It was fortunate that Frau Doerr was not present to hear this answer or else there would have been a fresh embarrassment. But the good lady who was usually so brisk, at least where the Baron was concerned, had not yet returned, and so Lena said: "Very well, then, have it your own way. And for all I care, the two ladies may wait until another time! But what do the foreign names mean? I asked you before, the time you brought the bonbons. But you gave me no real answer, only half an answer. Is it a secret?" "No." "Then tell me about it." "Gladly, Lena, these names are only nicknames." "I know that. You said so before." "So they are names that we have given each other for convenience, with or without reason, just by chance." "And what does Pitt mean?" "Pitt was an English statesman." "And is your friend a statesman too?" "For heaven's sake ..." "And Serge?" "That is a Russian given name, belonging to a Russian saint and many Russian crown princes." "Who, however, do not find it necessary to be saints if I am right?... And Gaston?" "Is a French name." "Yes, I remember that. Once when I was a little young thing, before I was confirmed, I saw a piece: 'The Man with the Iron Mask.' And the man with the mask was called Gaston. And I cried dreadfully." "And now you will laugh if I tell you that I am Gaston." "No, I will not laugh. You have a mask too." Botho was about to contradict this, both in earnest and in jest, but Frau Doerr, who just then came in, broke off the conversation, by excusing herself for having kept them waiting so long. But an order had come in and she had been obliged to make a burial wreath in a hurry. "A big one or a little one?" asked Frau Nimptsch, who loved to talk about funerals and had a passion for hearing all the details about them. "Well," said Frau Doerr, "it was a middle-sized one; plain people. Ivy and azaleas." "Oh, Lord!" went on Frau Nimptsch, "every one is wild about ivy and azaleas, but I am not. Ivy is well enough when it grows on the grave and covers it all so green and thick that the grave seems as peaceful as he who lies below. But ivy in a wreath, that is not right. In my day we used immortelles, yellow or half yellow, and if we wanted something very fine we took red ones or white ones and made a wreath out of those, or even just one color and hung it on the cross, and there it hung all winter, and when spring came there it hung still. And some lasted longer than that. But this ivy and azalea is no good at all. And why not? because it does not last long. And I always think that the longer the wreath hangs on the grave, the longer people remember him who lies below. And a widow too, if she is not too young. And that is why I favor immortelles, yellow or red or even white, and any one can hang up another wreath also if he wants to. That is just for the looks of it. But the immortelle is the real thing." "Mother," said Lena, "you talk so much about graves and wreaths lately."