"Nearly twenty, mein herr." "Good. Are you the keeper of the Wilde Katze?" "No--my father is." "Would you like to earn easily a rix-dollar?" "That will I do readily, mein herr," said the girl, coming briskly forward, for a rix-dollar was then about the value of four of our guineas. "Then you must deliver a note for me?" "Where?" "In the city." "And to whom, mein herr? "To the Colonel von Warriston at the palace near the Wiesse Saal. The girl, little suspecting what was in store for her, curtseyed and signified her readiness, while the king, drawing forth his tablets, and using his holster for a desk, wrote to my father in this manner:-- "MY DEAR COLONEL VON WARRISTON, "On receipt of this order, you are to marry _the tallest_ of your grenadiers to the bearer thereof, taking particular care to have the ceremony performed in your own presence; and for the execution of this, I hold you responsible. "FRIEDRICH." "P.S.--If he refuse, to Spandau with him, until further orders." "Can you read, fraulein?" asked he, while folding this remarkable order. "No, mein herr." "Good; then there is the less use for a seal, which I have not here." He placed the note and the rix-dollar in the large fair hand of the girl, and added, "I have noted this place--the Wilde Katze in my tablets, and I trust to your honesty and fidelity, Gretchen, in delivering my note without delay, as the matter is of great consequence to me, and may not prove unpleasant to yourself." And giving her a look that somehow impressed her, he put spurs to his old charger, and shambled off. As ignorant of the contents of the letter as of the exalted rank of its writer, Gretchen Viborg was hurrying along the road towards Berlin, when she suddenly remembered that she had to keep an appointment with her lover, a remarkably jealous little fellow, who had a mill on the Spree--an assignation which the delivery of this note would completely mar! While pausing to consider this dilemma, honesty impelling her forward, and love or fear staying her steps, she met an old crone who was employed by her at the Wilde Katze, to till the ground, carry wood and do other out-door work; and supposing it was all one _who_ delivered the note, provided that it safely reached its destination, she offered her a ducat to bear it to the palace near the White Hall. Now this old crone could read; she scanned the note, saw the whole bearings of the case, and knew who the writer was in an instant. She grinned a horrible grin of intense satisfaction, undertook the mission, and already beheld in prospect her victim--the tallest grenadier!