She turned over the heavy, clumsy binding and said:
"Klaasje will explain...."
But the black pictures, the dark portraits held no story for her; and, pointing her finger at the picture or the portrait, she could not make one up, could not find her tongue:
"Turn over, turn over," she repeated.
She was longing for colours, yellow, blue and red; but the pictures contained black, all black stripes and black patches, and she thought them ugly.
"Turn over, turn over, turn over," she kept repeating, excitedly yearning for them to become yellow, blue and red.
The old woman, with her puckered smile, patiently turned over the pictures. For her too they held no story, because they were black and sombre; and she was already seeing colours for herself, the dead-white and deep-blue, the bright, lacquered green of houses, sky and trees in Java. Here, under the sombre oppression of the skies, here, in the sombre pictures, the old woman and the child found nothing to charm them.
Then Klaasje became very angry and dragged the heavy book from Granny's lap and beat it, heedless of the pain, and scolded:
"Ugly books ... ugly, black books!"
"Ssh!... Ssh!" said the old woman soothingly, laying her veined hand on the girl's fair head.