Frau Lämke nodded.
"But my--my real m--" He could not say the word "mother." He held his hands before his face and his whole body quivered. He was suddenly seized with a longing, that great passionate longing, for a mother who had borne him. He did not say a word, but he uttered sighs that sounded like groans.
Frau Lämke was frightened to death; she wanted to clear herself but made it much worse. "Tut, tut, my dear boy, such a thing often happens in life--very decent of him that he doesn't disown you; there are heaps who do. And you would have far to go to find anybody like the lady who has adopted you as her own child. Splendid--simply splendid!" Frau Lämke had often been vexed with the fine lady, but now she felt she wanted to do her justice. "Such a mother ought to be set in gold--there isn't such another to be found." She exhausted herself in praise. "And who knows if it's true after all?" And with that she concluded.
Oh, it was all true. Wolfgang had grown quiet--at least his face no longer showed any special emotion when he let his hands fall. "I shall have to be going now," he said.
Frida stood there looking very distressed. She had known it all a long time--who did not know it?--but she was very sorry indeed that he knew it now. Her clear eyes grew dim, and she looked at her friend full of compassion. Oh, how much more beautiful her own confirmation last Easter had been. She had not had any gold watch, only quite a small brooch of imitation gold--it had cost one shilling and sixpence, for she had chosen it herself with her mother--but she had been so happy, so happy.
"What text did you get?" she asked quickly, so as to take his thoughts away from it.
"I don't know it by heart," he said evasively, and his cheeks that had grown pale flamed. "But it suited." And with that he went out of the door.
He went straight home--why should he waste any more time? the matter was urgent. He did not notice the starlings flying in and out of their boxes on the tall pines, did not notice that there was already a bright crescent in the evening sky that was growing darker and darker, and a golden star near it, he only noticed with satisfaction as he entered the hall at the villa that the coats and hats had disappeared from the pegs. That was good, the visitors had left. He rushed to the drawing-room, he almost fell into the room. His father and mother were still sitting there--no, his father and she, the--the----
"Come, tell us where you've been such along time," inquired his father, not without a touch of vexation in his voice.
"To-day, just on this day," said his mother. "They all sent you their love, they waited for you. But it's almost eight o'clock now."