Marion had not seen Ingrid von Schmundt for sixteen months.

It was thus with great surprise that her neighbor appeared one morning, full of smiles, for a visit.

“Hello, Ingrid,” said Marion, hurrying downstairs the moment an anxious Heidi had located her. While her mistress went down to her guest, Heidi hastily spread the need for caution to the second floor.

Marion led her neighbor to the small parlor next to the door.

“You are perspiring, Marion. Whatever have you been doing?”

“Oh, just housework, Ingrid,” answered Marion, still trying to recover from her surprise and anxiety over her friend’s appearance.

“Housework indeed! What are servants for, Marion? Why would you be doing such a thing?”

“I enjoy working with my women. Surely you must have felt the effects of rationing yourself.”

“My husband’s and son’s proper loyalties keep us very well taken care of,” said Ingrid, her nose inching into the air.

“You are fortunate. But we find we enjoy the added work.”

The countess laughed. “I will never get used to the ways of you and the baron! You and I used to see things the same. Sometimes I wonder if I even know you anymore. Working with your women—such notions!” exclaimed Frau Schmundt. “I tell you, Marion, that husband of yours has not been good for you. You’ve changed.”

The uncharacteristically sharp reply that sought exit from Marion’s lips in defense of her husband did not get past the back side of her teeth. She swallowed it, taking in a breath to steady herself.

I hope I’ve changed, she said to herself. I would not want to be the same person at forty I was at twenty! I hope I’ve put some roots of growth and character and personhood down in all that time.

But to her guest she said, “I’m sorry you feel that way, Ingrid. Heinrich has not changed me. We’ve grown together. He works with his men, I with my women. These are times when all people need to join together. We have no desire to be above them, so to speak.”

“But you are above them,” objected the countess with annoyance.

“That is not how we see it.”

“How else is there to see it?”

“We view servanthood as the pinnacle of being.”

Countess von Schmundt threw her head back and made no attempt to disguise the disdainful tone of the laughter that erupted from her wide mouth.

“Why Marion,” she said after a moment, dabbing her eyes as she tried to stop laughing. “That is one of the most ridiculous things I have ever heard!”

Marion held her tongue, compassion now replacing the earlier vexation that had fluttered briefly when she had heard her husband ridiculed.

“Servanthood indeed! Servants are servants, nothing more.”

“There was one who said that the last would be first, and that the way to achieve greatness was to be the servant of all.”