Philippina jerked the pan from the stove; the flames leaped up. “You can go to Hell, so far as I’m concerned,” she said in a furious rage. With the light from the fire flaring up through the open top of the stove and reflected in her face, she looked like a veritable witch.
Daniel gazed at her questioningly. “What is the matter with Agnes?” he asked after a while. “The child seems to try to avoid me.”
“You’ll find out what’s the matter with her,” said Philippina spitefully, and placed the pan on the stove again. “She don’t swallow people whole.”
Daniel left the kitchen.
“He is going over to see his bastard, the damned scoundrel,” murmured Philippina. She crouched down on the kitchen stool, and gazed into space.
The potato noodles burned up.
IX
Daniel entered his mother’s little house in Eschenbach late at night. As soon as he saw her, he knew that some misfortune had taken place.
Eva was gone. She had disappeared one evening four weeks ago. A troupe of rope dancers had given an exhibition in the city, and it was generally suspected that they had abducted the child. The people of Eschenbach were still convinced of their suspicion after the police had rounded up the dancers without finding a trace of the child.