After a few days the lawyer stopped his visits. Thomas locked up the business books and had the shutters fixed in the old study of Ulwing the builder. He seemed quite calm now, only his face was thinner than usual. In the outer office he stopped in front of Otto Füger and looked motionlessly down on him.
The former book-keeper became embarrassed.
“Sad work,” he stuttered, while he took off his spectacles and wiped them energetically, holding them near to his eyes.
“Scoundrel,” said Thomas Illey with imperturbable calm, “you did your stealing cleverly.”
Otto Füger stared at him confounded. He was not prepared for this. His lips parted, he wanted to protest.
Illey looked down on him from head to foot. He exclaimed:
“Clear out!” and, as Füger did not move, he gripped him by the shoulders and without apparent effort, thrust him out of the door. The spectacles had fallen to the ground; as if he would not touch them with his hand for fear of pollution, Thomas pushed them with the tip of his shoe to the threshold.
Otto Füger spoke excitedly under the porch:
“Defamation of character.... We shall meet again. Then we shall see. I’ll have the law on you....”
He never did. It was not in his interest to make a scandal. He was a rich man now.