"Where do you get the money, Constance, to spend on those expensive things?"
"I get it from my lovers," said Constance.
"Wha-at?" cried Adolphine, in a terrified voice.
Constance gave a nervous laugh:
"I tell you, from all my lovers."
"Oh, don't say things like that, even in fun! I thought it was imitation lace."
"Yes, but you don't know much about lace, do you?" said Constance, very calmly. "Or about diamonds? And you have not the least notion how to dress yourself, have you? I sometimes think you look very dowdy, Adolphine. It may be Dutch and substantial, but I consider it dowdy. And, on the other hand, you oughtn't to buy such rubbishy, shabby-genteel things as you do. And you haven't much notion of arranging your house, either, have you? If you were capable of understanding my taste, I wouldn't mind helping you to alter your drawing-room. But you would have to begin by getting rid of those horrible antimacassars and those china monkeys and dogs. Do; I wish you would. And choose a quieter carpet.... Don't you find those dinners very trying, Adolphine? I should say that Bertha is more at home in that sort of thing, isn't she?... And so the Erkenbouts go to your dinners, do they? I should have thought that Bruis, of the Fonograaf, was more in your set. But I was forgetting: you haven't a set, really; you have a bit of everything, an omnium gatherum.... Curious, isn't it, that none of our friends of the old days—our little Court set, let me call it—ever come to you nowadays? What's the reason?... Of course, you have to make your house attractive, if you want to keep your acquaintances.... I suppose you don't care really about seeing people. It's such hard work for you.... You're more the good mother of your children, though I consider your girls, at least Floortje and Caroline, rather loud; and, as for your boys, you seem quite unable to teach them any sort of manners.... Well, if I can be of any use to you, if you want to alter that drawing-room of yours, you have only to say so and we will fix a day...."
Adolphine had listened gasping, unable to believe her ears. Had Constance gone mad? She stood up, shaking all over, while Constance, with apparent composure, continued to fold her laces:
"You're a deceitful creature!" she hissed, furious, so deeply wounded in every detail of her vanity that she could no longer control herself.
"Why?" asked Constance, calmly. "Perhaps I was, for months, with a view to winning your affection; and that was why I spent myself in praises admiring Floortje's trousseau. But now that I know that you love me so well, now that we have had a good, sisterly talk, now that we have given each other our advice and our opinion, I see no further need for being deceitful and I too prefer to express my sisterly feelings with the frankest sincerity."