Now the ice was really broken, and when the apple fritters arrived, frizzling crisply in their juice, Hertha thought the atmosphere was favourable for her great question. Still she struggled twice with herself before she was sure that she could combine the right moment with the right words. For she felt that her friend's new smile did not mean joking. "There's one thing I want to ask you," she began, in a careless, casual sort of tone, though there was a choking sensation in her throat. "Wives love their husbands ... that's taken for granted; but do you think it's possible that wives ... can be ... loved by men--men who are not their husbands?" Her friend didn't smile this time, but laughed outright, and Hertha felt a stone fall from her heart. Here was some one who was not going to be shocked, she thought. "How funny you are," Meta said. "No one can prevent people loving whom they choose." "I know.... But a man, don't you see, ought not----" "No; he _ought_ not, but often does." "Does any one else love _you_, then?" Meta coloured. She looked into space. Perhaps she was thinking of the man who had first captured her maiden fancy. "I don't ask," she said. "It is more than enough that I please Hans; and, of course, I shouldn't allow anything of the kind." "Then it isn't allowed?" "Of course not, when they tell you so straight out." "What? Do they ever tell it?" "Often. It happens if the man is a very bold lover." "Good gracious!" exclaimed Hertha, in horror. "If such a thing happened to me, I should show him the door pretty quick." Then she became suddenly silent. She was asking herself the question, "What might _he_ have said to her? What might she have answered?" "Would it be possible," she inquired again eagerly, "for there to be women ... who--who wouldn't mind?" "Oh yes," replied Meta. "Who in the end might return such a bold man's love?" "Yes; even that." The world seemed to spin round in Hertha's brain, and with all the energy of innocence she cried, "Meta, I won't believe it!" "There is a good deal that you would not believe, that I now know to be facts." "Tell me, tell me. What, please?" "No; most of it can't be told," said her friend, guardedly. "Not to any one, at least, who is not married." Hertha thought of the vow they had once exchanged, but an undefinable feeling of shyness stopped her from reminding the forgetful Meta of it. "All I can tell you," she continued, "is that things are very different from what we girls think they are. Do you remember, for instance, how all our heads were turned once about your uncle?" "Which uncle?" asked Hertha. "Leo Sellenthin," replied Meta, glancing sideways. Hertha sighed. She was only too willing to forget the relationship which gave him authority over her. And then, all at once, her heart seemed to stand still, for she understood that the next minute would be pregnant for her with revelation. She was to hear something terrible.