But Dumnoff yielded to the inevitable; a couple of well-planted blows delivered by the rescuing party on the sides of his thick skull made him shake his head as a cat does when its nose is sprinkled with water, and the mujik reluctantly relinquished the struggle.
At the same time the porter who had claimed the doll came forward and touched his bare head with a military salute.
"What is your name ?" asked the first policeman, anxious to get to business.
"Jacob Goggelmann, Dienstmann number 87, formerly private in the Fourth Artillery, lately messenger in the Thueringer Doll Manufactory." "Very good," said the policeman, anxious to take the side of his countryman from the first, and certainly justified in doing so by the circumstances.

"And what is your complaint ?" "That doll, there, on the table," said the porter, "was stolen from me on New Year's eve, and now that man"-- he pointed to the Count, who stood stiffly looking on--"that man has got possession of it." "And who stole it from you ?" inquired the policeman with that acuteness in the art of cross-examination for which the police are in all countries so justly famous.
"Ja, Herr Wachtmeister, if I had known that--" suggested the porter.
"Of course, of course," interrupted the other.

"That man stole the doll from you, you say ?" "Somebody stole it with my basket, as I stopped to drink a measure in the yard of the Hofbraeuhaus, and I had to pay for it out of my caution money, and I lost my place into the bargain, and there lies the accursed thing." The policeman, apparently quite satisfied with the porter's story, turned upon the Count with a blustering and overbearing manner.
"Now, then," he said, roughly, "give an account of yourself.

Who are you and what are you doing here?
But that is a foolish question; I know already that you are a Bohemian and a journeyman tinker." "A Bohemian?
And a journeyman tinker ?" repeated the Count, almost speechless with anger for a moment.

"I am neither," he added, endeavouring to control himself, and settling his refractory collar with one hand.