That evening Gerdy said to Constance:

"Auntie, Mathilde carried on like a lunatic to-day."

But Constance refused to listen. She well knew that there was no love lost between Mathilde and the rest of them; and it always upset her that, on the one hand, Mathilde always remained a stranger and that, on the other, one of the children always had some remark to make about Mathilde. She, on the contrary was always glossing over Mathilde's shortcomings and nearly always took her side.

"Honestly, Auntie, Mathilde carried on like a lunatic this afternoon...."

Gerdy was in a great state of excitement and she determined to tell her story. It was after dinner, tea had not yet been served and Mathilde was upstairs, putting the children to bed. The others in the room were Adeline, Emilie and Guy; Granny was sitting in her corner. And Constance refused to listen:

"You mustn't always be so intolerant ... about Mathilde," said Constance, by way of reprimand.

"Intolerant? Intolerant?" echoed Gerdy, excitedly. "But you didn't see her, the insane way she behaved.... We were on the ice ... and...." She lowered her voice to a whisper, though Granny was not likely to understand. "We were on the ice ... and there were others: the Erzeeles from Utrecht and Johan Erzeele from the Hague, you know, the one who's in the grenadiers.... Yes, I know, Mathilde and he are old acquaintances, she used often to dance with him ... but that's no reason for carrying on with him as she did."

"I say, it wasn't as bad as all that," said Guy, in a tone of palliation.

"Not as bad as all that, not as bad as all that?" repeated Gerdy, very angrily, because Guy, Constance and everybody were making excuses for Mathilde. "Not as bad as all that? Well, if I was married, or even unmarried, I should be ashamed to carry on like that with any man, though I'd met him at a hundred dances!"

"Do let Mathilde enjoy herself," said Constance. "Really, she has so little...."

"So little what?" said Gerdy, almost impertinently. "She has everything, she has everything she could wish for! She has a darling of a husband, she has the sweetest of children ... she has everything...."

"But she sometimes feels ... a little neglected and strange ... among all of us," said Constance, still taking Mathilde's part. "So, if she's a little irresponsible once in a way, I don't grudge it her for a moment."

"But it was more than being irresponsible, it was much worse: she was simply carrying on!"

"For shame, Gerdy! You mustn't be so spiteful."

Gerdy shrugged her shoulders angrily. She simply doted on Aunt Constance; nothing on earth would induce her to quarrel with Aunt Constance: Aunt Constance, who was so kind to all of them; and so she preferred to say nothing. But her dear, eager little soul was up in arms; she was very angry indeed; she pitied Addie. She was so angry, she felt such pity for Addie that really she did not quite understand her own feelings. After all, this was not the first time that Mathilde had annoyed her; she had never liked Mathilde; it was enough to make her spill the tea or the milk if Mathilde entered the room unexpectedly; and so she really could not quite understand why she was so very angry and thinking so much of Addie, simply because Mathilde had carried on so with Johan Erzeele, why it should irritate her so that Constance—on principle, she could understand that much—was taking Mathilde's part, why it should irritate her that Mamma and Emilie were sitting so sad and silent, that Granny was sitting so feeble and silently trembling in her far corner, why it should irritate her that AdÈletje and Guy should keep on playing backgammon:

"Three and four...."

"Two and five.... Imperial.... Once more...."

She was very much overwrought; and, when Mathilde came in for tea—the children were now asleep—Gerdy's little face quivered; she could hardly contain herself; but she made the effort, because Constance was looking at her in such surprise. And, to keep herself in countenance, she went in search of Uncle Henri, found Van der Welcke in the passage, on the point of coming in, and asked him:

"Uncle, are you coming to play a rubber?"

"If you like, dear. Who's going to make up?"

"Marietje, I dare say, and Alex."

"Is the other Marietje, Mary, downstairs?"

"No, Uncle, she's up in her room."

"This house of ours is a regular hospital, eh?"

"Oh, it's not as bad as that, Uncle!... I think it's a very nice house."

"You do, do you?"

Gerdy, usually so cheerful, suddenly became very nervous, cross and angry, very limp; and she didn't understand herself, couldn't understand herself....

"Well, come and have a rubber."

"Yes, yes, I'm coming.... Don't hustle your uncle: he's getting old."

But Gerdy laughed, shrilly, though she had to keep back her tears:

"You'll never be old."

