Suddenly Mrs. Meyerburg leaned forward with a great flash across her face. "Simon," she cried, leaning to the door and stretching forward quavering arms. "Simon, my darling!" She leaned further, the rims of her eyes stretched wide. "Simon—come, my darling. Simon!"
Into the opposite doorway, smirched with flour and a white pail of it dangling, flashed Mrs. Fischlowitz, breathing hard from her climb.
"What, Mrs. Meyerburg, you want something?"
"Simon," cried Mrs. Meyerburg, her voice lifted in a paean of welcome; "come, my darling, come in. Come!" And she tried to rise, but sat back, quivering, her brow drenched in sudden sweat.
Raucous terror tore through Mrs. Fischlowitz's voice, and she let fall her pail, a white cloud rising from off the spill. "Mrs. Meyerburg, there ain't nobody there. Mrs. Meyerburg, he ain't there. Mrs. Meyerburg!"
"Simon!"
"Mrs. Meyerburg, he ain't there. Nobody's there!
Ach—help—doctor—Tillie!"
Back against Mrs. Fischlowitz's frenzied arms lay Mrs. Meyerburg, very gray, her hand against her left breast and down toward the ribs.
"Gott! Gott! Please, Mrs. Meyerburg—Mrs. Meyerburg!" dragging back one of the weary eyelids and crying out at what she saw there. "Help doctor—Tillie—quick—quick—"
She could not see, poor dear, that into those locked features was crystallized the great ecstasy of reunion.