She switched on the light. The cream coloured blind completed the circle of coquettish intimacy. She sat down at her dressing table. In the mirror she saw a face which still retained the seaside sunburn. It suited her well, made her hair still fairer and her teeth whiter. Laura was now a woman of thirty. There was something of the fair renaissance type in her plumpness, something at one and the same time crude and refined. Her quick smile was full of health and light impudence.
But just now Laura was not smiling. On the whole women are never so serious as when they are occupied with their personal appearance. During the siege of the Legations during the Boxers’ rising in China it is told that a lady stole yolks of eggs, whilst people died of starvation all round her, in order to preserve the colour of her hair. That is serious....
Laura always had a long tête-à-tête with her face before she paraded it in public.
She became very impatient as somebody hesitatingly fingered the door handle and little Georg at last stepped in.
Georg was very like his father. He had his long face and fair eyes. In this case the weaker had been the stronger. It looked like nature’s revenge. She had always the image of the wronged father before her.
Georg smiled the hesitating smile of the neglected child. There was a certain shyness about him as he crept up to the mother.
Laura’s face hardened as she turned from the mirror:
“Don’t touch me! You soil my clothes.”
Georg humbly drew back:
“Mummie darling, may I stay up a little longer?”