"I expect it's only just spooning ... as Jaap says."

"I don't think!" said Jaap, with a knowing grin.

"Behave yourself, Jaap!" said Adolphine, angry because Floortje had used the word "old."

"Rats!" said Jaap, rudely, shrugging his shoulders, as much as to say that Mamma was an idiot. "I'll eat my hat if it's only spooning."

They looked at one another: Uncle, Adolphine and Floortje.

"You mustn't speak like that," said Adolphine, in a tone of reprimand, "when you don't know...."

"And what does Floortje know and what do you know? And you are both just as bad as I am, with your insinuations.... Only, I say what you and Floortje think...."

He flung down his cards and left his seat, because he couldn't stand being treated like a little boy who didn't know things.

The three others went on talking about Marianne and Van der Welcke ... because they saw. But they saw nothing of Brauws and Constance ... and did not talk about them....

"Oh, dear!" whined Cateau. "What a frump Aunt Adolph-ine looks to-night!"

She was sitting at the bridge-table with Aunt Ruyvenaer, Toetie and Eduard van Raven and looked over her ample bust at each card as she played it, very carefully, putting it down with her fat, stumpy fingers, the incarnation of unctuous caution.

"To-night?" asked Eduard.

"Oh, so oft-en: such a frump!" declared Cateau, emphatically. "So dowd-y!"

"She's your husband's sister, after all," said Aunt Ruyvenaer, quietly.

"Yes, Aunt-ie, I know.... But Ka-rel is al-ways a gen-tleman!"

"And Aunt Adolphine never," replied Van Raven, to provoke her.

There was no love lost between aunt and nephew; and Cateau said, meekly:

"Well, I'm not say-ing it to say any-thing un-kind about Adolph-ine.... But, Van Ra-ven, how ill Emilie-tje's looking: so tired! Are you two all right to-gether?"

"Say, half right," said Van Raven, echoing her emphasis.

Toetie t.i.ttered behind her cards; and Auntie said:

"Ajo, [4] Edua-r-r-rd, you!... Attend to the game.... Your lead!"

Cateau was no match for Van Raven at laconic repartee and so she preferred to go on talking about Constance and said:

"Is she nev-er com-ing to Mo-ther's Sun-days again? Ah, I ex-pect she's been fright-ened away!"

"By you?" asked Eduard, gleefully capturing Cateau's knave of trumps.

"No, by the old aunts. It was re-ally ve-ry tactless ... of the two old aunts.... Isn't it aw-ful: about Mari-anne and Van der Wel-cke?"

Karel, Van Saetzema and Dijkerhof were playing three-handed bridge at the third table. They had begun in grim silence, each of them eager to play the dummy, and inwardly Karel thought his sister Adolphine dowdy, Van Saetzema thought his sister-in-law Cateau dowdy, while Dijkerhof thought both his aunts very dowdy, hardly presentable. All three, however, kept their thoughts locked up in the innermost recesses of their souls, so that outwardly they were playing very seriously, their eyes fixed greedily and attentively on the dummy's exposed cards. Suddenly, however, Karel said:

"I say...."

"Well?" asked Van Saetzema.

"Isn't it caddish of Van der Welcke?"

"What? Compromising Marianne?"

"Ah, those girls of Aunt Bertha's!" said Dijkerhof, with a grin.

"What do you mean?" asked his father-in-law.

"Well, Louise is in love with her brother Otto, Emilie with her brother Henri and now Marianne, by way of variety, goes falling in love with her uncle."

"They're crazy, all that Van Naghel lot," said Karel, who felt particularly fit and well that evening, puffing luxuriously after a substantial dinner. "I say, what about Constance? Isn't she coming any more?"

"It doesn't look like it."

"Isn't Aunt Constance coming any more?"

"No, it doesn't look like it."

"Father, it's my turn to take dummy."

"Yes, Saetzema, it's Dijkerhof's turn."

Father-in-law and son-in-law exchanged seats.

The old aunts were sitting in a corner near the door of the conservatory:

"Rine."

"Yes, Tine."

"She doesn't seem to be coming any more on Sundays."

"No, Tine, she doesn't come on Sundays now."

"A good thing too!" Tine yelled into Rine's ear.

Mamma van Lowe, smiling sadly, moved from table to table, with Dorine, asking the children if they wouldn't like something to drink.

CHAPTER XVI