Margarete even frowned upon Elinor buying fashion magazines, which Margarete thought were a waste of money and nothing more than frivolous expenses. The reprimand had an undercurrent of shaming because it implied that Elinor was ungrateful and spent money carelessly. Margarete had always maintained a regular beauty regimen. She would get manicures every week and a pedicure once a month. She visited the hair salon weekly for her signature look, a low chignon.21 Instead of seeing Elinor’s interest in fashion and design as a common bond the two could share, however, she chastised her daughter-in-law about her shallow ness. Although Elinor usually couldn’t understand what her mother-in-law was saying until Kristina translated, her combative tone was enough to ascertain the meaning of her words.

“Elinor was so unhappy and my grandmother could yell, my God, she could yell.” said Kristina. “Sometimes I went after Elinor. I saw her in the kitchen in the morning crying. How could she be happy here?”

Elinor did her best to adapt to her inhospitable mother-in-law because she had a son to raise, but she mostly retreated to the suite that she and Frederick occupied. “I felt very badly for Elinor,” said Kristina. “My grandmother did not like her and didn’t want her there. To her, Frika married this black woman.”22 That infuriated Margarete. She didn’t understand how her son could choose someone black over someone white. And word spread quickly about the new “black woman” and tan child living with the Alberts.

Elinor couldn’t leave the house without gawkers following her. What should have been an uneventful stroll down Wenderstrasse often turned into a spectacle. Everyone stared at Elinor wherever she went. One man, coming out of a store, dropped his bag of groceries when he saw her, and stood there motionless as his cabbage rolled down the sidewalk. Charlotte, on a visit, was with Elinor at the time. “He acted as if he had been struck by lightning. I’ll never forget that episode.”23 It’s quite possible that Elinor was the first black person most residents of Göttingen had ever seen up close. That, coupled with her statuesque six-foot physique and striking dark skin, shocked people into paralysis.

It was unnerving for Elinor to stand out in this way. She felt as though she was a walking exhibit or an animal in a zoo, but she had no choice but to leave the house because little Stephen had to go to school and play outside. The two of them together stirred up so much curiosity and resentment that Kristina found herself in the unfortunate position of constantly answering questions about her aunt as well as her cousin, who looked neither white nor black.