Before going to bed, Eleanore wrote a letter to Herr Zittel informing him that she was leaving the Prudentia at once.
Lying in bed, she could not sleep. She saw herself on the ice cutting bold and novel figures. The spectators, grouped about her in a wide circle, admired her skill. She saw the sea with fishing smacks and coloured sails. She saw gardens full of roses.
Her father and Benno had come home long ago. She heard the bell up in the nearby church tower strike twelve—and then one—and then two.
She heard some one walking back and forth in the house; she heard some one opening and closing a door. Then the steps died away, and all was quiet. She got up, went to the door, and listened. A deep sigh reached her ear from the next room. She opened the door just a little, without making the slightest noise, and peeped out through the crack.
Gertrude was standing by the open window; she was in her night-gown and bare feet. The moon was shining on the square in front of the house; the glitter of the snow on the roofs made it seem quite cold. The spooky illumination made the girl’s face look spooky. Her loose flowing hair looked as black as ebony.
Eleanore ran into the room, and closed the window. “What on earth are you doing, Gertrude?” she exclaimed; “are you getting ready to take your life?”
Gertrude’s slender body shivered in the cold; her toes were all bent in as if she were having a convulsion. “Yes,” she said with marked moroseness, “that is what I would like to do.”
“That’s what you would like to do?” replied Eleanore, also trembling with cold. “And your father? Haven’t you the slightest consideration for him? Do you want to give him more worry than he already has? What is the matter with you, you crazy girl?”
“I am a sinner, Eleanore,” cried Gertrude, fell on her knees, and clasped Eleanore about the hips. “I am a sinner.”
“Yes? A sinner? What sin, pray, have you committed?” asked Eleanore, and bent down over her.