The luncheon was not less delicious: fresh, white bread, smoked beef, cake and cheese, and very fragrant coffee, whose aroma filled the entire house. Aunt Seréna talked about church-going, about the choosing of a profession, and about pure and honest living. Johannes, being in a kindly mood, and inclined to acquiescence, avoided argument.
In the afternoon, as he sat dreaming in the shady avenue of lindens, Aunt Seréna came bringing a tray, bearing a cooky and a glass of cherry-brandy.
At half-past five came dinner. Daatje was an excellent cook, and dishes which were continually recurring on stated days were particularly well prepared. Vermicelli soup, with forced-meat balls, minced veal and cabbage, middlings pudding with currant juice: that was the first meal, later often recalled. Aunt Seréna asked a blessing and returned thanks, and Johannes, with lowered eyes and head a little forward, appeared, from the movement of his lips, to be doing a little of the same thing.
Through the long twilight, Aunt Seréna and Johannes sat opposite each other, each one in front of a reflector. Aunt Seréna was thrifty, and, since the street lantern threw its light into the room, she was not in a hurry to burn her own oil. Only the unpretending little light for the making of the tea was glimmering behind the panes of milk-white glass—with landscapes not unlike those upon the night-light.
In complete composure, with folded hands, sat Aunt Seréna in the dusk, making occasional remarks, until Daatje came to inquire "if the mistress did not wish to make ready for the evening." Then Daatje wound up the patent lamp, causing it to give out a sound as if it were being strangled. A quarter of an hour later it was regulated, and, as soon as the cozy, round ring of light shone over the red table-cover, Aunt Seréna said, in the most contented way: "Now we have the dear little lamp again!"
At half-past ten there was a sandwich and a glass of milk for Johannes. Daatje stood ready with the candle, and, upstairs, the night-light, the chest of drawers with the wax fruit, the green bed-curtains, and the impressive bed-tassel were waiting for him. Johannes also descried something new—a big Bible—upon his night-table. There was no appearance yet of any attempt at a reconciliation on the part of the furniture. The cuckoo continued to address himself exclusively to the stilly darkness, in absolute disregard of Johannes; but the latter did not trouble himself so very much about it, and soon fell fast asleep.
The morning differed but little from the foregoing one. Some Bibles were lying ready upon the breakfast-table. Daatje came in, took her place majestically, folded her half-bare wrinkled arms—and Aunt Seréna read aloud. The day before, Aunt Seréna had made a departure from this, her custom, uncertain how Johannes would take it; but, having found the boy agreeable and polite, she intended now to resume the readings. She read a chapter of Isaiah, full of harsh denunciations which seemed to please Daatje immensely. The latter wore a serious look, her lips pressed close together, occasionally nodding her head in approval, while she sniffed resolutely. Johannes found it very disconcerting, and could not, with his best endeavors, keep his attention fixed. He was listening to the twittering of the starlings on the roof, and the cooing of a wood-dove in the beech tree.
In front of him he saw a steel engraving, representing a young woman, clad in a long garment, clinging with outstretched arms to a big stone cross that stuck up out of a restless waste of waters. Rays of light were streaming down from above, and the young person was looking trustfully up into them. The inscription below the engraving read, "The Rock of Ages," and Johannes was deep in speculation as to how the young lady had gotten there, and especially how she was to get away from there. It was not to be expected that she could long maintain herself in that uncomfortable position—surely not for ages. That refuge looked like a peculiarly precarious one; unless, indeed, something better might be done with those rays of light.
Upon the same wall hung a motto, drawn in colored letters, amid a superfluity of flowers and butterflies, saying: "The Lord is my Shepherd. I shall not want."