“To you, too?”
She sighed. “My poor mother,” she said.
“What is it?”
“You see, for five years I have been sick-nurse; there are many sad hours, and when the night-light burns, and one’s eyes hurt with watching so much, and outside the storm rattles the shutters, many thoughts come to one about life and death, about love and loneliness—well, in short, one makes a book of poetry in one’s own head and does not read other people’s any more. But come away from this noise; I should like to ask you so much, and here one can hardly hear one’s own voice.”
“Directly,” he said; “I only wanted—”
His eyes wandered searchingly over the dancing-ground, then he heard a man’s voice behind him, saying:
“Just look at those two little minxes, mad after men.”
Instinctively he turned round, and saw the brothers Erdmann, whom he had not met for years. They had meanwhile been at an agricultural college and become grand gentlemen.
“We’ll have fun with them,” said the other.
Thereupon they laughingly mixed among the dancers.