y her mother, to whose house she went regularly. Paul was abroad; and
Adeline was expecting her confinement. Mrs. van Lowe noticed nothing of
what was troubling Constance; and, when, on Sunday, the members of the
family all met again, the old woman was radiant in the illusion of their
great attachment to one another. The children always kept her in
ignorance of their disputes, kept her, out of love and respect, in her
dear illusion. Adolphine never spoke cattishly of Bertha, in Mamma's
presence; was amiable to Constance. The old lady knew nothing of the
quarrel between Addie and Jaap, nothing of the explanation which Van der
Welcke had demanded from the Van Saetzemas.

When her husband and Addie returned, Constance spoke casually of her
conversation with Adolphine. But, for the rest, she remained very silent
and solitary and only saw Mamma and, just once, Adeline, the quiet
little mother, expecting her eighth child. And once she went with her
mother to call on the old aunts in their little villa near Scheveningen;
and then it was:

"How are you, Dorine?"

"What do you say?"

"Marie asks how you are, Rine. She _is_ so deaf, Marie."

"Oh, I'm all right.... Who's that?"

And Aunt Dorine pointed to Constance, always failing to recognize her,
with the stubbornness of second childhood.

"That's Constance," said Mrs. Van Lowe.

"That's Gertrude!" Auntie Tine would say next. "Isn't it, Marie? That's
Gertrude!"

"No, Christine, Gertrude died as a child at Buitenzorg."

But Auntie Tine was yelling in Auntie Rine's ear:

"That's Marie's daughter!"

"Marie's daughter?"

"Yes, Gertrude, Gertru-u-ude!"

Constance smiled:

"Never mind, Mamma," she whispered.

And Mamma said good-bye:

"Well, good-bye, Dorine and Christine."

"What d'you say?"

"Good-bye, Dorine and Christine; we must go."

"They've got to go!" yelled Auntie Tine in Auntie Rine's ear.

"Oh, have they got to go? Where are they going?"

"Home!"

"Oh, home? Oh, don't they live here?... Well, good-bye, Marie; thanks
for your visit. Good-bye, Gertrude! You are Gertrude, aren't you?"

"Ye-e-es!" Auntie Tine assured her, in a shrill, long-drawn-out yell.
"She's Ger-trude, Marie's daugh-ter."

"Well, then, good-bye, Gertrude."

"Never mind, Mamma, let them think I'm Gertrude," said Constance,
softly, indulgently, while Mrs. van Lowe became a little irritable, not
understanding how very old people could cling so stubbornly to an
opinion and a