"I confess that I have never had such an experience of backbiting as here, at the Hague; in Brussels, at any rate, no one ever doubted the legitimacy of my child. But here—and even in your house, Adolphine—people seem to think that he is not my husband's son."
"How can I help that?" Adolphine began to blubber.
"No, you can't help it; at least I'm prepared to believe you can't. But I did hope that, if any one in your house spoke unkindly of your sister, you would have stood up for her, against your children, who perhaps did not quite realize all the mischief which their words might cause.... Let me finish, Adolphine: I am quite calm and I want to tell you this calmly.... If Addie had dared to speak of you in my presence as your children must have spoken of me, I should have been very severe with him. I was under the illusion that I might expect as much from you. I thought that there was still a family-bond, a family-affection, a family-pride among all of us; I thought that there was a mutual sympathy among us great enough, even though there was an appearance of truth in people's slanders, for that sympathy and pride to excuse and protect and defend the one who was slandered. The things that can be said about me are no secret. They are a matter of general knowledge; and I carry the punishment for my sin about with me as a burden on my life. But I have nothing more to reproach myself with than what is known as a fact. Don't think that I am making light of it. I only say that that is all there is. I should have thought that you would have known this, that you would have believed this, even if I had never told you. Addie is Van der Welcke's son as surely as I am Papa's daughter. What people like to invent besides is no concern of mine. I can't even understand why they care to invent at all, when I have already given them so much that is true to discuss. But it was a great disappointment to me, Adolphine, to find that those lies could be countenanced for a moment in your house."
Adolphine, seeing that her pumped-up tears were making no impression, had time to recover herself while Constance was speaking. Inwardly furious, but superficially calm, she now said, spitefully, in a tone of sisterly reproof:
"You must have expected some disappointment on returning to the Hague?"
"Perhaps, but not this disappointment ... if you had had any affection for me."
"Come, Constance, it's not as if I wasn't fond of you. But it might have been better if you had not come back."
"It's a little late to speak of that now, Adolphine: I'm here and I mean to stay. When I wrote to Mamma six months ago...."
"Mamma is a mother."
"I thought that you were a sister."