and
anxious, she too wondered how long this unexpected war would last. But
whereas Rose couldn't have told why she was restless and anxious, her
one-time nurse knew quite well what ailed herself this afternoon.

Anna had a very good reason for feeling worried and depressed, but it
was one she preferred to keep to herself. For the last two days she had
been expecting some money from Germany, and since this morning she had
been wondering, with keen anxiety, whether that money would be stopped
in the post.

What made this possibility very real to her was the fact that an uncle
of Anna's, just forty-four years ago, that is, in the August of 1870,
had been ruined owing to the very simple fact that a sum of money owing
him from France had not been able to get through! It was true that she,
Anna, would not be ruined if the sum due to her, which in English money
came to fifty shillings exactly, were not to arrive. Still, it would be
very disagreeable, and the more disagreeable because she had foolishly
given her son-in-law five pounds a month ago. She knew it would have to
be a gift, though he had pretended at the time that it was only a loan.

Anna wondered how she could find out whether money orders were still
likely to come through from Germany. She did not like to ask at the Post
Office, for her Berlin nephew, who transmitted the money to her
half-yearly, always had the order made out to some neighbouring town or
village, not to Witanbury. In vain Anna had pointed out that this was
quite unnecessary, and indeed very inconvenient; and that when she had
said she did not wish her mistress to know, she had not meant _that_. In
spite of her protests Willi had persisted in so sending it.

Suddenly her face brightened. How easy it would be to find out all that
sort of thing at the meeting to-night! Such a man as Manfred Hegner
would be sure to know.

There came a ring at the front door of the Trellis House, and Anna got
up reluctantly from her easy chair and laid down her crochet. She was
beginning to feel old, so she often told herself regretfully--older than
the Englishwomen of her own age seemed to be. But none of them had
worked as hard as she had always worked. Englishwomen, especially
English servants, were lazy good-for-nothings!

Poor old Anna; she did not feel happy or placid to-day, and she hated
the thought of opening the door to some one who, maybe, would condole
with her on to-day's news. All Mrs. Otway's friend