"You think that?"

"No, never."

"Ah! Then I shall remain a scapegrace to my dying day?"

"No, a dear, kind uncle.... But come and have a rubber now."

She dragged him into the room. Constance grumbled mildly:

"Gerdy, you're just like a naughty child. Every time you run out of the room, you leave the door open."

And Gerdy, from being limp, became filled with poignant self-pity. Aunt Constance had ceased to care for her, cared more for her daughter-in-law, Mathilde.... Everybody, everybody cared more for Mathilde.... Addie, Johan Erzeele: they all cared more for Mathilde.... She, Gerdy, was misjudged by everybody ... everybody except Uncle Henri, who was nice and kind....

She made a great effort, mastered herself, mastered her volatile emotions. Alex had come over that Saturday from Amsterdam, where he was now boarding with a tutor at the Merchants' School; and he and Marietje soon got the bridge-table ready. And it became quite a serious rubber, in the still, pale-yellow atmosphere of the big living-room, where the lamps shone sleepily through their yellow-silk shades, just bright enough to light the books or crochet-work in the hands of the silent women, Constance, Adeline, Emilie.... At about nine o'clock there was a certain movement in those intimate, silent, almost melancholy indoor lines and colours, when Adeline took Klaasje to bed and Constance and AdÈletje helped Grandmamma upstairs: the child and the old woman at the same hour, the one never outgrowing her first childhood, the other relapsing into her second, after so well knowing the many sad things that were to come, that had come, that had already faded away, even as all life, that comes and goes, fades away in the faded pallor of the past.... And, when Constance and Adeline returned downstairs together, they seemed to hear the wind getting up around the house; and Adeline said, on the stairs:

"Listen, the wind's getting up."

"There's a change in the weather," said Constance.

"That means thaw; it's a westerly wind and we shall have rain."

On entering the room, they found Ernst there. He often came round in the evenings. He watched Gerdy's cards and sat very still, never spoke much, feeling that they never understood what he said and that it was better to talk to them as little as possible, even though there was some good about them, even though they were not utterly depraved, even though they meant the suffering souls no harm, although once in a way, all of them, they would trample on them unconsciously, because they did not see and understand and because they were so stupid and so innately rough.... Nevertheless, rough and stupid as they were, they were his relations and he came and looked them up, feeling at home in the house of his sister Constance and her husband, in the house also of Addie, who was the cleverest of them all and who, he felt certain, did hear and see the souls, for he often spared them.... He now stared at the cards and thought of the rubbers at Mamma's in the Alexanderstraat, when he used to go there on Sundays in the old days.... Strange, that everything changed, that nothing remained, he thought.... It was no longer the Hague now: it was Driebergen; it was Van der Welcke's house and Gerrit's children: Gerrit, how rough, how very rough he used to be, but even so not exactly wicked and depraved! And the cards as they were played one after the other fell from the fingers of Van der Welcke, Gerdy, Alex and Marietje. The same game; only life changed; the game did not change nor did the souls, the poor souls, ever and ever suffering around him, linking themselves to his soul with dragging chains.... He sat in silence and followed the play of the hand, understood it, nodded his approval of Van der Welcke's careful game....

Mathilde had come in; so had Addie, for a moment, before going upstairs to work; and they met as husband and wife who, after dinner, in a bustling house, seek each other out for a moment to exchange a word or two. Mathilde's eyes were red, Addie looked serious; and they all noticed it; it struck them, it saddened them, while they heard the wind flapping like a sagging sail and the panes lightly creaking and the windows lightly rattling in their frames.... Constance wondered what had happened and thought that it must be Mathilde, always urging him to move to the Hague; and Addie would be quite willing, for his wife's sake, but then the money-question would crop up and remain insoluble, because Mathilde would not be economical.... And that indeed was how it was; and they had lost each other, Addie and Mathilde; and they would find each other again in a rebirth of desire, when Addie reflected:

"What a beautiful, healthy woman she is! And we have to be healthy in our bodies and normal in our longings if we would be healthy of soul, in the life of our bodies and our physical being."

