"So you permit me at last to approach the Prince?" said he, in a somewhat dictatorial tone. "Sit down here by the door," replied the minister; "the Prince goes to dinner shortly, and will pass by this way. You can then speak to him." The young man with the beggar's sack sat for a long time at the Prince's door, till Apafi came out of his room on his way to dinner. The beggar with the knapsack planted himself right in his Highness's way. "Who are you?" asked the Prince, much surprised. "I am that renowned warrior, Emerich Balassa, who once was one of the chief men of Hungary, and now stands before your Highness with the beggar's staff." "You were involved, I understand, in that conspiracy against us?" said Apafi, disagreeably flurried. "That I was not, your Highness. If you would deign to listen to my tale, then----" "Speak!" "There was once in Hungary a famous Turkish freebooter, named Corsar Beg, who for a long time ravaged the mountain regions. The banded might of six counties was insufficient to besiege him in his fortress. This man I captured by subtlety. By promises and flatteries I won over his favourite slave, who enticed him out of his stronghold by night and alone. I, duly advertised thereof, fell upon him with horsemen ambushed in the woods, and took captive both him and his slave, who is the most beautiful and the most abandoned of her sex in the whole world." "I have heard of you, Master Balassa. It was a daring deed." "Listen further, your Highness. No sooner had the news of my capture spread abroad, than the Palatine of Hungary, very emphatically, insisted upon my handing over the prisoners to him. The Turks had already offered me a ransom of sixteen thousand ducats for the pair, but I would not part with the girl at any price. I therefore sent word to the Palatine that if he wanted a Beg of his own he must catch one, for I had not captured mine on his account." Apafi laughed heartily. "That was one for him!" "Thereupon the Palatine waxed wroth, and by the Emperor's command sent out troops against me to rob me of my captives. Now just at this very time, your Highness's brother-in-law, Denis Banfi, had taken refuge in my castle, and to him I entrusted the slave, of whom I was madly enamoured. He was to fly with her to my castle of Ecsed, and as I saw that the Palatine was bent upon securing Corsar Beg for himself in order to cut off his head at Buda as a warning to all malefactors, I gave the Turk poison, which he, to escape the scaffold, thankfully accepted. When, therefore, the troops of the Palatine arrived at my house, all that they found there was the cold corpse, which the Turks afterwards purchased from me for a thousand ducats." "The Palatine was naturally very angry, I suppose?" remarked Apafi.