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PARTISAN REVIEW
humor that reduced every violence of emotion to nothing, said, "You
will give our friend here the wrong impression. I always got along as
well with your mother as she would allow."
And then, as
if
to prove her good faith, she insisted upon open–
ing the album of pictures, pointing to her mother-in-law's image, and
saying to me, "Look at her! Hasn't she a fine figure? And you can
just barely get an idea of her beautiful hair. The picture doesn't do
her justice!" Since I couldn't see over Mrs. Hoffmann's shoulder I
was unable to judge.
"I don't think she's pretty," Elsa said. "Just because she hap–
pens to be my father's mother am I to think her pretty if she isn't?"
Elsa had a quiet, small and melodious voice, but it could
be
decisive and full of inordinate rage at times. The girl's personality was
split wide open with contraries and I never knew precisely what I
thought of her; if I accepted as final the rather rigid self-consciousness
she usually showed around adults, she would betray my impression by
the alarming conviction with which she could, when provoked, take
her part in the world.
"Elsa!" Mrs. Hoffmann said, winking at me. I think, however,
she meant this weak exclamation as a rebuke to her daughter.
Dr. Hoffmann began to cough, but this did not successfully con–
ceal the agitation he felt. His brow was drawn into a severe frown
and it was painful to see him thus insulted and hurt by his daughter.
All his attention was for Elsa and I believed he had forgotten his
wife or, perhaps, she had lost her capacity to touch him deeply and
so she was really outside the situation. Dr. Hoffmann stood up and I
saw that he was going to leave the house and guessed, from the auto–
matic way in which he did this, that he usually resolved domestic
troubles by disappearing for a short time. He rushed into the hall and
got his coat. When he was ready to leave he stopped by my chair and
said, "I'm sure you will excuse me. I want to go out for a walk."
After we heard the door shut Mrs. Hoffmann said to Elsa, "Why
in the world did you say such a thing? I don't understand you." The
mother was so calm, her optimism so steadfast, that I thought she
showed a lack of feeling. In any case, I was sure she didn't com–
prehend the delicate and precarious way her husband was put to–
gether or to what extremities of emotion her daughter was being
driven.
"I only spoke the truth," Elsa said. "I've heard how badly his
mother treated you." She was straining to say more and was obviously
baffied by her mother's reprimand when she had so clearly summoned
