She who received this friendly greeting as Frau Dörr was not only stout, but was an especially imposing-looking woman, who produced the impression of narrow-mindedness as well as that of kindliness and trustworthiness. Meanwhile Frau Nimptsch apparently took no offence and only repeated: "Yes, his evening at the bowling alley. But what I was going to say was, that Dörr's hat really will not do any longer. It is all threadbare and really disgraceful. You ought to take it away from him and put another in its place. Perhaps he would never know the difference.... And now draw up your chair, dear Frau Dörr, or perhaps over there where the footstool is.... Lena, you know, has slipped out and left me in the lurch again."
"Has he been here?"
"Of course he has. And they have both gone a little way towards Wilmersdorf; nobody comes along the footpath. But they may be back again any minute."
"Well, then I had better go."
"Oh, no indeed, dear Frau Dörr. He will not stay. And even if he should, you know, he would not mind."
"I know, I know. And how are things then?"
"Why, how should they be? I believe she is thinking of something even if she does not want others to know it, and she is imagining something or other."
"Oh, my goodness," said Frau Dörr, as she drew up a somewhat higher stool instead of the footstool that had been offered her. "Oh, my goodness, then it's bad. Whenever one begins to imagine things, trouble begins. It is just like the Amen in church. See here, dear Frau Nimptsch, it was just the very same with me, only there was no imagining. And that is just why everything was really quite different."
Apparently Frau Nimptsch did not really understand what Frau Dörr meant, and so the latter went on: "And because I never took any notions into my head, things always went perfectly well and smoothly and now I have Dörr. Oh well, that isn't much, but still it is something respectable and I can show my face everywhere. And that is why I went to church with him too, and not merely to the registrar's office. If you only go to the registrar's office, there will always be talk."
Frau Nimptsch nodded.