On the police department's identification blank Daniel had called
himself a musician. Frau Hadebusch brought the paper into her living
room, which, like all the rooms of the house, seemed built for dwarfs
and reeked of limewater and lye. It was at the day's end, and in the
room were assembled Herr Francke and Herr Benjamin Dorn, who lodged on
the second floor, and Frau Hadebusch's son, who was weak-minded and
crouched grinning beside the stove.

Herr Francke was a town traveller for a cigar house, and was regarded as
a good deal of a Don Juan by the female servants of the neighbourhood.
Benjamin Dorn was a clerk in the Prudentia Life Insurance Company,
belonged to a Methodist congregation, and was respected by all the
respectable on account of his Christian walk and conversation.

These gentlemen examined the document thoroughly and with frowns. Herr
Francke gave it as his opinion that a musician who never made music
could scarcely be regarded as one.

"He's probably pawned his bass violin or bugle or whatever he was
taught," he said contemptuously; "perhaps he can only beat a drum. Well,
I can do that too if I have one."

"Yes, you've got to have a drum to be a drummer," Benjamin Dorn
remarked. "The question, however, is whether such a calling is in
harmony with the principles of Christian modesty." He laid his finger on
his nose, and added: "It is a question which, with all proper humility,
all proper humility, you understand, I would answer in the negative."

"He hasn't any relatives and no acquaintances at all," Frau Hadebusch
wailed, and her voice sounded like the scraping of carrots on a grater;
"and no employment and no prospects and no boots or clothes but what
he's got on. In all my life I haven't had no such lodger."

The blank fluttered to the floor, whence the weak-minded Hadebusch Jr.
picked it up, rolled it in the shape of a bag, and applied that bag,
trumpet-like, to his lips, a procedure which caused the document in
question to be gradually soaked through and thus withdrawn from its
official uses. Frau Hadebusch was too little concerned over the police
regulations to take further thought of her duties as the keeper of a
lodging house.

Herr Francke drew from his pocket a pack of greasy cards and began to
shuffle them. Frau Hadebusch giggled and it sounded like a witch
rustling in the fire. The Methodist conquered his pious scruples, and
placed his pfennigs on the table; the town-traveller turned