On the evening after the excursion on the ice, they found each other again. The wind had lashed their blood to a warm glow, the exercise had sent it coursing through their veins. Love was reborn of their embrace until drowsiness overtook them. And Mathilde thought that she had found him again and Addie thought that he had found her again, because their kisses had sealed one to the other, because their arms had clasped one to the other, but they lost each other again at once, as ever and always, because Mathilde just did not know him in his two-sided soul and he never knew things for himself, whatever he might know for others, in the clarity of his knowledge; in any of the manifestations of the instinctive knowledge which he knew silently and blissfully in his soul's soul: the hidden spark, from which treasure shone.

Mathilde sat down quietly in a corner, sitting a little way from the others, to catch the light of a lamp on her book; and Addie remained for only a moment, saying that he had work to do. And, as he went out of the door, there was a sudden draught, so that the lamps flickered and smoked and nearly went out.

"There's something open," said Constance. "Where can that wind come from?"

"I'll look," said Addie, closing the door.

"You see," said Gerdy, pursing up her mouth and turning to Aunt Constance, "you see it's not always my fault when there's a draught."

Silence fell; there was not a sound but the hard tap of the dice on the backgammon-board and the rustle of the cards as they were played, while Constance, Adeline, Emilie and Mathilde read or worked, and the evening hours in the soft light of the sitting-room dozed away as with soft-trailing minutes and quarters, dull reflexions in the mirrors, faint lamplight on the furniture and the rhythmical ticking of the clock in the almost entire silence, broken only now and again by an occasional word, at the card-table, or when Guy said:

"It's blowing ... and thawing.... There'll be no skating to-morrow...."

A piercing scream rang through the house; and the scream so suddenly and unexpectedly penetrated the silence of the stairs and passages of the great house, outside the room in which they were sitting, that all of them started, suddenly:

"What's that?... What's that?..."

They all sprang up; the cards, thanks to Gerdy's fright, fell on the floor, and lay flat with their gaudy pictures. When Van der Welcke opened the door, there was no longer any draught; the maids were running into the hall, anxiously, through the open door of the kitchen. Everybody asked questions at once. They heard Addie come down a staircase; and the hurried creaking of his firm step on the stairs reassured the women. They called out to him, he to them; and, amid their confusion, they at last heard his voice, clearly:

"Help me!... Here!..."

"Where?..."

"On the stairs."

They ran up the stairs.

"On the back-staircase!" they heard him call.

And Constance saw that the partition door was standing ajar at the end of the long passage. She gave a cold shiver and she heard Mathilde suddenly say:

"Oh, nothing ... nothing will induce me to go up that staircase!"

But she forced herself and went; and the others followed her.

They found Addie on the small, narrow back-staircase; and he was carrying Marietje, Mary, in his arms. She hung against him unconscious, like a white bundle of clothes, with her nerveless arms hanging slack and limp.

"What happened?"

"I heard her call out.... The staircase-door above was open.... I expect she meant to go downstairs ... to fetch something ... and was taken ill on the stairs.... Help me, can't you?" he said, almost impatiently.

The women helped him carry Marietje upstairs. They all went up now, to their rooms; the maids, still pale and trembling, put out the lamps in the sitting-room; and silence and darkness fell over the house, as they went creaking up the stairs, with candles in their hands.

The wind outside increased in violence; and the dripping thaw pattered against the panes.

The three sisters were together in their bedrooms: Marietje and Gerdy in their room, AdÈletje in her own room, with the door open between them. And they spoke very low, in whispering voices:

"I'm getting used to it," said Marietje, sensibly; "I'm no longer frightened."

"I heard it quite lately," said Gerdy.

And AdÈletje answered:

"Yes, I hear it nearly every evening."

"Uncle and Aunt don't speak about it."

"No, it's better not to."

"It's always the same sound: like the dragging of heavy footsteps, in the garret, under the roof...."

"And then it goes downstairs."

"Yes ... then it goes downstairs."

"Uncle had the garret examined."

"Addie has been up there, with Guy."

"They found nothing."

"It can't be a rat."

"It's quite unaccountable."

"I'm getting so used to it," said Marietje.

"It sometimes comes down the little staircase."

"Aunt Constance is afraid of the little staircase."

"She doesn't like the house at all."

"But Uncle does and Addie does."

"Mathilde was so frightened!"

"Uncle and Addie wouldn't like to leave the house."

"And it's a nice house," said Gerdy. "I ... I'm frightened myself lately ... and yet I'm fond of the house."

