CHAPTER IV.
THE KING KEEPS HIS APPOINTMENT.
Whether I had slept a minute or a year I knew not. I awoke with a start and a shiver; my face, hair, and clothes dripped water, and opposite me stood old Sapt, a sneering smile on his face and an empty bucket in his hand. On the table by him sat Fritz von Tarlenheim, pale as a ghost and black as a crow under the eyes.
I leaped to my feet in anger.
"Your joke goes too far, sir!" I cried.
"Tut, man, we've no time for quarreling. Nothing else would rouse you. It's five o'clock."
"I'll thank you, Colonel Sapt——" I began again, hot in spirit, though I was uncommonly cold in body.
"Rassendyll," interrupted Fritz, getting down from the table and taking my arm, "look here."
The king lay full length on the floor. His face
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