I did not know what my guests thought of my proceedings that night. I did not care. I was going back to the Harzland, to the Regenstein, to Ilsa, to Martin Luther. The accursed lotus eating of the past months would cease. Life would be real; and come pain, come joy, come hell, come heaven--they, too, would be real. I was too delighted at the thought that I had truly chosen the man’s part, and would play it, to endeavor to shape ways and means how I might creditably dismiss my associates from Palaestro, and find occasion for returning to Germany. Long, very long, I sat in the black room, till Marianna’s candle had flickered down to its socket; then at last the door and the arras were cautiously pushed one side. Rabbi Isaac Sarfati, the Cardinal of Forli’s Jewish body physician drew his white beard and long dark cloak into the room. “The Conte is sadly indisposed;” he began, gliding about with his long fingers; “he is excited. He will be the better for sleep. Allow my officiousness to prevail. If he will but go to bed, and then a draught--” The deep booming of the tower clock announcing the hour after midnight reënforced his suggestion. I rose hastily. “Yes, yes,” I assented, “it is late. Let me retire.” Andrea, who had been anxiously waiting without, entered on the first sign, and I was assisted to bed. Rabbi Sarfati was there with his silver cup. In a more cautious mood I would have hesitated at the heavily spiced liquor he forced upon me, but at the moment I was utterly unsuspicious. I felt sight and sound leaving me, and for many hours must have been plunged in profound slumber. * * * * * When I awoke, I was in a small, mean room with narrow windows, and these with view only over a distant landscape. The furniture was dingy, the floor mere gray tiling. From the angle of the sunbeams one could tell it was past noon. I rose with a sudden start, but was plucked back by a hammer-like throbbing in my head. All my bones seemed to ache together. I gave a faint groan from the mingled pain and weakness. My call to Andrea brought at first no answer, but in a moment I saw beside the bed the olive face of Eugenio, one of Forli’s favorite body-servants. “How in Satan’s name, rascal,” I began, “came I here? And how came you here? I don’t take snakes such as you into my service. What has happened?” The fellow grinned most impudently before he replied. “The Conte should be calm. He is very sick.” “He was very well last night and will be well enough now to break a cane over you soon.” Again I started up. Again a sense of abject weakness and pain sent me back upon the pillows. I could only curse under my breath. “At least,” I ordered, “fetch hither Andrea.” “That is not commanded,” was the reply. “Not commanded? And who gives commands in Palaestro save myself? Was the castle stormed last night, or am I turned mad?”