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86 But, because Adeletje looked after the flowers in the conservatory and he saw her carrying a watering-can, he assisted her and even sponged the leaves of an aralia, while Klaasje played at Grandmamma's feet, building houses with cards, which she loved for the shrill colours of the court-cards, and aces and for the pretty figures of hearts and diamonds, clubs and spades. He built a house for her; he teased Gerdy, who was back at her piano, now that Mathilde had left off overhead, until Truitje came to lay the table for lunch and he raced up three flights of stairs, terrified, to work at all costs. . . hang it all, yes, to work! . . . He sat with his hands to his ears, so as not to hear, and his eyes fixed on the maps; and, when the luncheon-bell rang, he deliberately waited a few minutes, pretended to himself to be annoyed because a morning passed so quickly and never came down to lunch less than five minutes late, making the excuse that he had been working so hard. . ..

Now, in the winter, the short days passed in peaceful, sombre domesticity: in the afternoon, Constance went for a walk or to see a poor person, generally with Adeletje; paying or receiving a visit was quite an event, which happened only three or four times during the winter; only Gerdy sometimes entertained her tennis-club and gave the members tea, upstairs in the girls' sitting-room, as though striving for a little sociability from the outside. . . . And, in the yellow circle of light shed by the lamps, the evening drowsed on gently after dinner, with the wind whistling round the house, with Gerdy's bustle amid the chink of her tea-things, with Guy and Adeletje rattling the dice:

"Two and five. . . ."