"Oh-oh-oh!" cried the doctor; but Anton was gone. "A hundred! A hundred! Oh-dear-no, oh-dear-no, tut-tut! No, I can do nothing, I can do nothing. I'm old myself, yes-yes, I'm old: eightee-eight years old, eightee-eight, Lietje!... Yes-yes, that counts, yes-yes.... No, I can do nothing more, what do you say? And it's a good thing that Mamma's got Dr. Thielens: he's young, ay-ay, he's young.... Here come the children! Well-well!" the doctor continued, by way of greeting. "Best congratulations, ay-ay, very nice! Art, eh, art for art's sake?... Is Granny better to-day? Then I'll just go upstairs, yes-yes, well-well!..."
"Where are you going now, children?" asked Mamma Ottilie.
"To Aunt Stefanie's," said Elly. "And perhaps to Uncle Harold's afterwards."
Anna let them out; and Ottilie, going upstairs behind Dr. Roelofsz, who hoisted himself up one step after the other, tried to understand what he was muttering, but understood nothing. He kept talking to himself:
"Yes-yes, that Anton, all-very-well, make her see a hundred! A hundred! Well, he'll see a hundred all right, ay-ay, yes-yes, though he has been such a beast!... Yes-yes, yes-yes, a beast: don't I know him? Tut-tut! A beast, that's what he's been!... Yes-yes, perhaps he's still at it!"
"What do you say, doctor?"
"Nothing, child, nothing.... Make her see a hundred! I, I, who am old myself; eightee-eight ... eightee-eight!..."
Puffing with the effort of climbing the stairs, he entered and greeted the two old people, his contemporaries, who nodded to him, each at a window:
"Well-well, yes-yes, how-do, Ottilie? How-do, Takma?... Well-well, yes-yes.... Well, I don't call it warm in here!..."
"Come," said Takma, "it's only September...."