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was out in the afternoon when Mathilde opened Constance' telegram:

"Please come see Emilie."

"There's always something," Mathilde grumbled to herself. "Addie is physician-in-ordinary to his relations. When it's not Klaasje, it's Adeletje, or Mary, or Emilie. There's always something. . . . What can be the matter with her now? He's only just been home. Oh, of course, she's always ill in the summer! I expect it's the same as last year. . . ."

She had an angry impulse to tear up the telegram and say nothing to Addie, to tell him later that it must have gone astray. She did not destroy it, however, but laid it on the table where he would see it and then went out to the tennis-club. As a rule, she took the steam-tram and alighted at the Witte Brug. This time, she ran against Erzeele, with his racket in his hand, in the Bezuidenhout.

"I was waiting for you," he said.

"How nice of you! . . . Let's take the steam-tram."

"Why not walk?"

They stepped out, along the Hertenkamp.

"Is anything the matter?" he asked.

"Why?"

"You look so preoccupied."

"Oh, it's nothing!"