From the windows, which opened onto a broad courtyard, rose muffled, rhythmic hammer blows, apparently from a carpentry shop, and the howls of a dog. There was an antique, stuffy, and slightly sour smell in the room, which reminded him of the distinctive smell of the historical museum for weapons and military uniforms. After a moment it was joined by the pungent aroma of boiling coffee filtering through the doorway. Franzi Mitteldorfer removed her hat and tidied her boyishly cropped grey hair opposite the mirror on the cupboard door. Suddenly a baby began to cry from the next room, and the young woman hurried out after begging her guest’s pardon and handing him a big, thick photograph album. Gurdweill opened the album mechanically and read on the thick, grey-green frontispiece, in red ink and a round, fair hand: To dear Franzi, etc. He did not read the verse that followed, written in the same fair hand. Suddenly he felt that he was a thousand miles away from himself, from his way of life, his usual environment, and even from the city of Vienna itself — as if he had been miraculously removed to a remote and foreign country, and set among the people of an unfamiliar race. The cries of the baby in the next room died down, but the carpenter in the courtyard below went on hammering. The first picture in the album showed a youth standing, strong and slender, with his hair parted in the middle and a downy growth on his upper lip. His face told Gurdweill nothing. He turned the page and saw another picture of a seated girl, with a high bosom beneath a white blouse, and thick blonde hair covering her forehead in a heavy fringe. The girl was apparently trying to smile, but succeeded only in twisting her lips into a peculiar grimace.

In the meantime the door opened and the old woman entered bearing a tray with coffee cups, which she placed on the table. Immediately afterwards her daughter came in with a baby in her arms. The baby was about eight months old, with fat cheeks and a pointed forehead crowned with a quiff of thin, colourless hair standing up like a coxcomb. The baby smiled toothlessly and brandished a plump little fist in Gurdweill’s face, to the delight of the two women.

‘He likes you, the little treasure,’ said the young mother, pushing a curl out of her eyes with her free hand. ‘Fritzi, my little one, the gentleman found Mummy in the street and brought her home to you so that you wouldn’t cry, and now she’s going to stay with you forever and ever.’