"What a pity!" she thought. "All that is beautiful passes like a dream."
She set to work at once to remove the powder from her face. With a handkerchief rolled into a ball she rubbed and scrubbed cheeks, forehead, and nose; and the harder she rubbed, the greater became her fear that she might not be able to wipe off all traces of her misdoing. Her heart beat loudly. She seemed to herself like a criminal on the verge of being discovered. At the sound of footsteps in the corridor, she let the handkerchief fall and retired to the most shadowy corner of the room behind the bed-curtains, where she pretended to be engrossed in the study of a picture.
"Mamma is asleep," said Meta, coming in, "and coffee is ready."
"Oh, is it?" replied Hertha, in confusion. She would have given worlds to be able to stay in that dark corner, but of course it was not possible.
On the way to the dining-room she gave her cheeks a few more vigorous rubs, and then gallantly faced the light. She fancied that the old mamselle, who greeted her with a smile as she brought in the coffee, was mocking at her secretly; and when Meta's glance rested on her for more than a second, she could hold out no longer, and burying her hotly blushing face on her shoulder, she confessed her crime.
Meta smiled and kissed her, saying, "Never mind. We all do that some time in our lives."
"You too?" asked Hertha, daring to breathe freely again.
Meta nodded, and as mamma's going off to sleep had put her in a more cheerful humour, she added the confession that on the second morning of her wedded life, she had hardly had the patience to wait for Hans to go out of the room before flouring her face, so eager had she been to operate with the new powder-puff.
"But one soon gets over that sort of thing," she went on, with a thoughtful, hard look in her eyes.
Now the ice was really broken, and when the apple fritters arrived, frizzling crisply in their juice, Hertha thought the atmosphere was favourable for her great question. Still she struggled twice with herself before she was sure that she could combine the right moment with the right words. For she felt that her friend's new smile did not mean joking.