"Do you act too?" she asked with interest.
"I act Dathan, the Jewish trader," he said proudly. "I have been in the Play sixty years, for when I was a child three years old I sat in Eve's lap in the tableaux." The countess could not repress a smile and old Andreas' face also brightened.
The little girl, a daughter of the short, plump woman, peeped through the half open door, gazing with sparkling eyes at the lovely lady.
"Whose child is the little one?" asked the countess, noticing her soft curb and beaming eyes.
"She is my grand-daughter, the child of my daughter, Anna. Her father was a foreigner. He ran away, leaving his wife and two children in poverty. So I took them all three into my house again."
The countess looked at the old man's thin, worn figure, and then at the plump mother and child.
"Who supports them?"
"Oh, we help one another," replied Andreas evasively. "We all work together. My son, the drawing teacher, does a great deal for us, too. We could not manage without him." Then interrupting himself with a startled look, as if he might have been overheard, he added, "but I ought not to have said that--he would be very angry if he knew."
"You appear to be a little afraid of your son," said the countess.
"Yes, yes--he is strict, very strict and proud, but a good son."