Fair Ida flew to him and hung round his neck; but he shook her off roughly, for there at the head of the drinkers he beheld the Candidate Kurt Brenckenberg smug and smiling as ever, and a cruel satisfaction thrilled through him. "The fellow is now in my clutches," he said to himself; "and so I shall not go to another world without having avenged the insult my family has suffered from this impudent cur." The Halewitz bailiffs, at the entrance of the new-comers, had risen respectfully to give up their seats, but the candidate, though visibly paler, pretended not to have noticed or seen any one come in. Leo went up to him. "I have something to say to you, Herr Kurt Brenckenberg." "You know where to find me, Herr Leo von Sellenthin," replied the Candidate, without stirring from his place. "Thank God I have found you," Leo replied. The boy struggled to put on his most arrogant air. "Excuse me, Herr von Sellenthin," he said, toying nervously with the badge in his buttonhole. "I must remind you that I am corps-student, and know what is etiquette in these matters. Once before you have treated me in this extraordinary fashion. Please leave me alone. I have no time to give you at present." Something like pity awoke in Leo, as he smiled down on this wretched little upstart bristling with pugnacity. At another time he might have challenged him to face his pistol, and might have shot him down, but now that his own death-knell had sounded, such a course seemed hardly worth while and to belong too much to the things that did not matter; to the petty despicable affairs of the world on which his hold was loosening. Nevertheless he determined to give the young man a lesson, so that his foolish little sister should be safe from his impertinent attentions for the future. "Get up!" he roared, seizing him by the arm, and putting him on his feet. The Candidate raised his fist to strike him in the face. But before he could carry out his intention Leo's left hand gripped both his wrists as in a vice. The fair-haired Ida screamed loudly and ran out. The bailiffs drew aside perturbed, and Hans Sembritzky initiated the rest of his party in the cause of the quarrel. For a few minutes dead silence reigned in the stuffy, crowded room, which was insufficiently lighted by one smoking lamp. The Candidate in his frantic efforts to free his hands bounded up and down like a dancing doll. "You young blackguard," said Leo; "instead of sitting on your form at school you swagger about the countryside and play the devil. If your old father won't spank you I must."