kitchen, from the
kitchen back to the drawing-room; and when she took refuge in her
bedroom, he read to her through the door. However, it was no good, and
Frau Brohl stood firm. Then Marker tried a new method. He was
argumentative before, now he became tragic; he threatened to throw
himself out of the window, to become dangerously ill, to go away and
never be heard of again. He left half-finished letters on his
writing-table, in which he announced his death to his acquaintances,
laying the blame on his wife and mother-in-law; in short, poor Frau
Brohl, whose existence had become a veritable hell, with a heavy heart
put her hand once more into her pocket, and gave Marker what he wanted.

Everything now went on as smoothly and merrily as before. After a few
weeks Marker again lost everything, and seemed so upset that he stayed
away all day without coming home. At last he appeared again, and
hesitatingly, with a timid expression, begged for forgiveness. "Very
well," said Frau Brohl, "only I hope you will not begin all over
again." Her hopes were not realized. The spirit of speculation had too
strong a hold over Marker to be kept back. After he had remained quiet
for about a year, he actually had the effrontery to ask his
mother-in-law for more capital. But this time she was like a rock. "Not
a penny," said Frau Brohl, and kept her word. Marker wept, and she let
him weep; he talked of suicide, and she advised him to use a rope, as
he did not understand the use of firearms. He had run through half her
money, and the other half she meant to defend like a lioness. The
specter of poverty rose up before her, she reflected that rich people
would cast her out of their society, and look upon her as a weak woman
without any self-respect, conquered by Marker's tenacity.

There were no more storms after this, and peace reigned in the
tightly-crammed flat in the Lutzowstrasse, but it was peace which
concealed a great deal of grumbling and sulkiness. Marker very seldom
spoke, and his obstinate silence was made easy for him, for the women
at last hardly ever spoke to him. Every week he had a certain sum given
him for pocket-money; Frau Brohl paid his tailor's and bootmaker's
bills, and he was treated in fact as if he had done with this world.
His business was to take the little Malvine to school and fetch her
home again, and on the way he grumbled incessantly to the child about
her mother and grandmother. The former he called "she," and