fat
hands, trotted the proprietor, with a terrified expression too great not
to be assumed. Waiters completed the retinue, wearing faces much whiter
than the napkins slung on their arms.

As the orchestra faced the audience, they perceived this inroad before
the latter and, as by a signal, ceased playing. The startled dancer, for
all her aristocratic self-command, stopped immediately for explanation,
and, riveting her glances on the female head of the intruders, whom she
recognized--that was clear--stood stupor-stricken.

Claudius, following her hint, turned to the center and had no difficulty
in recognizing in the woman arrayed in the Polish pelisse, the chief of
the beggars, Baboushka. He recalled the remark of the Jew, that she
befriended this debutante, and he was averse to believing it. That
delicious creature and this hideous one in ties of communion!
ridiculous, monstrous!

Spite of his concern for himself, Claudius noticed that twenty or thirty
of the spectators, apparently perplexed at the rare conjunction of their
leader and the authorities in friendly communication, would not wait for
the elucidation but began to make a rush for the outlets.

The voice of the town inspector, rotund and sonorous, froze them with
terror, although not personal.

"Gentlemen--(the ladies were apparently here only on sufferance, and the
stage-performer was of no consideration in the authorities'
eyes)--Gentlemen, a murder has been committed and we seek the culprit
here in your midst!"

"Murder!" and the audience rose to their feet like one man.

"Stand up here," said the functionary, pointing to a place on a bench
which a timid spectator had vacated, and pushing Baboushka roughly, "and
point out the man who has made away with the honorable Major von
Sendlingen."

"Major von Sendlingen!" repeated the audience, shocked, as the officer
had been seen but the night previously among them in lusty life, and
death is a spectre most terrible in a saloon of mirth and carousal.

After that general exclamation, a silence ensued; one that meant
acquiescence in the proceedings of the police.

"I must have killed him," thought the student. "This is a black
prospect! I had better have quitted the hall and profited by the
invitation of refuge which Herr Daniels offered me."

For the moment, he could take no part, though he could not doubt that
Baboushka would denounce him--a stranger, and the principal in the duel
with canes. His clo