[After Effi and Mrs. Zwicker had been in Ems for nearly three weeks
they took breakfast one morning in the open air. The postman was late
and Effi was impatient, as she had received no letter from Innstetten
for four days. The coming of a pretty waitress to clear away the
breakfast dishes started a conversation about pretty housemaids, and
Effi spoke enthusiastically of her Johanna's unusual abundance of
beautiful flaxen hair. This led to a discussion of painful
experiences, in the course of which Effi admitted that she knew what
sin meant, but she distinguished between an occasional sin and a
habitual sin. Mrs. Zwicker was indulging in a tirade against the
pleasure resorts and the ill-sounding names of places in the environs
of Berlin, when the postman came. There was nothing from Innstetten,
but a large registered letter from Hohen-Cremmen. Effi felt an
unaccountable hesitation to open it. Overcoming this she found in the
envelope a long letter from her mother and a package of banknotes,
upon which her father had written with a red pencil the sum they
represented. She leaned back in the rocking chair and began to read.
Before she had got very far, the letter fell out of her hands and all
the blood left her face. With an effort she picked up the letter and
started to go to her room, asking Mrs. Zwicker to send the maid. By
holding to the furniture as she dragged herself along she was able to
reach her bed, where she fell in a swoon.]