"I love the house too," said AdÈletje. "It's so brown, so dark ... like something safe and something very dear ... around us all. I should be very sorry to leave the house. I shall never marry—shall I?—because I'm ugly and delicate ... and I shall always remain with Uncle and Aunt...."

Gerdy took her in her arms.

"You won't," AdÈletje went on. "You'll marry one day, Gerdy ... and so will Marietje."

"Oh, stop!" said Gerdy. "Do stop, AdÈletje!... What are you talking about marriage!... I'm ugly as well; nobody likes me!"

"Listen!" said Marietje.

"What did you hear?"

"The sound ... I thought."

"I hear nothing."

"Listen!"

"Yes, listen!"

"It's trailing up the stairs."

"Oh, I'm frightened, I'm frightened!" said Gerdy.

The sisters all crept together.

"I'm not frightened," said Marietje. "I often hear it, like that."

"What is it?"

"The maids say...."

"What?"

"That it's...."

"Who?"

"The old man...."

"Hush!"

"Listen, listen!"

"They say the house is haunted."

"It may be nothing at all," said Marietje. "It may be the wind, making a draught."

"But everything's shut."

"Old houses have queer draughts sometimes, for all that."

"The furniture's old too."

"Listen, it's trailing!"

"That's the wind."

"There's the same trailing sound in the wind sometimes, blowing round the house. I'm getting used to it," said Marietje.

"Yes," said AdÈletje, "one gets used, one gets used to everything.... I shall always remain in this house, with Uncle and Aunt. I love them."

"They never talk about it."

"That's by far the best way."

"Mathilde, how frightened she is!"

"Listen, listen! It's going upstairs!"

"It's the wind ... taking the draught upstairs."

"In an old house ... it's as though the old wood were alive."

"And the furniture."

"What can have been the matter with Mary?"

"Can she ... have seen anything?"

"No."

"No, no."

"She wanted to fetch something.... She fainted.... She's very ill, I believe, very weak."

"Addie says that she's not so very ill."

"Listen!"

"Could it really be ... the old man?"

"And, if it were the old man ... what then?" said AdÈletje. "I ... I shall remain in the house. I shall die, here, I think, at Uncle and Aunt's."

"Oh, do hush, AdÈletje!" said Gerdy, limply, nestling in her sister's arms.

"I'm not afraid of dying."

"Oh, AdÈletje, do hush, do hush! You mustn't talk of dying."

"Listen! I hear it again!"

"But now it's trailing away."

"Like a draught sucking in the air."

"Yes," said AdÈletje, "I expect it's the old man."

"Why should it be he?"

"He can't tear himself away from the house."

"He was always implacable...."

"To poor Aunt Constance."

"The old woman was different."

"Yes, she was different."

"No, it's the draught, it's only the draught.... And the house, creaking."

"It's nothing."

"It's nothing."

"But perhaps we imagine ... because we hear...."

"We all feel ... a sort of fear ... because we hear."

"Mary saw something, I expect."

"Come, girls, let's go to bed."

"Do you dare sleep alone in your room, AdÈletje?"

"Yes, Gerdy ... but leave the door open between us."

"Yes, that's nicer."

"Good-night then, darlings."

"AdÈletje ... you won't think any more of dying, will you?" said Gerdy, moist-eyed. "Perhaps I shall be dead before you are."

"Hush, darling! How can you talk like that?... I'm delicate and ugly.... You're strong, you're pretty."

"I may be dead first, for all that!" said Gerdy, sobbing.

"Gerdy, don't excite yourself so," said Marietje. "That's because we've been talking about it. Now you won't sleep all night."

"I dare say I shall be frightened to-night," said Gerdy. "If so, I'll wake you, Marietje, and creep into bed beside you."

"Very well, do.... And don't worry...."

"Good-night, then...."

"Good-night...."

"Good-night...."

Round the house the thaw wept; and in the night the sinewed grain of the ice broke and melted in weeping melancholy, with the added melancholy of the west wind blowing up heavy clouds, the west wind which came from very far and moaned softly along the walls and over the roof, rattling the tight-closed windows of the night....

Inside the house reigned the darkness of repose and the shadow of silence; and the inmates slept. Only Gerdy could not fall sleep: she lay thinking with wide-open eyes, as she listened vaguely to the wind blowing and the thaw pattering, thinking that she hated ... and loved ... that she hated Mathilde ... and loved ... him ... Johan....