se.
But Spiele had not yet abandoned hope of that family, nor could
Hoeflinger persuade her to his viewpoint. So the question was for a long
time undecided, while the relation of the couple assumed a critical
intensity, which they both felt as a sort of sweet bitterness, with the
sweet or the bitter element alternately prevailing. Sometimes Spiele
wept; then again she indulged in all sorts of tricks that she had
learned from her father and his apprentices. She lost money and found
it in Victor's pocket, which gave her an opportunity to appeal to his
conscience. She could read fortunes in the cards and make spirits rap
at her table. She promised Victor a good wife, and added cheerily: "One
like me." She also promised him four healthy and handsome children, and
at the prophesy lapsed at once into a melancholy mood.

Victor would have liked, with his glowing gaze, to hide her in a
burning bush, so that nobody else could approach her. One evening he
forgot himself in Hoeflinger's presence. Spiele had teased him about his
red necktie, which began to look black with wear; she asked whether he
would always stay a Garibaldi and offered to sew a new one for him, if
he would let her remove the old. He agreed; nobody noticed the glow and
the tension in his eyes. When she had unfastened the little red rag and
was running away with it laughing, he quickly grabbed her hand and
caught it between his crooked horse-teeth. Spiele cried out and tore
herself away. Victor laughed with embarrassment and excitement.
Hoeflinger looked up startled. The tailor's daughter seemed angry and
scolded Victor; but her scolding was music to his ears. When he finally
noticed the husband's cold and disapproving glare, he showed his teeth
again and remarked aggressively: "People ought to be able to take a
joke!" Then he struck the table with his fist and went out quickly.

After that incident Hoeflinger walked up and down in silence and
listened to Spiele, who set about removing a double veil from his eyes.
She told him what a distant and strange husband he was, his head filled
with the business of other people and his heart never heeding the need
and the loneliness of his wife. Absorbed by other interests, he seemed
to leave it to her whether she should continue to hope for the
fulfillment of her longing, or like him, however young in years,
passively give up all hope. She told him what wrong he was directly
committing against himself and her, by renounc