"I don't believe that she has been up since, but we can go and ask."
She gave him an affectionate kiss. It was as an atonement after what had clashed and thrilled through them, without bitter words. She tried to recollect herself, to force herself, in the empty hunger of her soul. She loved Lot with all her heart; she would devote herself to him ... and perhaps later to his children.... That must be enough to fill a woman's life.... She would have her hobbies: she would take up her modelling again; after all, the Beggar Boy was very good.... That would certainly give completeness to her life, so long as she was happy with her husband; and that she was sure she was. She began to talk in a livelier strain than at first: something seemed to recover itself in her dejection. She would lead an ordinary life, as a happy wife, a happy mother, and cease longing for great, faraway things.... She would give up striving for horizons difficult of approach, horizons that proved to be limits, so that she had to go back after all.
She was gay at luncheon and Aunt Adèle brightened: the poor thing had been depressed lately and walked with a stoop, as though bending under a heavy load; she was sad also because she thought that Lot and Elly were not quite happy. Aunt Adèle now freshened up, glad because Elly was more cheerful and looked brighter and was once more talking with her restless volubility.
[CHAPTER XXVIII]
That afternoon, Lot and Elly went to Grandmamma's.
Since the evening when Mamma Ottilie had told her of Dr. Roelofsz' death, the old woman had not left her bed. Dr. Thielens called every day, declaring that she was really remarkably well: she was not suffering from any complaint whatever; she was perhaps suffering from old age; her brain was perfectly clear; and he was amazed at that splendid constitution, the constitution of a strong woman who had possessed a great deal of blood and a magnificent vitality.
When Anna opened the door in the Nassaulaan, just as Lot and Elly rang, they found her talking in the passage to Steyn.
"I've come to see how Mamma is," he was saying.
"Do come in, please!" said Anna. "There's a nice fire in the morning-room."