The investigator again treated me to such epithets as "crazy woman, liar, etc." Coming down, I begged the bookkeeper to look over the names of all the employés again. I thought perhaps he was working as a driver, clerk--or at some other job. To get rid of me he asked, 'How does he look?' I had his picture with me and I showed it to the man. He grew pale, and exclaimed: 'That's our boss, Mr. Ap.' All at once he realised what he had said and bent his head over his books. I was thunderstruck. Here he was, the boss of all this and his wife and children starving and begging. So that's the kind of a man he is? The investigator asked the bookkeeper:
"'I don't know,' he answered, and we could get no more information from him. I cried and pleaded--it did not help.
"We returned to the office, where the Manager was told of all that had happened. He listened very patiently and then said: 'Give me the picture--we will attend to that now. Meanwhile, you keep quiet.' Some additional money was given to me and they said that I must not go to the factory. They would watch the place and if it was true that he had gone to Europe we would have to wait his return."
The woman's chest heaved, and cold sweat appeared on her brow and face and arms, as though her whole body were on the rack. She rested a few minutes, drank some water and resumed.
"I waited. True, I could not keep away from the place. Several times I walked past in the hope of getting a glimpse of him. I knew that if I could meet him quietly and talk to him he might relent. I might show him his children. Perhaps he had not recognised me. I had changed so much in the years that had passed since we had last seen one another.
"He was not to be seen, however. Yes, he has grown rich--very rich--he did not want me any longer. He has changed his name--perhaps he has married another woman. All these thoughts came to me. My God!" The woman sobbed again.
"For weeks and weeks my only occupation was to go from home to the charities, from there to Greene Street and back. The Manager of the office at the charities spoke to me several times and asked me details about our former life and condition when we married. I told him all. The truth as ever. One day as I walked down from the elevated on First Street and Third Avenue I saw him again, but this time he was not alone. A woman leaned on his arm. What I suffered! What I endured! I did not approach him. I feared he might again go away. I ran to the office, and told them that he was back. Again I was counselled to keep still. They would attend to it. The next and the third day I asked the Manager whether he had any results. 'No, he had not seen him.' Then on the fourth day he called me into his private room and told me that Mr. Ap. denied that he had ever married me.