Rantzau-Ascheberg, Köller-Banner, and Von der Osten, formed a triumvirate dangerous to their opponents. As chief aide-de-camp, Köller-Banner received apartments in Frederiksberg Palace, where the court resided in the summer of 1772. Hence Rantzau also procured rooms in the palace; but, as the number of doors and windows annoyed him, he hired lodgings in the village adjoining the palace, and Von der Osten removed to the same spot, so that the three friends were close neighbours. Rantzau also supported in the Generalty College all the propositions that emanated from Köller, while he said simultaneously to Eickstedt, who hated Köller: "Do not suppose that I have any serious understanding with Banner. Certainly not. I only pretend to be his partisan, in order that the Pomeranian may burn his fingers in the candle." Von der Osten displayed equal dissimulation in the council of state, where he supported and praised everything proposed by Schack Rathlau, while in secret calumniating him to the best of his ability. The other conspirators, consequently, began to entertain doubts about their three ambitious and intriguing colleagues, and apprehended that they might even meditate evil designs against the queen dowager and her son. Suddenly it was announced that Rantzau-Ascheberg, at his own request, had been relieved of all his offices, and retired on a pension of 8,000 dollars; and it was generally believed that Russia and Prussia had insisted on his removal. There may be some truth in this, as the Empress Catharine had just ratified the Holstein exchange, and naturally expected something in return. In the highest circles, however, all were glad at being freed from this dangerous man. Suhm, however, tells us, that the decisive cause of Rantzau's dismissal was, that he said about a letter written by the hereditary prince to Guldberg, "Yes, it can be recognised by the style! But was not Struensee's head cut off for the same thing?" Immediately after his retirement from active service, Rantzau quitted Copenhagen, and went to his Holstein estates; but, on October 16, the restless traitor proceeded to Kragsberg, near Odense, in Fühnen, but whether with reactionary purposes remained an enigma. In Copenhagen the return of the dangerous man occasioned such alarm among his former confederates, that, on November 6, Major von Harboe suddenly handed him a royal order to quit the island immediately. Under the major's escort he returned to Ascheberg, and directly after went, _viâ_ Hamburg, to Frankfort, where he cashed a draft of 24,000 florins in the assumed name of Juel. He left Frankfort again as quietly as he had arrived there, and proceeded to the south of France, where he took up his temporary abode at Orange, probably in obedience to royal commands. Afterwards he removed to Avignon, where he spent the rest of his days, and died there, in 1789, in his seventy-second year, without having once revisited his country.