e
Pension Schwarz. In the kitchen the elderly maid, with a shawl over her
shoulders and stiffened fingers, made the fire, while in the dining-room
the little chambermaid cut butter and divided it sparingly among a dozen
breakfast trays--on each tray two hard rolls, a butter pat, a plate,
a cup. On two trays Olga, with a glance over her shoulder, placed two
butter pats. The mistress yet slept, but in the kitchen Katrina had a
keen eye for butter--and a hard heart.

Katrina came to the door.

"The hot water is ready," she announced. "And the coffee also. Hast thou
been to mass?"

"Ja."

"That is a lie." This quite on general principle, it being one of the
cook's small tyrannies to exact religious observance from her underling,
and one of Olga's Sunday morning's indulgences to oversleep and avoid
the mass. Olga took the accusation meekly and without reply, being
occupied at that moment in standing between Katrina and the extra pats
of butter.

"For the lie," said Katrina calmly, "thou shalt have no butter this
morning. There, the Herr Doktor rings for water. Get it, wicked one!"

Katrina turned slowly in the doorway.

"The new Fraulein is American?"

"Ja."

Katrina shrugged her shoulders.

"Then I shall put more water to heat," she said resignedly. "The
Americans use much water. God knows it cannot be healthy!"

Olga filled her pitcher from the great copper kettle and stood with it
poised in her thin young arms.

"The new Fraulein is very beautiful," she continued aloud. "Thinkest
thou it is the hot water?"

"Is an egg more beautiful for being boiled?" demanded Katrina. "Go, and
be less foolish. See, it is not the Herr Doktor who rings, but the new
American."

Olga carried her pitcher to Harmony's door, and being bidden, entered.
The room was frigid and Harmony, at the window in her nightgown, was
closing the outer casement. The inner still swung open. Olga, having put
down her pitcher, shivered.

"Surely the Fraulein has not slept with open windows?"

"Always with open windows." Harmony having secured the inner casement,
was wrapping herself in the blue silk kimono with the faded butterflies.
Merely to look at it made Olga shiver afresh. She shook her head.

"But the air of the night," she said, "it is full of mists and
illnesses! Will you have breakfast now?"

"In ten minutes, after I have bathed."

Olga having put a match to the stove went back to the kitchen, shaking
her head.

"They are st