"Hurt them! How?"
"I mean," she said incoherently, "that when you are angry with me,-- such as I, am not fit----"
"Nonsense!" he interrupted quickly, feeling that if she went on he would be angry with her again.
After supper she appeared in some trepidation at the door. Snowy linen shimmered in her hand. She remained standing till he had impatiently invited her to sit down.
"You want people to stand on ceremony with you, as if you were some fine lady," he said.
She laughed in confusion.
"I am only nervous, Herr, because I am not quite sure--how to behave." And she turned to her work.
No more passed between them that evening, and it was more than a week before they broke into conversation again.
He sat brooding over his yellow papers, and she let her needle fly through the crackling calico. When the clock struck eleven, she gathered up her sewing, and whispering "Good-night," slipped out on tiptoe without waiting for an answer.
"What are you working at so industriously?" he asked her one evening, after he had watched her intently for some minutes.