Leopold Winkler, was employed as bookkeeper. The clerk at the door
noticed the woman's excitement and asked her kindly what the trouble
was.

"I'd like to speak to Mr. Winkler," she said eagerly.

"Mr. Winkler hasn't come in yet," answered the young man. "Is
anything the matter? You look so white! Winkler will probably
show up soon, he's never very punctual. But it's after eleven
o'clock now and he's never been as late as this before."

"I 'don't believe he'll ever come again," said the old woman,
sinking down on a bench beside the 'door.

"Why, what do you mean?" asked the clerk. "Why shouldn't he come
again?"

"Is the head of the firm here?" asked Mrs. Klingmayer, wiping her
forehead with her handkerchief. The clerk nodded and hurried away
to tell his employer about the woman with the white face who came
to ask for a man who, as she expressed it, "would never come there
again."

"I don't think she's quite right in the head," he volunteered. The
head of the firm told him to bring the woman into the inner office.

"Who are you, my good woman?" he asked kindly, softened by the
evident agitation of this poorly though neatly dressed woman.

"I am Mr. Winkler's landlady," she answered.