sday last. What an idea of yours, to go to Bertha's!"

"I intend to do more than that, Dorine. And I can't help it if I don't
share your awe for Bertha's days...."

"At which you may meet all sorts of people...."

"Dorine, one has so many unpleasant meetings in this world," said
Constance, haughtily. "You, you don't know the world."

"Thank goodness for that!"

"Then don't condemn me. You don't know why I am acting as I am."

"If you only kept to yourself...."

"I wanted to keep to myself."

"You give people occasion...."

"Yes, now: I give them occasion now...."

"Oh, children," said Auntie, "don't quarrel.... There's _soesah_[25]
enough, with that hor-r-rid article!"

Gerrit arrived:

"I thought I'd just look in, Mamma...."

"How's Adeline?"

"She's well. The doctor called this afternoon. She's very well indeed.
Oh, she doesn't upset herself for a small affair like that!"

The big, fair man laughed nervously, boisterously filling the whole room
with his loose-limbed strength. Then he went up to Constance:

"Connie," he whispered, "I'm so furious, so furious!"

"I haven't read it."

"Haven't you? Haven't you? Then don't!"

"But what do they say?"

"Nothing. Don't read it."

But she hardly listened to Gerrit, for she now saw Van der Welcke and
Paul standing in a corner, in the back-drawing-room. She moved in their
direction. She saw that Van der Welcke, with his back turned to the
other room, was reading something, screened by a curtain, while Paul was
warning him, anxiously:

"Come, give it me, quick ... Van der Welcke...."

Constance was behind them:

"Paul, tell me, that article...."

"The scoundrels, the scoundrels!" Van der Welcke was hissing.

"Henri, have you it? Give it to me."

"No, Constance!" Paul implored her. "Don't read it, don't read it."

"Give it to me, Henri!"

"I want to read it myself first!"

And he cursed as he read:

"The damned scoundrels! And it's not true; it didn't happen like
that...."

"But what is it they say?" Constance demanded, furiously.

Paul took her by the arm and led her into the little boudoir, where
their father's portrait hung:

"Be quiet, Constance. Please, please don't read it! What good will it do
you; all that dirty language, all that vulgarity? It's filthy, it's
filthy!"

"And is there nothing we can do?"

"No, no, for God's sake, no!" Paul begged, as though preferring to hush
up, everything. "Every one will have forgotten it