"Yes," said the Baroness, relaxing a little before this flattering appreciation. "Yes. It was. Some people would call it chance. But we, as Christians, knew it was heaven." "But how _punctual_," said Ingeborg admiringly, "how _tidy_!" "Yes, yes," mused the Baroness, relaxing still more in the warm moisture of remembrance, "they were happy times. Happy, happy times. One's little ones coming and going--" "Oh? Did they go as well as come?" asked Ingeborg, lowering her voice to condolence. "About one's knees, I mean, and the house." "Oh, yes," said Ingeborg, relieved. "Every year the Christmas candles shining down on an addition to our treasures. Every year the gifts of past Christmases gathered about the tree again, bigger and stronger instead of being lost or broken as they would have been if they had been any other kind of gift." "But what happened when there weren't any more to give?" "Then I gave my husband cigar-cases." "Oh." "After all, most women have to do that all their lives. I did not grumble. When heaven ceased to provide me with a present for him, I knew how to bow my head and went and bought one. There are excellent cigar-cases at Wertheim's in Königsberg if you wish to give one to Herr Pastor next Christmas. They do not come unsewn at the corners by July or August in the way those one buys in other shops do. Ah, yes. Happy years. Happy, happy years. First the six years of great joy collecting my family, and then the years of happiness bringing it up. Of course you are fond of children?" "I've never had any." "Naturally you have not," said the Baroness, stiffening again. "So I don't know," said Ingeborg. "But every true woman loves little children," said the Baroness. "But they must be _there_," said Ingeborg. "One has God-implanted instincts," said the Baroness. "But one must _see_ something to practise them on," said Ingeborg. "A true woman is all love," said the Baroness, in a voice that sounded very like scolding. "I suppose she is," said Ingeborg, who felt that she never could have met one. She had a vision of something altogether soft and squelchy and humid and at the same time wonderful. "Are any of your children at home?" she asked, thinking she would like to test her instincts on the younger Glambecks. "They are grown up and gone. Out into the world. Some far away in other countries. Ah, yes. One is lonely--" The Baroness became loftily plaintive. "It is the lot of parents. Lonely, lonely. I had five daughters. It was a great relief to get them all married. There was naturally the danger where there were so many of some of them staying with us always." "But then you wouldn't have been lonely," said Ingeborg. "But then, Frau Pastor, they would not have been married." "No. And then," said Ingeborg, interested, "you wouldn't have been able to _feel_ lonely." The Baroness gazed at her.