it must be done, he looked so pale
and was so thin, his round face had positively become long. What had
struck her before struck her with double force now, and she got a great
fright. "Wolfgang," she said hastily, avoiding his glance almost with
fear--oh, how he would accuse her, how reproachful he would be, and
justifiably reproachful--"I must tell you at last--it's better--it
won't surprise you much either. Do you still remember that Sunday it
was the day of your confirmation--you--you asked us then----"

Oh, what along introduction it was. She called herself a coward; but
it was so difficult, so unspeakably difficult.

He did not interrupt her with a single sound, he asked no questions,
he did not sigh, he did not even move.

She did not venture to turn her eyes, which were fixed on one point
straight in front of her, to look at him. His silence was terrible,
more terrible than his passion. And she called out with the courage of
despair: "You are not our son, not our own son."

He still did not say anything; did not make a single sound, did not
move. Then she turned her eyes on him. And she saw how the lids fell
over his tired, already glassy eyes, how he tore them open again with
difficulty and how they closed once more, in short, how he fought with
sleep.

He could sleep whilst she told him this--this? A terrible feeling of
disillusion came over her, but still she seized hold of his
arm and shook him, whilst her own limbs trembled as though with fever:
"Don't you hear--don't you hear me? You are not our son--not our own
son."

"Yes, I know," he said in a weary voice. "Leave me, leave me." He
made a gesture as if to thrust her away.

"And it--" her complete want of comprehension made her stammer like
a child--"it does not affect you? It--it leaves you so cold?"

"Cold? Cold?" He shrugged his shoulders, and his tired, dull eyes
began to gleam a little. "Cold? Who says it leaves me cold--has left me
cold?" he amended hastily. "But you two have not asked about that. Now
_I_ won't hear anything more about it. I'm tired now. I want to sleep."
He turned his back on her, turned his face to the wall and did not move
any more.

There she stood--he was already asleep, or at least seemed to be so.
She waited anxiously a few minutes longer--would he, would he not have
to turn once more to her and say: "Tell me, I'm listening now." But he
did not turn.

Then she crept out of the room like a condemned criminal. Too l