After dinner they took their coffee on the balcony, where Katherine, after making some objections, appeared in her travelling costume: a Rembrandt hat and a dust cloak with a travelling satchel slung over her shoulder. She looked charming. Balafre was more enchanted than ever and begged her not to be too much surprised if the next morning she should find him anxiously squeezed into the corner of the coupe as an escort for the journey. "Provided that he gets his furlough," laughed Pitt. "Or that he deserts," added Serge, "which would really be the first thing that would make his devotion complete." And so they chatted for a while longer. Then they bade their hospitable host and hostess good-bye and agreed to go together as far as the bridge at Luetzow Square. Here, however, they divided into two groups, and while Balafre, Wedell and Osten sauntered further along the canal, Pitt and Serge, who were going to Kroll's, went toward the Thiergarten. "What a charming creature that Katherine is," said Serge. "Rienaecker seems rather prosaic beside her, and then he looks at her so discontentedly and so reprovingly, as if he needed to make excuses to every one for the little woman, who to a discerning eye is really cleverer than he." Pitt kept silence. "And what in the world does she want at Schwalbach or Schlangenbad?" Serge went on. "That does not help matters at all. And if it does, it is usually a rather peculiar sort of help." Pitt glanced at him sidewise. "I think. Serge, that you are growing more and more Russian, or what amounts to the same thing, you are living up to your name more and more." "But still not enough. But joking aside, my friend, I am in earnest about one thing: Rienaecker makes me angry. What has he against the charming little woman? Do you know?" "Yes." "Well?" "She is rather a little silly. Or if you prefer it in German, she babbles a bit. At all events too much for him." CHAPTER XIX Between Berlin and Potsdam Katherine was already drawing down the yellow curtains of the car windows to protect herself from the dazzling light which grew stronger and stronger. But on this same day no curtains were drawn in the little home on the Luise Bank and the forenoon sun shone brightly in at Frau Nimptsch's window and filled the whole room with light. Only the background was in shadow and here stood an old-fashioned bed with a high pile of red and white checked pillows, against which Frau Nimptsch was leaning. She was sitting up rather than lying down, because she had water on the lungs and was suffering severely from asthma. She kept turning her head toward the one open window, but still oftener toward the fireplace where no fire was burning to-day. Lena was sitting by her, holding her hand, and when she saw that her mother kept looking in the same direction, she said: "Shall I make a fire, mother? I thought that you were lying warm in bed and it is such a hot day ..."