much as to say: "Hm! I'll have to
think over it. He's been up to something."

"I met the Holsma family in Kalver Street," Walter said. He told
the truth; he had met the family in Kalver Street. But why didn't he
tell anything about the extraordinary circumstances under which he
met them? Ah--there's the rub!

"Your back is so sticky!" complained Pietro, whose care it was to
look after the washing.

The family rubbed, and felt, and smelt; and then they declared
unanimously that Walter's back had been guilty of absorbing all kinds
of sticky gases and liquids.

"Really, it smells like lemon," said Trudie.

"And like wine!"

"And it's just coated with sugar. Boy, where have you been? Don't
you have any sense of shame? To go to visit such swell people with
lemon and sugar on your back! It's a disgrace, a disgrace."

"There was such a crowd on the street."

"That don't explain the wine on your back--nor the lemon--nor the
sugar. What say you, Trudie?"

There was complete unanimity. Timid, as usual, Walter didn't have the
courage to tell everything. Nor would this have done any good. The
understanding of the Pieterse family was like a rusty lock that no key
will open. Walter knew this, and remembering former sad experiences,
allowed the storm to rage above his head. Unfortunately he, too,
in a sense, was rusty. His nobility of character had suffered; he
had been guilty of cowardice.

He felt it. No minister could pray it away. Not even God himself
could revoke it. Everyone must act according to his conviction,
Mevrouw Holsma had said. He had not done this.

A dog would have kissed the hem of Femke's garment, meeting her after
such a long separation. For it was she. Certainly it was Femke--or----

Oh, he was hunting for or's!

Could it have been somebody else? It must have been somebody else. How
could Femke be at Dr. Holsma's?

No, no, it was she! Didn't she say that she knew me? Didn't she speak
with the same voice that I heard when she called me a dear boy and
gave me the kiss at the bridge?

She didn't know then what a coward I am! She wouldn't deny me and
betray me. She would say to everybody: That is Walter, my little
friend that I kissed that time, because he was so brave in fighting
off those boys!

And I? Oh, help me God!

No, God has nothing to do with it. I am a coward. I can't live
this way.

He thought of suicide; and in this mood he spent that Thursday
night. He arose Friday morning with