"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 cloak would help toward the identification and unless
the hag's crew had abstracted it, it would be forthcoming, he doubted
not.

Indeed, elevated on her perch, able to see the faces of all around her,