“Ah, you are there yet, are you?  Tell Lois I asked for him, and that I will see him to-morrow some time.  I’ll see you again, of course, for you’ll have to wait several days for him.  You didn’t think we had such a fine time here, did you?  No need to take life hard just because we may lose it any day.”

The old man looked keenly at his master.

“Yes, the gentlemen were jolly enough, and you were the ring-leader, but—­your highness is not gay now.”

“I?  What’s the matter now?  Why shouldn’t I be gay?”

“I don’t know, but I see you are not happy,” declared Stadinger.  “When you were at Rodeck with Herr Rojanow you were quite different.  As you stood looking into the fire just now I could see that something lay on your heart.”

“Don’t bother me with your observations,” exclaimed Egon impatiently.  “Do you think I should never have a serious thought, when it may be we go into battle to-morrow?”

Then he resumed his old position, and Stadinger, though silent, was unconvinced.  He knew full well that something was the matter with his master, that it was no thought of battle which clouded his sunny face.  The door opened and Lieutenant Walldorf entered without closing it.

“Come in,” he cried to some one behind him.  “Here’s an orderly from the seventh regiment with some information.  Come in, orderly!”

Walldorf repeated his invitation to enter in an impatient tone.  The soldier who stood on the threshold of the door had hesitated, and made a movement to retreat into the darkness again.  Now he obeyed; he remained close to the door, his face in the shadow.

“You come from the outpost yonder on chapel mountain?” questioned Walldorf.

“At your service, Herr lieutenant.”

Egon, who had turned round indifferently when the soldier entered, started as he heard the voice.  He took a hasty step forward, then halted suddenly, as if he remembered something, but his glance embraced the stranger with a look almost of horror.  He was, as far as one could see in the semi-darkness, a tall young soldier wrapped in the coarse mantle of the private, with a helmet over his closely cut black hair.  He stood stiff and immovable, and gave his message minutely.  His voice had a suppressed, almost suffocated tone.

“I come from Herr Captain Salfeld!” he announced.  “We have seized a suspicious looking man, dressed as a peasant, but probably from the relief corps, who was sneaking into the fortress.  There was some writing found on him.”

“Come over closer,” ordered Walldorf sharply.  “I can’t hear you over there by the door.”

The soldier obeyed at once, and stepped up to the officers.  The firelight gleamed full upon the face, which was pallid, and on the tightly compressed lips, but not on the eyes, for they seemed fastened to the ground.

Egon’s hand seized the hilt of his sabre with convulsive grasp; it was all he could do not to cry out, while Stadinger stared at the man with wide open eyes.