But this autumn, as the weeks had gone by without bringing any answer to her affectionate letters, she had told herself that Minna, or if not Minna then Willi, would surely write for Christmas. And most bitterly disappointed had Anna felt when the Christmas week went by bringing no letter.
In vain Mrs. Otway told her that perhaps Willi and Minna felt, as so many Germans were said to do, such hatred of England that they did not care even to send a letter to someone living there. To Anna this seemed quite impossible. It was far more likely that the cruel English Post Office had kept back the letter because it came from Germany.
Now it was New Year’s Day, and after having heard her mistress go out, Anna, sore at heart, reminded herself that were she now in service in Germany she would have already received this morning a really handsome money gift, more a right than a perquisite, from her mistress. She did not remind herself that this yearly benefaction is always demanded back by a German employer of his servant, if that servant is discharged, owing to her own fault, within a year.
Yes, England was indeed an ill-organized country! How often had she longed in the last eighteen years to possess the privilege of a wish-ticket—that delightful Wunschzettel which enables so many happy people in the Fatherland to make it quite plain what it is they really want to have given them for a birthday or a Christmas present. Strange to say—but Anna did not stop to think of that now—this wonderful bit of organisation does not always work out quite well. Evil has been known to come from a wish-ticket, for a modest person is apt to ask too little, and then is bitterly disappointed at not getting more than he asks for, while the grasping ask too much, and are angered at getting less!
It would be doing Anna a great injustice to suppose that her sad thoughts were all of herself on this mournful New Year’s Day of 1915. Her sentimental heart was pierced with pain every time she looked into the face of her beloved nursling. Not that she often had an opportunity of looking into Rose’s face, for Mrs. Jervis Blake (never would Anna get used to that name!) only came home to sleep. She almost always stayed and had supper with the Robeys, then she would rush home for the night, and after an early breakfast—during which, to Anna’s thinking, she did not eat nearly enough—be off again to spend with her bridegroom whatever time she was not devoting to war work under Miss Forsyth.
Anna had been curious to know how soon Mr. Blake would be able to walk, but in answer to a very simple, affectionate question, the bride, who had just then been looking so happy—as radiant, indeed, as a German bride looks within a month of her marriage day—had burst into tears, and said hurriedly, “Oh, it won’t be very long now, dear Anna, but I’d rather not talk about it, if you don’t mind.”
Yet another thing added to Anna’s deep depression. It seemed to her that Alfred Head no longer enjoyed her company as he used to do. He had ordained that they must always speak English, even when alone; and to her mingled anger and surprise he had told her plainly that, in spite of his solemn assurance, he neither could nor would pay her the fifty shillings which was now owing to her in connection with that little secret matter arranged between herself and Willi three years ago.
About this question of the fifty shillings Mr. Head had behaved very strangely and rudely indeed. He had actually tried to persuade her that he knew nothing of it—that it was not he but someone else who had given her the five half-sovereigns on that evening of the 4th of August! Then when she, righteously indignant, had forced the reluctant memory upon him, he had explained that everything was now different, and that the passing of this money from him to her might involve them both in serious trouble.
Anna had never heard so flimsy an excuse. She felt sure that he was keeping her out of the money due to her because business was not quite so flourishing now as it had been.