I suppose I'd better not disturb her?«

»No, and besides, time, Andreas.«

»I'll be ready in five minutes.«

They went into the passage. As Frau Binzer opened the door of the front bedroom, a long wail came from the room.

That shocked and terrified Andreas. He dashed into the bathroom, turned on both taps as far as they would go, cleaned his teeth and pared his nails while the water was running.

»Frightful business, frightful business,« he heard himself whispering. »And I can't understand it. It isn't as though it were her first – it's her third. Old Schäfer told me, yesterday, his wife simply ›dropped‹ her fourth. Anna ought to have had a qualified nurse. Mother gives way to her. Mother spoils her. I wonder what she meant by saying I'd worried Anna yesterday. Nice remark to make to a husband at a time like this. Unstrung, I suppose – and my sensitiveness again.«

When he went into the kitchen for his boots, the servant girl was bent over the stove, cooking breakfast. »Breathing into that, now, I suppose,« thought Andreas, and was very short with the servant girl. She did not notice. She was full of terrified joy and importance in the goings-on upstairs. She felt she was learning the secrets of life with every breath she drew. Had laid the table that morning saying, »Boy,« as she put down the first dish, »Girl,« as she placed the second – it had worked out with the saltspoon to ›Boy.‹ »For two pins I'd tell the master that, to comfort him, like,« she decided. But the master gave her no opening.

»Put an extra cup and saucer on the table,« he said; »the doctor may want some coffee.«

»The doctor, sir?« The servant girl whipped a spoon out of a pan, and spilt two drops of grease on the stove. »Shall I fry something extra?« But the master had gone, slamming the door after him. He walked down the street – there was nobody about at all – dead and alive this place on a Sunday morning. As he crossed the suspension bridge a strong stench of fennel and decayed refuse streamed from the gully, and again Andreas began concocting a letter. He turned into the main road. The shutters were still up before the shops. Scraps of newspaper, hay and fruit skins strewed the pavement; the gutters were choked with the leavings of Saturday night. Two dogs sprawled in the middle of the road, scuffling and biting. Only the public-house at the corner was open; a young barman slopped water over the doorstep.

Fastidiously, his lips curling, Andreas picked his way through the water. »Extraordinary how I am noticing things this morning It's partly the effect of Sunday. I loathe a Sunday when Anna's tied by the leg and the children are away. On Sunday a man has the right to expect his family. Everything here's filthy, the whole place might be down with the plague, and will be, too, if this street's not swept away.