He lit a lamp and then went to the letter-box to ascertain whether anything had arrived by the evening mail. He found two letters with bills inside, amounting to over six hundred marks.
He did a little grumbling to himself, and then locked up the two “rags” in his desk.
In doing so he noticed a large yellow envelope. Supposing it to be an official letter, he seized it, intending to open it. But he found that it had been already opened, and his curiosity grew as he drew from it three large sheets.
Without at first catching its purport, he gazed at the clerical handwriting in it, and then he sat down at the table and read the whole document from beginning to end.
Ah, indeed, his wife too? Why, that was quite a charming surprise! If her funds were running so low as to oblige her to contract debts it would be vain, he thought, to expect any help from his mother-in-law, and yet he had always counted on her as a last resort. In a rage he flung the summons and the legal statement into a corner and went up and down in the room, musing on the financial embarrassment of his wife.
Probably Frau Leimann had heard the steady tramp of his feet through the ceiling, for now she entered with exuberant excuses.
“My dear George,” said she, breathlessly, “I had a pressing engagement with my dressmaker, and I ran after you in the street. I saw you passing before me, but I could not catch up with you.”
“What did you have to do with your dressmaker?” Leimann confronted her furiously.
“What else should I have had to do there than business for which I pay her? She is making a riding-habit for me!”
“You had better first pay for your old rubbish before ordering any new gear!” shouted he.