"In the winter ... skating ... I thought he was fond of me.... It's my own fault: it was silly of me, it was silly.... It wasn't anything.... He was just the same to me as to other girls; and I thought, I thought ... It's nothing, Mamma, it's my own fault, but I thought ... Mamma, I oughtn't to take it so much to heart ... but it makes me very unhappy.... He danced with me, once.... But he danced with Mathilde the whole time.... He was always with her.... People were talking about it.... It was just as if she was mad, as if she didn't think ... that she oughtn't to behave like that ... with Johan.... It struck Uncle Henri too: I could see it by his face. They were together the whole evening and ... you understand.... He paid her attentions ... shamelessly ... the way he does to married women.... With girls he's different.... I hated him for a moment. But then he came and asked me, for that one dance ... and then I thought ... I oughtn't to have thought it. It's my own fault. I'm very unhappy, Mamma.... Uncle Henri was very angry too ... with Mathilde ... because she wouldn't come back with us to Driebergen.... He gave way and let her stay, to avoid unpleasantness.... But it was ridiculous of her: the carriage is big enough and she would not have been so badly creased.... Oh, she looked lovely, she looked lovely!... She is quite lovely, dressed like that, at a ball.... Addie ought to have come with us.... She was really beautiful, but not—it's wrong of me to say it, I know—not like us."
"How do you mean, dear?"
"Not like Aunt Constance and Emilie and you.... She didn't ... she didn't look well-bred.... She looked beautiful, but she looked coarse.... If Addie had come, perhaps she would have restrained herself, not worn her dress so low. She was the only one in such a very low frock.... You see, there was something about her ... that repelled me even more than usual: I can't say what and it's very wrong of me, because after all she's Addie's wife and we must be fond of her; but really, she didn't look a lady; and I could see it in people's faces: they thought her very handsome ... but not ... not well-bred.... And ... after that ... when she did nothing but dance with Johan ... then ... oh, Mamma, then she looked at me ... and looked at me with a sneer ... as if she were looking down on me!... I knew that I was not at my best, that I looked pale and thin; my shoulders are not good; and Johan behaved so oddly to me, in such a queer, mocking way: oh, Mamma, he was almost cruel!... I do believe, oh, Mamma, I do believe, that I ... that I'm in love with him! But I oughtn't to tell you and I oughtn't to be like this ... I oughtn't to cry so; but I couldn't help it, I couldn't help it!... I did my best, Mamma, not to show it before Uncle Henri and before Guy, but, oh, Mamma, the whole dance ... the whole dance was a torture!"
Adeline mingled her sobs with Gerdy's:
"My darling, my poor, poor darling!"
"Mamma! Oh, Mamma!"
"What is it, my poor dear?"
"Listen, Mamma!"
"What?"
"Don't you hear? The sound ... upstairs!"