He hadn't made a definite appointment, and if he were to show up late-yes, even if he were not to come at all, no one would think it strange, neither the men in the Cafe Schopf nor Miss Kessner. Only her mother-who wasn't bad-looking herself-might wonder why he hadn't come.

"Please, do help yourself," he said to Otto, who had not yet put the cup to his lips.

Otto took a quick sip and started at once, "I'll be brief: maybe you know that for the last three months I've had a position as a cashier in the office of an electrical installation company. But why should you know that? You don't even know that I'm married and have a son-a four-yearold boy. You see, I already had him when I was here. No one knew. Well, anyway, things didn't go so well for me. You can imagine. It was especially bad this last winter. The boy was ill-well, the details can't really be of interest to you-and so I was forced to borrow from the cash drawer on a few occasions. I've always paid it back in time. But this time it was a bit more than usual, unfortunately, and"-he paused for a moment while Wilhelm stirred his coffee with his spoon-"and even worse, as luck would have it, I learned just by chance that this time, on Monday, tomorrow morning in other words, we're to be audited by the company headquarters. We're a branch, you understand, and we handle only very small accounts. Really, the amount I owe is trivial-nine hundred and sixty gulden. Let's say a thousand, more or less. But the exact amount is nine hundred and sixty. And that has to be there tomorrow by half past eight, otherwise-well, you get the idea. You really would be doing me a tremendous favor, Willi, if you could-"

Suddenly, he could go no further. Willi was a little embarrassed for him, not so much because of the petty cheating or-well, theft, that's what it really was-which his old comrade was guilty of, but rather because the former First Lieutenant Otto von Bogner-only a few years ago a popular, well-situated, and fashionable young officer-now sat pale and crumpled in a corner of the sofa, unable to go on talking because he was choking back tears.

He placed his hand on Otto's shoulder. "Come on, Otto," he said, "you don't have to take it so tragically." As if in answer to this not very auspicious beginning, Otto looked up at him with a desolate, frightened air, so Wilhelm added, "The trouble is, I'm pretty broke myself just now. My entire fortune at the moment consists of a little over a hundred gulden. A hundred and twenty, to be as exact as you were. Of course it goes without saying that the entire amount is at your disposal, down to the last kreuzer. But if we make an effort, I'm sure we can think of some way out."

Otto interrupted him. "You can be sure that I've already exhausted all the other-ways. So we don't have to waste time racking our brains unnecessarily-especially since I've come with a definite proposal."

Wilhelm looked at him intently.

"Try to imagine, Willi, that you found yourself in just such a difficulty. What would you do?"

"I don't quite understand," Willi replied defensively.

"Naturally, I know that you've never taken money from someone else's cash drawer-that's something that can only happen in civilian life. Okay. But still, if for some-less criminal-reason you desperately needed a certain sum of money, to whom would you turn?"

"I'm sorry. Otto, but I've never thought about something like that, and I hope ... Of course, I don't deny that I've also sometimes had debts.