He now hurried rapidly along the opposite side; his bearing was as vigorous and energetic as it had just been bowed and feeble; and with the wrinkles and gray hair every trace of age had also vanished he was now a young man, but the large black eyes, with their bold, fiery gaze, suited the rosy cheeks and fair hair as little as they had formerly harmonized with the old man’s pallid countenance.  But at any rate the present youthfulness was no disguise, and the swift, vigorous movements were no assumption; that was evident from the ease and speed with which the baron, after entering one of the handsomest houses in the Grabenstrasse, ran up the stairs, never pausing until he had mounted the third flight.  Beside the bell of a glass door, on a shining brass plate, was engraved the name of Count von Kotte.  Baron von Moudenfels pulled this bell so violently that it echoed loudly, and at the door, which instantly opened, appeared a liveried servant with an angry face, muttering with tolerable distinctness something about unseemly noise and rude manners.

“Is Count von Kotte at home?” asked the baron hastily.

“No,” muttered the lackey, “the count isn’t at home, and it wasn’t necessary to ring so horribly loud to ask the question.”

He stepped back and was about to close the door again, but the baron thrust his foot between it and the frame and seized the man’s sleeve.

“My good fellow, I must see the count,” he said imperiously.

“But when I tell you that the count isn’t—­”

He stopped suddenly in the middle of his sentence and cast a stolen glance at the florin which the baron had pressed into his hand.

“Announce me to Count von Kotte,” said the baron pleasantly.  “He will certainly receive me.”

“Your name, sir?” asked the lackey respectfully.

“Commissioner Kraus,” was the reply.  The man withdrew, and, a few minutes after, returned with a smiling face.

“The count is at home and begs the gentleman to come in,” he said, throwing the door wide open and standing respectfully beside it.

Commissioner Kraus, smiling, stepped past him into the anteroom.  A door on the opposite side opened, and the tall figure of a man attired in the Austrian uniform appeared.

“Is it really you, my dear Kraus!” he cried.  “So you have returned already.  Come, come, I have longed to see you.”

Holding out his hand to the visitor, he drew him hastily into the next room.

“You have longed to see me, my dear count,” said Kraus, laughing, “and yet I was within an ace of being turned from your door.  Since when have you lived in a barricaded apartment, count?”

“Since the spies of the French governor of Vienna, Count Andreossy, have watched my door and pursued my every step,” replied the count, smiling.  “But now speak, my dear Kraus.  You went to Totis?  You talked with the Emperor Francis?”

“I went to Totis and talked with the Emperor Francis.”