Frau Asmussen hit on a fiendish method of humiliating Lilly still further. She regarded religion, like many orthodox Protestants, solely in the light of a penance, and, though hitherto she had not concerned herself in the least about Lilly's creed, she now took to beginning every meal with a long-winded prayer, in which, in face of the steaming soup-tureen, she commended Lilly amidst tears and sighs to the Lord, and begged Him to forgive her sinful depravity. Woe to Lilly if there was any backsliding! That first chastisement did not by any means remain the only one. She was cuffed and beaten on the slightest provocation, and storms of abuse descended on her unprotected head. In fact, she scarcely dared breathe till the soothing medicine prescribed by the eminent physician began to do its work. Then Lilly seized the first book she came across, and suffered all the agonies of the heroines in the stories about lost wills and broken marriages, about poison, arson, and murder; with them she loved, and conquered, and died, finding in it all a never-ending source of ecstasy. CHAPTER VII It was a spring-like evening in March, with bright sunshine. The last grimy heaps of snow lying along the gutters had melted into radiant paddles, and a shower of silvery drops fell from the icicles clinging to the roofs. The glow of sunset lay on the houses facing south like brilliant decorative carpets, sharply divided from the shadows on the opposite side of the street. The window lattices shone as if they themselves were suns reflecting their own light, and sparrows twittered on the dripping eaves. But most welcome feature of all in this early spring of city streets was the peculiar spicy fragrance of the melting snows, rising in vapour from the gutter with promise of meadows growing green and of boughs bursting into bud. Lilly, who had hardly been out more than two or three times during the winter, sat at the counter gazing wistfully into space. Everywhere windows and doors were wide open. Everywhere lungs thirsty for fresh air inhaled the zephyrs of coming spring. At last she too pushed open the casements, and gave the hall door a kick, which made it swing back and knock down the broom that stood in the corner behind it. She saw through the opening of the door into the rooms of the opposite tenant, who had also thrown his door wide to greet the spring.