A Rich Return on Her Honesty : Reward: Homeless woman who finds $25,000 check gives it back. ‘I feel better and that’s that,’ says Marlene Dallugge.

For a homeless woman forced to learn the brutal lessons of life on the streets, it was simply the right thing to do.

On Thursday, Marlene Dallugge returned a check for $25,000 she had found while scouring the streets for what she called “collectibles.” It was a small act of honesty that brought her a $100 reward and a lot of satisfaction.

“It is hard to find a $25,000 check on the sidewalk and give it up,” said a grateful Henry Spitzer, president of Topco Inc., the payee on the check. “It is like winning the Lotto for someone like her and being just one number off.”

“I feel better and that’s that,” Dallugge said after returning the check.

Dallugge, who said she is a former trapeze artist, has been down on her luck since the Northridge earthquake. She was living in a Woodland Hills home owned by her father, but was forced to leave when the badly damaged house was demolished, she said. After renting a string of rooms, Dallugge said she began living out of her car about a week ago.

“I have never found anything of this amount,” she told Spitzer. “Six or seven people walked past it before I picked it up.”

Dallugge said she never even thought of trying to cash the check, on which payment had been stopped the day it was lost.

“She has lived here her whole life and there are so many people like her in the Valley who are having a difficult time,” Spitzer said after meeting her in a diner. “I see them everyday.”

Dallugge’s only request of Spitzer was for a photocopy of the check.

“I want to show my dad, he will be so proud,” she said.