"There is no absolution among Catholics for that."
"Isn't there? I thought ... I thought that a priest could forgive anything ... and cleanse the soul before you died. The priest at any rate could have consoled me, could have given me hope! Our religion is so cold. I have never been able to speak of it to a clergyman...."
"No, no, of course not!"
"I could have spoken of it to a priest. He would have made me do penance all my life long; and it would have relieved me. Now, that is always here, on my breast. And I am so old. I sit with it. I lie in bed with it. I cannot even walk about with it, roam about with it, forget myself in movement...."
"Ottilie, why are you talking about it so much to-day? Sometimes we do not mention it for months, for years at a time. Then the months and years pass quietly.... Why are you suddenly talking so very much about it to-day?"
"I began thinking, because Lot and Elly are getting married."
"They will be happy."
"But isn't it a crime, a crime against nature?"
"No, Ottilie, do reflect ..."
"They are ..."