e you already ten?" The woman laughed and shook
her head, surprised at her own forgetfulness. And then she nodded to
her husband: "Do you still remember, Laemke, when she was born?"

"If I remember!" he said, pouring another cup out of the
inexhaustible coffee-pot. "Those were nice carryings-on when she was
born--none of that again, thanks. The girl gave you a lot of trouble.
And me too; I was terribly afraid. But that's ten years since, old
woman--why, it's almost forgotten."

"And if it had happened a hundred years ago I shouldn't have
forgotten it, oh no." The woman put out her hand as though to ward off
something. "I was just going to make myself some coffee about four
o'clock in the afternoon, like to-day, I had got such a longing for it,
and then it started. I just got as far as the passage--do you remember,
you were still working in Stiller's workshop at the time, and we lived
in the Alte Jakob, fifth storey to the left?--and I knocked at
Fritze's, the necktie maker's, whose door was opposite ours, and said:
'Oh, please,' I said, 'send your little one as quickly as you can to
Frau Wadlern, 10, Spittelmarkt, she knows all about it'--oh dear, how
bad I felt. And I fell down on the nearest chair; they had the greatest
difficulty to get me home again. And now it began, I could not control
myself however much I tried; I believe they heard me scream three
houses off. And it lasted, it lasted--evening came on--you came
home--it was midnight--five, six, seven in the morning--then at last at
nine o'clock Frau Wadlern said: 'The child, it'll soon be----'"

"That's enough now, mother," interrupted the man, glancing sideways
at the children, who were sitting very quietly round the table
listening, with wide-open, inquisitive eyes. "All that's over long ago,
the girl's here, and has been a credit to you so far."

"She was born at eleven sharp," said Frau Laemke dreamily, nodding
her head at the same time and then drawing a deep breath as if she had
climbed a high mountain. And then, overwhelmed by the pain and pleasure
of a memory that was still so extremely vivid after the lapse of ten
years, she called her daughter, her first-born, to come to her on this
her tenth birthday.

"Come here, Frida." And she gave her a kiss.

Frida, who was quite abashed at this unexpected caress,
giggled as she cast a glance at her brother Artur and the two other
boys, and then ran to the door: "Can we go and play now?"

"Be off with you