him escape her, felt it so vaguely
that it was hardly a thought, but merely a haze passing over her
bewilderment. Adeline sat very quietly in the midst of it, smiling
pleasantly at those reminiscences, at those games of the old days:

"Yes, it's extraordinary, the way children play by themselves!" she
said, simply; and then she would tell prettily of the games of her own
fair-haired brood.

But Gerrit would shake his head: no, that was romping, what his boys
did, but the other thing was playing, real playing. Until Constance
laughingly asked him to talk of something else than her bare feet. And
then the conversation took a more ordinary turn; and it was as if both
Gerrit and Constance felt that, although they liked each other, they had
not yet found each other. And in this there was a very gentle melancholy
that could hardly be formulated.

Constance did not see much of Ernst. She and Van der Welcke and Addie
had once lunched with him at his rooms and he had been a most amiable
host: he showed her the old family-papers, which, after Papa's death, he
had asked leave to keep, because he took most interest in them and they
would be in good hands. He would leave them to Gerrit's eldest son:
Gerrit was the only one of the four brothers who, so far, had provided
heirs. He showed her his old china and called her attention to the
different marks that were signs of its value. Next, he spread out an old
piece of brocade, embroidered with seed-pearls, and said very seriously
that it was a stomacher from a dress of Queen Elizabeth's. When
Constance laughed and ventured to express a doubt, he became rather
grave and almost angry, but graciously changed the conversation, as one
does, a little condescendingly, with people who have said something
stupid, who have not the same culture as ourselves.

When they sat down to lunch in his room with its beautiful old
colouring, the table was so carefully laid, the flowers so tastefully
arranged, with all the grace of a woman's hand, and the lunch was so
exquisite and dainty that Constance, amazed, had paid him a compliment.
He half-filled an antique glass with champagne and drank to welcome her
to Holland. There was about him, about his surroundings, about his
manner, something refined and something timid, something feminine and
something shy, something lovable and yet something reserved, as though
he were afraid of wounding himself or another. He had obviously devised
this reception in