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234 little polite-ness to her brothers and sis-ters. We nev-er see peo-ple, as you know, don’t you, Adolphine? Ka-rel doesn’t care for it; he only cares for qui-et. I should rather like it. But it’s Ka-rel, you see, who doesn’t care for it. And who were there, Adolph-ine?”

“Oh, well, they know nobody, so it looked to me rather like a failure. Nobody except that Vreeswijck. No doubt, they’d had one or two refusals, for they’d asked Paul to make up the party.”

“Oh, Paul? No doubt, one or two must have refused!”

“Yes, of course.”

“Well, re-ally, Con-stance is. . . But then I don’t call a din-ner like that a success. Do you, Adolph-ine?”

“No, I thought it ridiculous. A dinner-party of four!”

“Were the men dressed?”

“Yes, dressed.”

“And Con-stance? Low-necked?”

“No, not low-necked, but smart as paint. And champagne!”

“Re-ally! Cham-pagne as we-ell?”

“Yes, a cheap brand. And the rooms so dark: I didn’t think it respectable. Such a dim light, you know. Quite disreputable, I thought, with those three men,” said Adolphine, whispering because of Marietje.

“She can’t hear, she’s play-ing. Oh, re-ally! And what next?”