clutching at her skirts; they held up their little red, chapped faces, all dirty and streaked with tears; their lips quivered, and they began to whimper. But Gusta, with her wild eyes staring above their little flaxen heads, pressed on in, and the children, hanging on to her and impeding her progress, began to cry peevishly.
Gusta saw her mother sitting in the kitchen. Two women of the neighborhood sat near her, dull, silent, stupid, their chins on their huge breasts, as if in melancholia. Though the room was stiflingly warm with the heat from the kitchen stove, the women kept their shawls over their heads, like peasants. Mrs. Koerner sat in a rocking-chair in the middle of her clean white kitchen floor. As she lifted her dry eyes and saw Gusta, her brows contracted under her thin, carefully-parted hair, and she lifted her brawny arms, bare to the elbows, and rocked backward, her feet swinging heavily off the floor.
"Where's father?" Gusta demanded, starting toward her mother.
Mrs. Koerner's lips opened and she drew a long breath, then exhaled it in a heavy sigh.
"Where is he?" Gusta demanded again. She spoke so fiercely that the children suddenly became silent, their pale blue eyes wide. One of the neighbors looked up, unwrapped her bare arms from her gingham apron and began to poke the kitchen fire. Mrs. Koerner suddenly bent forward, her elbows on her knees, her chin in her hands, and began to cry, and to mumble in German. At this, the two neighbor women began to speak to each other in German. It always irritated Gusta to have her mother speak in German. She had learned the language in her infancy, but she grew ashamed of it when she was sent to the public schools, and never spoke it when she could help it. And now in her resentment of the whole tragic situation, she flew into a rage. Her mother threw her apron over her face, and rocked back and forth.
"Aw, quit, ma!" cried Gusta; "quit, now, can't you?"
Mrs. Koerner took her apron from her face and looked at Gusta. Her expression was one of mute appealing pain. Gusta, softened, put her hand on her mother's head.
"Tell me, ma," she said softly, "where is he?"
Mrs. Koerner rocked again, back and forth, flinging up her arms and shaking her head from side to side. A fear seized Gusta.