CHAPTER IV
The outer bell rang, and Frau Grünlich appeared on the landing to look down into the court—a habit she had lately formed. The door was hardly opened below when she started, leaned over still more, and then sprang back with one hand pressing her handkerchief to her mouth and the other holding up her gown. She hurried upstairs.
On the steps to the second storey she met Ida Jungmann, to whom she whispered in a suffocated voice. Ida gave a joyous shriek and answered with some Polish gibberish.
The Frau Consul was sitting in the landscape room, crocheting a shawl or some such article with two large wooden needles. It was eleven o’clock in the morning.
The servant came through the hall, knocked on the glass door, and waddled in to bring the Fran Consul a visiting-card. She took the card, got out her sewing-glasses, and read it. Then she looked again at the girl’s red face; then read again; then looked up again at the girl. Finally she said calmly but firmly:
“What is this, my dear? What does it mean?”
On the card was printed: “X. Noppe and Company.” The “X. Noppe” and the “and” were crossed out with a lead-pencil, so that only the “Company” was left. “Oh, Frau Consul,” said the maid, “there’s a gentleman, but he doen’t speak German, and he do go on so—”
“Ask the gentleman in,” said the Frau Consul; for she understood now that it was the “Company” who desired admittance. The maid went. Then the glass door was opened again to let in a stocky figure, who remained in the shadowy background of the room for a moment and said with a drawl-
