Consul Engel received her first glance. It came on him, following all that he had already gone through, like the last dram which deprives a man of consciousness. He began to wonder with a strange delirious feeling why his trousers felt so thin. Was it really so? The elegant Fürst sat beside him, holding his hat first in one hand, then in the other, and crossing and uncrossing his legs. It was on account of _him_ that all this had happened, and the budding politician was not yet sufficiently accomplished to be able to sit still while he was flayed, cut up, and put in the pot. Dösen, who was close behind him, pulled the ends of his fair moustache with his white-gloved hands--now left, now right--harder, and harder, and harder. He was marvellously industrious over it. The people in the body of the church saw this white hand moving about under his nose, and thought that he was playing some trick, or making signs to some one, but, they could not find out to whom. The grand folk felt the embarrassment of the situation to be most distressing, but, all the same, they wanted to get a look at the woman with the child--she was so devilish handsome, so foreign-looking. They strained their necks, they craned forward; Consul Bernick himself made his neck as long and distorted as that of a cockerel when it is learning to crow. To the rest of these mishaps was added the Dean's non-appearance. The vergers went in and out, in and out, with all the solemnity of intense stupidity. The organist's playing showed signs of impatience. It seemed to him that it was rather long before Dean Green came and he would be able to begin the hymn. He had exhausted the pompous style long ago; he now turned to the sentimental, its direct opposite--from the clear notes of the shepherd's pipe to the most impossible chirping of a chicken. His fancy indubitably wandered among all the little ones who were to spring from this marriage; he chased them with his fingers saying hush, hush, to them in the treble. At last Engel had recovered himself so far that he began to realise the difference between the delicate and the coarse, between well-bred and ill-bred individuals; to the latter he knew that nothing was so delightful as scandal, but this was something altogether unheard of. It needed a Kurt to have thought of this, to have created such a maddening scene. His handkerchief was wet already, his white gloves were almost grey. As he fanned himself and wiped away the perspiration, he glanced anxiously at Milla. She hated him! He prayed to God. Yes, Consul Emil Engel prayed fervently to God that their sins might not be visited upon this poor innocent girl! They had deceived her, truly, but with the best intentions in the world. God knew how true this was. But who could have anticipated that so mad a thing should have been attempted as to dishonour the sacred edifice.