Mabuse, tottering so that he was obliged to hold on to the edge of the table to save himself from falling, stuttered: “Spoerri, do you think there is anyone whose will is strong enough for him to kill someone else without even touching him?” But Spoerri did not understand him. He looked up at his master with glassy eyes, stupid yet faithful, troubled and sick. “_I_ can! and I shall do it, too!... Sleep,” he said suddenly, and rising, he spurned the other with his foot. He took a few steps forward, having to seek support. Then he pulled himself together, and his will-power was held as it were within an iron vice. Rigidly upright, without a sign of swaying, inflamed with drink and in a state of exaltation, he went into the room the Countess occupied and remained with her without saying a word. And from that hour of humiliation this woman, too, acknowledged his supremacy. She forgot her past, forgot her very self, and submitted willingly to her master. * * * * * During the night Mabuse started for Lake Constance. Just as he was approaching the villa at Schachen, having extinguished his lights, he narrowly missed a collision with the engine of the steam-roller which was standing in the road a few yards from the garden entrance. It was directly in front of him when he applied his brakes, and he therefore did not drive up to the house, but continued along the road for another kilometre, then left the car standing and went back to the house by the shore-path. “Why did you not tell me the steam-roller was here?” he asked George imperiously. “Even a match-box lying out in the street might betray us. Go and fetch the car, quickly! It is on the highroad near Wasserburg. Put it away and come straight back here.” * * * * * Next morning the telephone bell woke Wenk from his sleep. “News from the steam-roller,” he heard, and was at once wide awake. “Yes, yes; please go on.” “Last night about two o’clock a car arrived, and pulled up directly in front of our engine, then drove on again. As it was driving without lights, I ordered Schmied to follow on a bicycle. He found it about a kilometre further on, left alone by the roadside, and came back at once to report. I stole into the garden of the villa, but the dog began barking and I went outside round the shore. I saw a man come from the direction of the lake and go into the house. When Schmied and I went back to find the car it had vanished. There is nothing to be noticed this morning!” “Thanks. You can expect me there to-day.” * * * * *