The Marquise stood thunderstruck. She pulled herself together and wanted to hurry to her father, but the strange seriousness of this man, who she considered to have insulted her, paralysed her every limb, and in a highly emotional state she threw herself on the divan. Now losing trust in herself, she went through all the significant moments of the past year and considered herself insane when she recalled the most recent of these. At last her mother appeared, and at her vexing question as to why she was so unsettled, her daughter told her what the doctor had just disclosed. The mother called him shameless and despicable and supported her daughter in her decision to report this insult to her father. The Marquise insisted that the doctor had been totally earnest and seemed determined to repeat his hair-raising opinion to her father. Not a little shocked, her mother asked if she believed in the possibility of such a circumstance. “Not before,” the Marquise answered, “graves bear fruit and newborn babes are born from the wombs of corpses.” “Well now, you strange creature,” said her mother, clasping her firmly to her breast, “what is upsetting you? If your conscience is clear how can such a judgement, even if it were from a whole conclave of doctors, possibly trouble you? Whether his opinion arose from mistake or malice, is it not all the same to you? But it’s fitting that we tell your father.” “Oh, God,” said the Marquise convulsively, “how can I calm down? Are not my very own internal, all-too-familiar sensations against me? If I knew another woman was feeling what I feel, would I not make the same judgement?” “It is terrible,” said the mother. “Malice! Mistake!” continued the Marquise. “What grounds can this man, held by us in such high esteem till today, have for insulting me so wilfully and basely?—I, who never insulted him, who received him trustingly and with expectations of future gratitude. As his early words show, he came with a clear and sincere wish to help, not to cause me unparalleled, horrible pain. And if I had to choose,” she continued while her mother watched her coldly, “I would want to believe he’d made a mistake. But is it conceivable that even an ordinary doctor could make a mistake in such a case?” The mother said, a little tartly, “And yet it must have been one or the other.” “Yes,” rejoined the Marquise, “my dearest of mothers, it must,” kissing her hand with an expression of wounded dignity and glowing bright red in the face. “Although,” she added, “the circumstances are so extraordinary that I am permitted to have my doubts. I swear, because it needs such assurance, that my conscience is like that of my children. Your own, most honourable woman cannot be clearer. At the same time I’m asking you to send for a midwife, so that I can convince myself of what’s happening and calm myself as to the outcome.” “A midwife!” cried the mother, humiliated. “A clear conscience and a midwife!” She was speechless. “A midwife, my dearest Mother,” the Marquise repeated, kneeling before her, “and this instant, if I’m not to go mad.” “Oh, gladly,” said the Colonel’s wife, “only I ask that the confinement not take place in my house,” and she stood up and prepared to leave the room. The Marquise, following her with outspread arms, fell at her feet and embraced her knees. “If ever an innocent life,” she cried with the eloquence born of suffering, “based on your own model life, earned me the right to your respect, if any maternal feeling remains and speaks for me in your breast until my guilt is proven as clear as daylight, do not leave me alone at such a terrible time.” “Why are you so upset?” asked her mother. “Is it just the claims of the doctor, just your own inner feelings?” “Nothing more, my dear Mother,” said the Marquise, and laid her hand on her own breast. “Nothing more, Julietta?” continued the mother. “Only think! Such a lapse, as gravely as it would hurt me—such things happen, and I must eventually forgive it; but if you try to avoid a mother’s reproach by inventing fairy tales about upsetting the world order, and invoke blasphemous oaths to burden my all-too-trusting heart, that would be shameful. I could never be reconciled to you again.” “May the realm of redemption stand open before me now as my soul is before you,” cried the Marquise. “I kept nothing from you, Mother.” This statement, expressed with great feeling, shook her mother. “Oh, heavens!” she called out, “my dearest child! How you touch me!”, and she lifted her up and kissed her and pressed her to her breast. “Whatever in the world are you afraid of? Come, you are very ill.” And she wanted to take her to a bed, but the Marquise, so frequently reduced to tears, assured her that she was very well and that nothing was wrong with her apart from her strange and inexplicable condition. “Condition!” cried the mother once more. “What condition? If your past memory is so sure, what mad fear has got into you? Can’t a vague inner sensation deceive?” “No! No!” said the Marquise, “it didn’t deceive me. And if you send for a midwife you will hear that the terrible thing destroying me is true.” “Come, my dearest daughter,” said her mother, who began to fear for her daughter’s sanity. “Come, follow me and lie down in bed. What do you think the doctor told you? How your cheeks are glowing! And your whole body is shaking. What was it again the doctor told you?” And with that she took the Marquise, now herself incredulous about the whole course of events she had related, in her arms. Smiling through her tears, the Marquise said, “Beloved, excellent Mother! I’m master of my senses. The doctor told me I am with child. Call the midwife and as soon as she says it’s not true I will be at peace once more.” “Good, good,” replied her mother, suppressing her anxiety. “Let her come. If you want her to make fun of you, she’ll soon be here and will tell you that you’re a dreamer and not quite right in the head.” With that she pulled the bell-cord and immediately sent one of her servants to call the midwife. The Marquise was still in her mother’s arms, her breast heaving restlessly, when the woman appeared and the Colonel’s wife revealed to her the strange ideas from which her daughter was suffering. She explained that the Marquise swore that she had behaved virtuously, but at the same time considered it necessary for a professional woman to investigate her condition because of the inexplicable feeling deceiving her. Undertaking her investigation, the midwife spoke of young blood and the tricks of the world, and when she had completed her business declared that she had come across similar cases in the past. Young widows in the same situation all claimed to have lived on deserted islands. At the same time she comforted the Marquise and assured her that the jolly buccaneer who had touched land one night would eventually turn up. At these words the Marquise passed out. Her mother could not suppress her maternal feelings and revived her with the help of the midwife. When she came round, however, the mother’s outrage prevailed. “Julietta!” she cried with the liveliest pain. “Will you not reveal yourself to me and tell me who the father is?”—and still seemed inclined to reconciliation. However, when the Marquise said she was going insane, her mother got up from the divan and said, “Go! Go! You are despicable! I curse the hour I bore you!” and left the room.