ere so scant that
it was impossible for him to pay his premiums regularly; with the
expiration of each week it became increasingly difficult to make up the
back payments, and, before he knew precisely what had happened, his
policy had been declared void, and the money he had paid in on it
confiscated.

In this way the company made millions. It was the pfennigs of the
poorest classes that constituted these millions, made the dividends rise
higher and higher, increased the army of clerks, and filled the pockets
of the agents.

These agents were recruited from the scum of human society. They were
made up of bankrupts, decadent students, gamblers, topers, and beggars.
They came from the ranks of those who had been pursued by misfortune
and who bore the marks of crime. No one was too small or too bad.

Alfons Diruf, however, saw that it would vastly improve the credit of
the company if to this list of outcasts he would add a few eminently
respectable citizens. He consequently went out on his own
responsibility, and looked for help. His quest brought him to Jason
Philip Schimmelweis.

"It's a gold mine," he said; "you work for an ideal, and you get
something out of it for yourself. Ideals, incidentally, that are not
profitable are idiotic." With that he blew the smoke of his Havana cigar
through his nose.

Jason Philip understood. It was not necessary to flatter the leader and
politician that was admittedly in him. He nearly ran his legs off
working for the company. Alfons Diruf loved this socialist bookkeeper,
after a fashion.

Inspector Jordan saw however that the countless brokers were encroaching
on his territory and stirring up distrust on the part of his better
clients. He lost his interest. The directors felt obliged to send Alfons
Diruf a critical memorandum explaining Jordan's case, and showing that
he was no longer as efficient as he used to be.

II

Daniel had grown tired of his room in the attic and the society of
brush-maker Hadebusch. He announced that he was going to move.
Surrounded by a cloud of smells from boiled cabbage, Frau Hadebusch
raged about the ingratitude of man. Her shrieks called Herr Francke and
the Methodist from out their warm holes; the brush-maker and his
imbecile son also appeared in the dimly lighted vestibule; and before
these five Hogarth figures stood the defenceless sinner, Daniel
Nothafft.

He looked about in the suburbs of St. Mary, but