her dotage, or a stupid burgomaster, she made the drollest grimaces,
screwing up her eyes, wrinkling up her nose, lisping, squeaking....
She did not herself laugh during the reading; but when her audience
(with the exception of Pantaleone: he had walked off in indignation
so soon as the conversation turned _o quel ferroflucto Tedesco_)
interrupted her by an outburst of unanimous laughter, she dropped the
book on her knee, and laughed musically too, her head thrown back, and
her black hair dancing in little ringlets on her neck and her shaking
shoulders. When the laughter ceased, she picked up the book at once,
and again resuming a suitable expression, began the reading seriously.
Sanin could not get over his admiration; he was particularly
astonished at the marvellous way in which a face so ideally beautiful
assumed suddenly a comic, sometimes almost a vulgar expression. Gemma
was less successful in the parts of young girls--of so-called '_jeunes
premieres_'; in the love-scenes in particular she failed; she was
conscious of this herself, and for that reason gave them a faint shade
of irony as though she did not quite believe in all these rapturous
vows and elevated sentiments, of which the author, however, was
himself rather sparing--so far as he could be.

Sanin did not notice how the evening was flying by, and only
recollected the journey before him when the clock struck ten. He
leaped up from his seat as though he had been stung.

'What is the matter?' inquired Frau Lenore.

'Why, I had to start for Berlin to-night, and I have taken a place in
the diligence!'

'And when does the diligence start?'