e poor woman had fainted.

"Oh! Kasper," cried Annette, wringing her hands, "what is to be done?
Fly! fly! You may have been heard! Did you kill her?" "Kill her? I?" "I
am so glad! But fly! I will open the door for you." She unbarred it, and
I fled into the street, without stopping even to thank her; but I was so
terrified and there was not a moment to lose. The night was inky black;
not a star in the sky, and the street lamps unlighted. The weather was
abominable; it was snowing hard and the wind howled dismally. Not until
I had run for a good half-hour did I stop to take breath. Imagine my
horror when I found myself directly opposite the Pied de Mouton Tavern.
In my terror I had run around the square a dozen times for aught I knew.
My legs felt like lead and my knees tottered under me.

The inn, but a moment before deserted, swarmed like a bee-hive, and
lights danced about from window to window. It was evidently filled with
the police. And now, at my wits' end, desperate, exhausted with cold
and hunger, and not knowing where to find refuge, I resolved upon the
strangest possible course. "By Jove," I said to myself, "as well be
hanged as leave my bones on the road to the Black Forest." And I walked
into the tavern with the intention of giving myself up to the officials.
Besides the fellows with their cocked hats tilted rakishly over their
ears, and the clubs fastened to their wrists, whom I had already seen
in the morning, and who were now running here and there, and turning
everything upside down, there was the bailiff, Zimmer, standing before
one of the tables, dressed in black, with a grave air and penetrating
glance, and near him the secretary Roth, with his red wig, imposing
countenance, and large ears, flat as oyster shells. They paid no
attention to my entrance, and this circumstance altered my resolution at
once. I sat down in a corner of the room behind the big cast-iron stove,
in company with two or three of the neighbors, who had run hither to
see what was going on, and I ordered a pint of wine and a dish of
sauerkraut. Annette came near betraying me. "Goodness!" she cried, "is
it possible!" But one exclamation, more or less, in such a babel of
voices possessed but little significance. It passed unnoticed, and,
while I ate with a ravenous appetite, I listened to the examination to
which Dame Gredel was subjected as she lay back in a large armchair, her
hair falling down and her eyes bulged out with fright. "