"Rest, general! Be seated. Be seated. Relate thy heroic deeds to me."
"Relate them I can, but as to sitting I cannot in any way," cries Serrano, in desperation. "Oi!—Pardon, O queen! That cursed Kruchek! I wish to say Don José—Ai, ai! ai!"
Here pain drives away dreaming. Serrano looks around; the candle is burning on the table and spluttering, for just then it begins to burn the fly which had dropped into the tallow; other flies are crawling along the wall Oh! this is the house of four tenements, not the palace of the Escurial! There is no Queen Isabella here. Pan Zolzik recovers presence of mind. He rises in the bed, moistens a cloth in a dish of water standing near the bed, and changes the application on his wound.
Then he turns to the wall, dozes, or rather dreams half asleep, half awake, and is going again evidently by extra post to the Escurial.
"Dear Serrano! my love! I will dress thy wounds myself," whispers Queen Isabella.
Then the hair stands on Serrano's head. He feels the whole horror of his position. How is he to refuse obedience to the queen, and how is he in this case to yield himself to the dressing of his wound? Cold sweat is coming out on his forehead, when suddenly—the queen vanishes, the door opens with a rattle, and before him stands neither more nor less than Don José, Serrano's sworn enemy.
"What dost thou wish? Who art thou?" shouts Serrano.
"I am Repa!" answers Don José, gloomily.
Zolzik wakes a second time; the Escurial becomes the brick house again, the candle is burning, the fly is crackling in the wick, and blue drops are scattered; in the door stands Repa, and behind him—but the pen drops from my hand—through the half-open door are thrust in the head and shoulders of Kruchek. The monster holds his eyes fixed on Pan Zolzik, and seems to laugh.
Cold sweat in very truth is coming out on the temples of Pan Zolzik, and through his head flies the thought, "Repa has come to break my bones, and Kruchek to help him."