"I am injured," the Baron replied, with a loud laugh. "My left leg—ha-ha-ha!—is nearly killing me—hee-hee!—with p-pain, and if I mistake not, either my heart—ha-ha-ha-ha!—or my ribs—hee-hee-hee!—are broken in nineteen places."
Then he went off into such an explosion of mirth as not only appeared unseemly, but also deprived him of the power of speech for five or six minutes.
"I fail to see the joke," said the physician, as the Baron's laughter echoed and reechoed throughout the forest.
"Th-there—hee-hee!—there isn't a-any joke," the Baron answered, smiling. "Confound you—ha-ha-ha-ha!—oho-ho-ho!—can't you see I'm suffering?"
"I see you are laughing," the physician replied—"laughing as if you were reading a comic paper full of real jokes. What are you laughing at?"
"Ha-ha! I—I d-dud-don't know," stammered the Baron, vainly endeavoring to suppress his mirth. "I—I don't feel like laughing—hee-hee!—but I can't help it." And off he went into another gale. Nor did he stop there. The physician tried vainly to quiet him down so that he could set the fractured bones, but in spite of all he could do for him the Baron either would not or could not stop laughing. When he was able to move about again it was only with a limp, and even that appeared to have its humorous side, for whenever the Baron appeared on the public streets he was always smiling, and when the Mayor ventured to express his sympathy with him over his misfortune the Baron laughed again, and mirthfully requested him to mind his own business.
Then it was recalled how that ten years before, when the famous Von Pepperpotz Castle was destroyed by fire, the Baron was found writing in his study by the messenger who brought the news.
"Baron," the messenger cried—"Baron, the château is burning. The flames have already destroyed the armory, and are now eating their way through the corridors to the state banquet-hall."
The Baron looked the messenger in the eye for an instant, and then his face wreathed with smiles.