Page:Small Souls (1919).djvu/113

Rh charming, especially when compared with this place and that;” her countrymen used often to complain to her of the dulness and stiffness and exclusiveness of so many of their legations. Would she not have been in her right place by Van der Welcke’s side, even though people might talk and cavil at first, because, she, the divorced wife of a minister plenipotentiary, had afterwards married the youngest secretary in the service! But she would have shown tact, it would have been forgotten, it would have subsided into the past. She refused to believe but that all this would have been possible, not for any one else, perhaps, but certainly for her. And this was her grievance, that those two old people—and Henri with them—had never been able to see this as she did; that they had given her their son, with an allowance that meant poverty—two alms for which she was expected to be grateful!—but had left her and him and their child in Brussels, in a corner, like some unnamable disgrace! No, that was a thing which she could never forgive, never, never, never!

She was so deep in her thoughts that she did not notice that the train had stopped and that they had arrived at Zeist-Driebergen.

“Mamma!” said Addie, softly.

She started, turned pale. But she was resolved to control herself, to be dignified, to show those old people that she was not a worthless woman, even though she had committed a mistake, a false step in her life: very well, a sin, if they pleased, because she had loved. Addie helped her to alight; and her