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Rankas-Betoeng?" "No." "No, of course not. And that with a wife who topples over like a ninepin, twice a week, with the heat, flat on the floor!" "Otto!" "Oh, come, Grandmamma! It's the most confounded, beastly, filthy country I ever was in. We had much better sell those colonies to England; she'll only take them from us, one day, if we don't." "Otto, really I'm not used to this language!" "Oh, yes, Granny, I know all that official bombast about India! But we can't all be governor-general or colonial minister. If I ever become that, I shall begin to worship India at once." "You're upset because Frances is ill." "Ill? Ill? It takes a woman to be ill. She's not even that. She's a reed. If you blow upon her, she breaks." "She was a delicate little thing as a girl, Otto." "Well, but look here, Granny: I can't turn her into a robust little thing, can I?" "For shame, Otto! Don't be so bitter. You've got two darling little children." "Yes, children; I wish I hadn't. I'm sorry for the poor little devils.... Is the show beginning now? Tableaux-vivants, arranged by dear old Louise.... A play without words by Frans and Henri.... Stale things, these wedding-parties, always. I thought ours insufferable." "My dear Otto, you're in an intolerable humour." "I'm always like that now, Granny." "Then I strongly advise you to exercise a little self-control, or you will never have any happiness in life, in your own or your wife's or your family's." "The family doesn't affect my happiness." "What do you mean, Otto?" "Why, I don't live and move and have my being in my family, Granny!" "Oh, really, my boy, you're too horrid! Take me back to my seat. I see your mother beckoning to me: she wants me to sit between her and Aunt Ruyvenaer. The performance is beginning...." "Ye-e-es," Cateau was whining to Van Saetzema, Van der Welcke and Karel. "An evening-party of six-ty peo-ple. And the Rus-sian _Minister_ was there, and the Mis-tress of the _Robes_." "Well, after all, if they have so many acquaintances," said Karel, under his breath, by way of excuse. "Ye-e-es, but, Ka-rel, none of the fam-ily. Van der Wel-cke, were _you_ invited, by chance?" "No." "Oh, not you ei-ther? Well, I should have _thought_ that she would have asked Con-stance...." "Why?" asked Van der Welcke, coldly. "We-ell, because she used to go to _Court_, in the _old_ days. And you _too_, didn't you, Van der Welcke?"
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