distorted, and yet there was the ghost of a smile on his lips as
he saw his captors enter the door. He put his hand out, raised
his handkerchief hastily and then a wild scream echoed through the
room, a scream that ended in a ghastly groan.

"I have taken your bottle, you might as well give yourself up
quietly," said Muller calmly, holding his revolver near Langen's
face. The prisoner threw himself at the detective but was caught
and overpowered by Amster and the policeman.

A quarter of an hour later the cabs drove back toward the city.
Inside one cowered Egon Langen, watched by the policeman and Amster.
Berner was on the box beside the driver, telling the now interested
man the story of what had happened to his dear young lady. In the
other cab sat Asta Langen with Kurt von Mayringen and Muller.

"Do you feel better now?" asked the young commissioner in sincere
sympathy that was mingled with admiration for the delicate beauty
of the girl beside him, an admiration heightened by her romantic
story and marvelous escape.

Asta nodded and answered gently: "I feel as if some terrible weight
were lifted from my heart and brain. But I doubt if I will ever
forget these horrible days, when I had already come to accept it as
a fact that - that I was to be murdered."

"This is the man to whom you owe your escape," said the commissioner,
laying his hand on Muller's knee. Asta did not speak, but she
reached out in the darkness of the cab, caught Muller's hand and
would have raised it to her lips, had not the little man drawn it