moment! Madame la Concierge shall
receive them."

This idea tickled the young men exceedingly. They had little to fear
from the police, unless it was the chance identification on the Place
de la Concorde. But these things are rarely pushed.

Madame la Concierge was quickly arranged, her candle lighted. Then the
other light was turned down.

When the door was slowly opened four police officers, headed by the
commissary of the quarter, entered.

But they stopped abruptly on the threshold. The hideous skeleton with
the candle confronted them. A sepulchral voice demanded,--

"Who knocks so loudly at an honest door?"

It is no impeachment of the courage and efficiency of the Paris police
to say that the men recoiled in terror from this horrible apparition.
So suddenly, in fact, that the two agents in the rear were
precipitated headlong down the short flight. The other two vanished
scarcely less hastily. A fifth man, who had evidently been following
the agents at a respectful distance, received the full impact of the
falling bodies, and with one terrified yell sank almost senseless on
the stair.

This man was the cabman who had brought Jean Marot to Le Petit Rouge.

The veteran commissary, however, flinched only for an instant. Having
served many years in the Quartier Latin, he was no stranger to the
pranks and customs of medical students. The next instant he had his
foot in the doorway, to retain his advantage, and was calling his men
a choice assortment of Parisian names. To emphasize this he entered
and gave Madame la Concierge a kick that caused her poor old bones to
rattle.

"For shame!" cried young Massard, laughingly, turning up the light.
"To kick an old woman!"

"Now here, gentlemen, students,--you are a nice lot!"

"Thanks! Monsieur le Commissaire," replied Lerouge, with a polite bow.

"You are quite aware, gentlemen," continued the stern official, "that
you are responsible at this moment for any injury to my men?"

"No, monsieur," retorted Lerouge in his dry fashion; "but, if any
bones are broken we'll set 'em."

"Free of charge," added Villeroy.

"I want none of your impudence, monsieur! What's your name?"

"George Villeroy, 7 Rue du Pot de Fer, medical student, aged
twenty-four, single, born at Tours."

Well these young roysterers knew the police formula! Armand Massard
gave in his record at a nod. The veteran commissary wrote the replies
down.

"And what is your name, monsieur?"

"Henri