e paper-knife, and listening with half an
ear only to Dellwig, throwing in questions every now and then when she
thought she ought to say something. She did not look at him, preferring
much to look at the paper-knife, and he could examine her face at his
ease in the shadow of the lamp-shade, her dark eyelashes lowered, her
profile only turned to him, with its delicate line of brow and nose, and
the soft and gracious curves of the mouth and chin and throat. One hand
lay on the table in the circle of light, a slender, beautiful hand, full
of character and energy, and the other hung listlessly over the arm of
the chair. Anna was very tired, and showed it in every line of her
attitude; but Dellwig was not tired at all, was used to talking, enjoyed
at all times the sound of his voice, and on this occasion felt it to be
his duty to make things clear. So he went into the lengthiest details as
to the nature and office of Amtsvorstehers, details that were perfectly
incomprehensible and wholly indifferent to Anna, and spared neither
himself nor her. While he talked, however, he was criticising her,
comparing the laziness of her attitude with the brisk and respectful
alertness of other women when he talked. He knew that these other women
belonged to a different class; his wife, the parson's wife, the wives of
the inspectors on other estates, these were not, of course, in the same
sphere as the new mistress of Kleinwalde; but she was only a woman, and
dress up a woman as you will, call her by what name you will, she is
nothing but a woman, born to help and serve, never by any possibility
even equal to a clever man like himself. Old Joachim might have lounged
as he chose, and put his feet on the table if it had seemed good to him,
and Dellwig would have accepted it with unquestioning respect as an
eccentricity of _Herrschaften_; but a woman had no sort of right, he
said to himself, while he so fluently discoursed, to let herself go in
the presence of her natural superior. Unfortunately, old Joachim, so
level-headed an old gentleman in all other respects, had placed the
power over his fortunes in the hands of this weak female leaning back so
unbecomingly in her chair, playing with the objects on the table, never
raising her eyes to his, and showing indeed, incredible as it seemed,
every symptom of thinking of something else. The women of his
acquaintance were, he was certain, worth individually fifty such
affected, indifferent young la