The Goose Man · Jakob Wassermann
Chapter 4
Chapter 190 of 219 · 1 min read
Yet Dorothea said the next day at the dinner table that she was going to accept the invitation. It would be much easier just to go and have it over with, she remarked, than to stay away and explain her absence. She said this in a way that would lead you to believe that it had cost her much effort to come to her decision.
“Certainly, go!” said Daniel. “I have already advised you to do it myself.”
She had had a dark blue velvet dress made, and she wanted to wear it for the first time on this occasion.
Toward five o’clock Daniel went to his bedroom. He saw Dorothea standing before the mirror in her new dress. It was a tall, narrow mirror on a console. Dorothea had received it from her father as a wedding present.
“What is the matter with her?” thought Daniel, on noticing her complete lack of excitement. She was as if lost in the reflection of herself in the mirror. There was something rigid, drawn, transported about her eyes. She did not see that Daniel was standing in the room. When she raised her arm and turned her head, it was to enjoy these gestures in the mirror.
“Dorothea!” said Daniel gently.
She started, looked at him thoughtfully, and smiled a heady smile.
Daniel was anxious, apprehensive.
