She slipped falteringly down the street to go into the Augustinian Church. She wanted to pray for Corinne,--that Corinne might have her happiness. But Corinne's happiness was a tangled affair. Corinne's happiness could only come through Anna's death, and how wish the death of any being? As she knelt down she found that she had to put from her the thought that human destinies resemble hot peas jumping about in a pan,--no more meaning than that. Then her heart repented the wickedness of her thought and she was able to put it from her, and to pray that, as it was quite evident that she, Ildefonse Stacher, could not be trusted with a little happiness, the Lord might in some way trust Corinne with it. Then she prayed for Carli, though Carli, bright among the angels, needed no prayers ... for Kaethe, Leo, Hermann, Ferry--Fanny. Her knees were trembling as she knelt, and she felt a deathly cold, a grey cold, it seemed to her, like that of the stones of the high-vaulted church. She got up stiffly. Noon was sounding from the tower as she passed the marble tomb of one of Maria Theresia's daughters, so beloved by her sorrowing husband. She herself might well have taken position among the carved, grey, mourning figures that stood before the entrance to the tomb, so drooping, so shade-like was she. As she went out the terrible, mumbling old man with sore eyes held open the door for her; the pale, young cripple who stood by him didn't move when he saw that spectre of genteel poverty. So many just like that went in and out of the church. They had no more to give than he himself.... The sun for a moment was fairly flooding the winter streets; they shone in bright splashes of wetness. She stepped across the road into the doorway of the restaurant. To enter a restaurant again! Such a simple thing, she'd been doing it all her life. She felt like a fish suddenly thrown back into its own waters. Corinne was crossing the street. The light was very white and dazzlingly enveloped her slender, swaying figure. How sweetly, softly her blue eyes shone as she approached. "My little Dresden china Auntie!" she cried and kissed her right there in the doorway. Then they passed in and made their way to a table. "For three," said Corinne, "a gentleman is coming. Shall we wait a moment, Auntie dear, before ordering?" she asked as they sat down. Now the smell of the small, fresh rolls that the waiter was counting out, somewhat as he would once have counted gold, and three of which he had put on their table made Frau Stacher suddenly quite faint, but the feeling was so familiar and she was so happy to be there with Corinne that she only said: "But naturally," knowing, too, for whom they waited, and her eyes looked more deeply into Corinne's than she herself was aware of. Corinne glanced away with that oblique glance that could veil her thoughts more completely than fallen lids. She flushed slightly. When Tante Ilde spoke again it was to say: