CHAPTER VIII
Frau Permaneder mounted the main staircase, holding up her gown in front of her with one hand and with the other pressing her muff to her cheek. She tripped and stumbled more than she walked; her cheeks were flushed, her capote sat crooked on her head, and little beads stood on her upper lip. . . . Though she met no one, she talked continually as she hurried up, in whispers out of which now and then a word rose clear and audible and emphasized her fear. “It’s nothing,” she said. “It doesn’t mean anything. God wouldn’t let anything happen. He knows what he’s doing, I’m very sure of that. . . . Oh, my God, I’ll pray every day—” She prattled senselessly in her fear, as she rushed up to the second storey and down the corridor.
The door of the ante-chamber opened, and her sister-in-law came toward her. Gerda Buddenbrook’s lovely white face was quite distorted with horror and disgust; and her close-set, blue-shadowed brown eyes opened and shut with a look of anger, distraction, and shrinking. As she recognized Frau Permaneder, she beckoned quickly with outstretched atms and embraced her, putting her head on her sister-in-law’s shoulder,
“Gerda! Gerda! What is it?” Frau Permaneder cried. “What has happened? What does it mean? They said he fell—unconscious? How is he?—God won’t let the worst happen, I know. Tell me, for pity’s sake!”
But the reply did not come at once, She only felt how Gerda’s whole form was shaken. Then she heard a whisper at her shoulder.
“How he looked,” she heard, “when they brought him! His whole life long, he never let any one see even a speck
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