“Ah, you bring me there a wounded boar!” said Thugut, morosely.
“A boar who splendidly goaded on the hounds and performed the most astonishing exploits,” said Hubschle, enthusiastically. “He received a gunshot wound in the right arm and fainted. I carried him with the assistance of a few friends to a well, and we poured water on him until he recovered his senses and was able again to participate in the general jubilee.”
“Then it was a jubilee? Mr. Wenzel, tell me all about it.”
“It was a very fine affair,” said Wenzel, gasping. “We had penetrated into the house and were working to the best of our power in the magnificent rooms. The furniture, the looking-glasses, the chandeliers, the carriages in the courtyard, every thing was destroyed, while we were singing and shouting, ‘Long live the emperor! God save the Emperor Francis!’”
“What a splendid Marseillaise that dear, kind-hearted Haydn has composed for us in that hymn,” said Thugut, in a low voice, gleefully rubbing his hands. “And the banner? What has become of the banner?”
“The banner we had previously torn to pieces, and with the shreds we had gone to the Schottenplatz and publicly burned them there amidst the jubilant shouts of the people.”
“Very good. And what else was done in the embassy building?”
“We rushed from room to room. Nothing withstood our fury, and finally we arrived at the room in which the ambassador and his suite had barricaded themselves as in a fortress. It was the ambassador’s study,” said Wenzel, slowly and significantly—“the cabinet in which he kept his papers.”
Thugut nodded gently, and said nothing but “Proceed!”
“I rushed toward the door and encouraged the others to follow me. We succeeded in bursting the door open. At the same moment the besieged fired at us. Three of us dropped wounded; the others ran away.”