A minute later there was a knock at the door, and Felix Lanzberg
entered the room, pale, worn, with great uneasy, shy eyes.
Mamma Harfink reached him both hands, and merely said, "My dear
Lanzberg!" then she let him sit down.
He was silent. Many times he tried to speak, but the words would not
come, and he lowered his eyes helplessly to his hat, which he held on
his knees.
At last Mamma Harfink took his hat from his hand and put it away.
"You will stay to dinner with us?"
"If you will permit me, madam," said he, scarcely audibly.
"Oh, you over-sensitive man!" cried she, with her loud, indelicate
sympathy. How she pained him!
"Does Linda think that I am an over-sensitive man?" said he, almost
bitterly, and without looking at his future mother-in-law.
Mamma Harfink pondered for a last time. "I do not understand how you
could doubt Linda for a moment," replied she.