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“Yes, I’ve been run over,” answered Henck.

“That’s just like you,” said Richardt, laughing good-humoredly. “But you can’t go home like that. You may gladly have the loan of my fur coat, and I’ll send a boy home after my ulster.”

“Thanks,” said Dr. Henck. And after he had borrowed the hundred krona he needed, he added, “We shall be glad to have you for dinner.”

Richardt was a bachelor and was accustomed to spend Christmas Eve with Henck.

On the way home Henck was in a better humor than he had been for a long time.

That’s on account of the fur coat, he said to himself. If I had been smart, I should have got myself a fur coat on credit long ago. It would have strengthened my self-esteem and raised me in the popular opinion. One can’t pay such a small fee to a doctor in a fur coat as to a doctor in an ordinary overcoat with worn button-holes. It’s a bother that I didn’t happen to think of that before. Now it’s too late.

He walked a stretch through King’s Garden. It was dark already, it had begun to snow again, and the acquaintances he met did not recognize him.