ad not come. Why did he not come? Why did he leave him helpless at such
a moment? Axel was determined to face his misfortune quietly; yet the
feeling of absolute impotence, of being as it were bound hand and foot
when there was such dire necessity for immediate action, almost broke
down his resolution.

But it was only for a few hours, he assured himself, walking faster,
thrusting his hands deeper into his pockets, and he could bear anything
for a few hours. His brothers would come to him--to-morrow the first
thing his lawyer would certainly come. It was all so extremely absurd;
yet it was amazing the amount of suffering one such absurd mistake could
inflict. "Thank God," he exclaimed aloud, stopping in his walk, struck
by a new thought, "thank God that I have neither wife nor children." And
he paced up and down again more slowly, his shoulders bent, his head
sunk, a dull flush on his face; he was thinking of Anna.

The door was unlocked, and a warder with a bull's-eye lantern came in
quickly. "The Public Prosecutor is coming up," he said breathlessly.
"When he comes in, you stand at attention and recite your name and the
crime of which you are accused."

He had hardly finished when the Public Prosecutor appeared. The warder
sprang to attention. Axel slowly and unwillingly did the same.

"Well?" snarled the great man, as Axel did not speak. He was an old man,
with a face grown sly and hard during years of association with
criminals, of experiences confined solely to the ugly sides of life.

"My name is Lohm," said Axel, feeling the folly of attempting to defy
anyone so absolutely powerful in the place where he was; and he
proceeded to explain the crime of which he was suspected.

The Public Prosecutor, who knew perfectly well everything about him,
having himself arranged every detail of the arrest, said something
incomprehensible and was going away.

"May I have a light of some sort?" asked Axel, "and writing materials? I
absolutely must be able to----"

"You cannot expect the luxuries of a _Schloss_ here," said the Public
Prosecutor with a scowl, turning on his heel and signing to the warder
to lock the door again. And he continued his rounds, congratulating
himself on having demonstrated that in his independent eye the bearer of
the most ancient name and the offscourings of the street, tried or
untried, were equal--sinners, that is, all of them--and would receive
exactly the same treatment at his hands. Indeed