"This is he," I said. "I caught him prying in my room and he died."

"Ach!" she ejaculated ... and in her voice was all the world of
admiration that a German woman feels for brute man.... "The Herr
Englander came into your room and he died. So, so! But one must speak to
Franz. The man drinks too much. He is always drunk. He makes mistakes.
It will not do. I will...."

"I wish you to do nothing against Franz," I said. "This Englishman spoke
German well: Karl will tell you."

"As the gentleman wishes," was the woman's reply in a voice so silky and
so servile that I felt my gorge rise.

"She looks like a slug!" I said to myself, as she stood there, fat and
sleek and horrible.

"Here are his passport and other papers," I said, bending down and
taking them from the dead man's pocket. "He was an English officer, you
see?" And I unfolded the little black book stamped with the Royal Arms.

She leant forward and I was all but stifled with the stale odour of the
patchouli with which her faded body was drenched.

Then, making a sheaf of passport and permit, I held them in the flame of
the candle.

"But we always keep them!" expostulated the hotel-keeper.

"This passport must die with the man," I replied firmly. "He must not be