had spent the night; but his offer and the words in which he had couched it had shocked her, had frightened her all through that night, that short night, so that she had not had a moment's sleep. And now she was angry with herself for not summoning up her usual sound sense, so that he had seen how frightened and shocked she was and had laughed at it, with the caressing laugh of his well-shaped mouth. And, because she was angry with herself, all sorts of nervous excuses went whirling through, all her grievances, great and small, came surging up, as though to defend her against herself, against her own self-reproach. Why couldn't Addie have gone too? Why must he leave her to her own devices like that? Why was she only good for the one thing? Why did he hold such long conversations, full of strange intensity, with that ailing Marietje? Why did she sometimes, through his kisses, feel a strange chill come out of him and freeze her, so that the spontaneous word grew still and lifeless on her lips and she no longer knew what to say: she only knew that she was losing him, again and again and again, while all the others, down below, were winning him, winning him for themselves! Oh, how the grievances whirled up, fighting against her self-reproach, until at last she burst into tears, sheer nervous tears, such as she had never shed before! And, as though the grievances were winning, she suddenly laid the blame on Addie, on all of them, on her husband's whole family, on Driebergen, on the house full of lunatics and invalids, on the eerie, haunted house where she could not breathe, while they all, down below, found living there so delightful. She blamed them all, blamed the whole house for it, that she was losing her sound sense and had allowed Johan to say all sorts of things to her which otherwise she would never have
