“I order you to do all that. Now listen to your special commission. A few of my agents will always accompany you. As soon as you are in the ambassador’s house, repair at once to his excellency’s study. Pick up all the papers you will find there, and bring them to me. As soon as I see you enter my room with these papers, you will be free forever!”
“I shall bring you the papers,” exclaimed Wenzel, with a radiant face.
“But listen. Betray to a living soul but one single word of what I have said to you, and not only yourself, but your wife and your children will also be lost! My arm is strong enough to catch all of you, and my ear is large enough to hear every thing.”
“I shall be as silent as the grave,” protested Wenzel, eagerly, “I shall only raise my voice in order to speak to the people about our beloved and wise Minister Thugut, and about the miserable, over-bearing French, who dare to hang out publicly the banner of their bloody republic here in our imperial city, in our magnificent Vienna!”
“That is the right talk, my man! Now go and reflect about every thing I have told you, and to-morrow morning call on me again; I shall then give you further instructions. Now go—go to your wife, and keep the whole matter secret.”
“Hurrah! long live our noble prime minister!” shouted Wenzel, jubilantly. “Hurrah, hurrah, I am free!” And he reeled away like a drunken man.
Thugut looked after him with a smile of profound contempt.
“That is the best way to educate the people,” he said. “Truly, if we could only send every Austrian for one year to the penitentiary, we would have none but good and obedient subjects!”