"Oh, no, Connie! Karel and Cateau have been living at the Hague for years."

"And Gerrit is ... a captain?"

"Yes, in the hussars."

"I am quite out of everything.... And Ernst ... does nothing?..."

"Ernst has always been rather strange, you know; he really fights shy of people. He collects things, all sorts of things: china, books, old maps...."

"And Paul?"

"No, Paul does nothing."

"But how strange!"

"What?"

"That they have none of them done anything to distinguish themselves: none of Papa's sons...."