The man answered, "I am getting the horses ready for the start."
"We do not start till five o'clock. Take them back at once to the stable." The officer pretended not to see Fritz, who had to slink back at his heels to the barn, fully conscious that his chance to escape was gone.
News of this attempt reached the King, and the next day, when he met his son, he said sarcastically, "Ah, you are still here then? I thought that by this time you would have been in Paris."
All the boy's spirit had not been crushed out of him, and he dared to answer, "I certainly would have been there now had I really wished it."
Again he tried to escape, and again he was caught, and this time he was brought directly to the King. The father stared at his son as though he were some wild beast, and then said angrily: "Why did you attempt to desert?"
"I wanted to escape because you never treat me like your son, but like some common slave."
"You're a cowardly deserter," said the King, "without any feelings of honor."
"I have as much honor as you have," answered Fritz, "and I've done only what I've heard you say you would have done if you had been treated as I have."
The King, maddened beyond description, drew his sword, and would have struck the boy had not a general in attendance thrown himself between them, exclaiming: "Sire, you may kill me, but spare your son."
The boy was taken out of the room and locked in prison, where he was guarded by two sentries with fixed bayonets. The King proclaimed him a deserter from the army, and ordered him tried for that crime. It is small wonder that Fritz declared he would have been glad to exchange his place for that of the poorest serf in Prussia.