Small Souls Part 63

"Van der Welcke!" Paul entreated.

"Yes," said Van Naghel. "She did."

"Don't you dare," cried Van der Welcke, "don't you dare to criticize my wife's actions in any way!"

"Your wife compromised us," Van Naghel repeated.

But Van der Welcke let himself go, unable to restrain himself any longer. He made a rush for Van Naghel, raised his hand:

"Take that!" he shouted, crimson with rage, utterly beside himself.

But Paul flung himself between them and seized Van der Welcke's arm.

Bertha burst into hysterics, uttered scream after scream. Constance almost fainted. The two men stood facing each other, no longer drawing-room people, blazing now with mutual hatred:

"I am at your disposal, whenever you please!" said Van der Welcke.

"Of course you are!" yelled Van Naghel, his eyes starting out of his head, his cheeks scarlet as though he had actually received the blow.

"Of course you are! You have nothing to lose. You can afford to behave like a quarrelsome puppy, hitting people, fighting, duelling...."

And, turning on his heel, quivering with rage and shame, he disappeared from their eyes through the door that opened on the landing....

The door of the drawing-room opened. Dorine, Adolphine and Cateau had heard the angry words, had heard Bertha's sobs and screams. They went to Bertha's a.s.sistance, while Paul urged Constance, who was half fainting, to go into the drawing-room. She staggered to her feet:

"My G.o.d!" she cried. "Henri! Henri! What have you done!"

Mrs. van Lowe came up, with Aunt Ruyvenaer:

"My child, my child!"

Constance was clinging to Paul like a madwoman and kept on repeating:

"My G.o.d! Henri! Henri! What have you done!"

Addie came up.

"Mamma!"

"Addie! Addie! My boy! My G.o.d! My G.o.d! What has Papa done!"

Mamma van Lowe dropped into a chair, sobbing.

But, at that moment, the two old aunts, sitting all alone in the second drawing-room, looked up. On those evenings, they used generally to doze, hardly recognizing the various relations, and to wait until the cakes and lemonade were handed round, going home after they had had them. But, this evening, sitting quietly in their chairs, looking quietly, with eyes askance, at the people talking and playing their cards and uttering their harsh judgments, they felt the usual peaceful calmness to be absent from Marie's family-Sunday. There was something the matter.

Something was happening, they did not know what. But it suddenly seemed as though Auntie Tine, when she saw her younger sister, Mrs. van Lowe, bursting into sobs, became very lucid, for, opening wide and clear her screwed-up eyes, she said to Auntie Rine, very loudly, with the sharp tone of a woman hard of hearing, to whom her own voice sounds soft and almost whispering:

"Rine, Rine, Marie's crying!"

"What? Is she crying, Tine?"

"Yes, she's crying."

"What is she crying for?"

"No doubt, Rine, because one of the children's dead."

"Dead?"

"Yes, Rine."

"Oh, how sad! Is she crying?"

"Yes, she's crying. She's crying, Rine, about Gertrude."

"About whom?"

"About Gertrude. About Ger-tru-ude!" Auntie Rine began to scream. "She's dead, Rine."

"Is she dead?"

"Yes, the poor little thing died at Buitenzorg."

"Oh, how sad! Is Marie still crying, Tine?"

"Yes, she's still crying, Rine."

"But then who's that one, Tine?"

"Who, Rine?"

"That one, the girl standing beside her? She's crying, she's crying too!"

"Beside her?"

"Yes, can't you see? She's crying too!"

"Yes, yes!" screamed Tine, quite lucid now. "I know her; Rine, I know her quite well, quite well."

"Then who is it? Is it Bertha?"

"No, Rine!" Auntie Tine screamed, gradually more and more shrilly, always thinking that she was whispering in her deaf sister's ear. "It's not Bertha. It's not Bertha. But I know her, I know her."

"Then who is she?" Auntie Rine screamed, in her turn.

"I'll tell you who she is. I'll tell you who she is. It's Constance!"

yelled Auntie Rine.

"Who?"

"Constance!"