Before this flood of armed men we retired backward into the darkened room, where Tilly was reclining breathlessly against a post of the bed, from beneath which Bandolo, with a savage and lacrymose visage, blackened and distorted by rage and strangulation, was already crawling forth.
We were about to be cut down without farther parley, when Tilly, remembering that I had spared his life, and Count Kœningheim, who hurried forward in his breeches and boots, minus vest and doublet, threw themselves between us and death, and saved us for a time.
"Withhold your hand, Bandolo—count, secure these villains!" said Tilly; "away with them to the quarter-guard, I will deal with them in the morning. Search this, and all the other apartments; double all the sentinels, for I fear me much there has been treachery."
We were immediately hurried away to a lower apartment, and handcuffed together.
On the way we passed old Spürrledter, who had been alarmed by the uproar, and appeared in his shirt, blowing the match of his carbine. On beholding us, he gaped with well-feigned astonishment, which we understood quite well, and thus neither compromised the count nor the old corporal, who, with horses for our flight, had been waiting in an adjacent thicket for three hours, as he afterwards told me; and further, that the moment Tilly was fairly in his own apartment, that he—the corporal—had come in search of us, and, being totally unable to account for our mysterious disappearance at a time so critical, had retired to bed in the stables, supposing that we had escaped without him.
Book the Fifth.
CHAPTER XXVII.
THE MARCH TOWARDS LAUENBURG.
It may be easily supposed that neither Dandy Dreghorn nor I slept much for the short remainder of that eventful morning. Poor Dandy's lamentations for the plight into which his sneeze had brought me, were incessant. The honest fellow never uttered a complaint for himself; but, having lost his appetite, resisted all the gruff invitations of our guard, who offered to share us their miserable ration of black bread and Danish beer. It required all my efforts to pacify my comrade, and convince him that he had no more power over an irrepressible desire to sneeze, than over the wind.
With the grey dawn Tilly came forth, accompanied by several officers muffled in their mantles, with their helmets closed or their plumed hats slouched well over their faces, for the morning air was chilly. The sharp notes of the trumpet summoned a troop of Kœningheim's Reitres to horse, and with these Tilly trotted away, leaving four dismounted men, with their carbines loaded, and orders to conduct Dreghorn and myself to a certain place which he named. As we were marched off, I gave a parting glance at the gothic lattices of the old mansion, and two female figures caught my eye. They were those of Ernestine and the kind-hearted Gabrielle. I perceived that the latter was weeping, but the former only waved her hand in adieu. I gave a profound bow, for which the surly corporal of our escort gave me a punch with his carbine, and we were compelled to move on.