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Then he asked me to follow him to the police station. A taxi was waiting, and we reached the sombre building after a long drive. There I had to undergo a second cross-examination. I was asked to give all the references I could in Berlin, and after three hours' detention, I was finally released, having promised to report myself every morning to the police-station, and not to leave the Kaiserhof Hotel without letting them know about it.

I must say that the Police Commissair behaved quite decently, and apologised for the trouble he was forced to give me. He even offered me a bad cigar and a worse cup of coffee, which I couldn't refuse, and for which I was certainly more annoyed with him than for the arrest itself.

I stepped out of the decrepit building and found myself in a narrow, tortuous street of old Berlin, without the slightest idea of the direction I had to go to reach the modern part of the city.

After some wandering in narrow streets and irregular squares, which reminded me of some old Flemish town much more than of modern Berlin, I was lucky enough to find a taxi to drive to the post office. I began to ring up some of my old friends in Berlin. In four cases I was unlucky; three were at the front; one had gone to America last year, and though called to arms could not, or did not, trouble to come back. My fifth call was for a lieutenant friend in a cavalry regiment. I had not seen him for years. His sister answered the call, and when I asked for Otto she said, "Why, don't you know he is in hospital? He has been wounded in Belgium, and has been back over five weeks now."