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The major turned his head aside with an air of indifference.

“One single fact suffices to discount everything you have said, Baron,” he replied dryly. “You have twice attempted to escape from the fortress. An innocent man awaits his trial with confidence, knowing that it cannot be other than favorable. The culprit alone flees.”

Trenck, though quivering with blind rage, continued to maintain his former attitude, his features composed, his eyes fixed upon the major’s sword.

“Sir,” he said, “in three weeks, on the twenty-fifth of September, I shall have been a prisoner for one year. You in your position may not have found the time long, but to me it has dragged interminably. And it has been still harder for me to bear because I have not been able to count the days or hours which still separate me from justice and liberty. If I knew the limit set to my captivity–no matter what it may be–I could surely find resignation and patience to await it.”

“It is most unfortunate, then,” said the major, “that no one could give you that information.”

“Say rather, would not,” replied Trenck. “Surely, something of the matter must be known here. You, for instance, major, might tell me frankly what you think to be the case.”

“Ah!” said Doo, assuming the self-satisfied manner of a jailer; “it would not be proper for me to answer that.”

“You would save me from despair and revolt,” replied Trenck warmly. “For I give you my word of honor that from the moment I know when my captivity is to terminate–no matter when that may be, or what my subsequent fate–I will make no further attempts to evade it by flight.”

“And you want me to tell you—-“

“Yes,” interrupted Trenck, with a shudder; “yes, once again I ask you.”

Doo smiled maliciously as he answered:

“The end of your captivity? Why, a traitor can scarcely hope for release!”

The heat of the day, the wine he had drunk, overwhelming anger and his fiery blood, all mounted to Trenck’s head. Incapable of further self-restraint, he flung himself upon the major, tore the coveted sword from his side, dashed out of the chamber, flung the two sentinels at the door down the stairs, took their entire length himself at a single bound and sprang into the midst of the assembled guards.

Trenck fell upon them with his sword, showering blows right and left. The blade flashed snakelike in his powerful grasp, the soldiers falling back before the fierce onslaught. Having disabled four of the men, the prisoner succeeded in forcing his way past the remainder and raced for the first rampart.

There he mounted the rampart and, never stopping to gauge its height, sprang down into the moat, landing upon his feet in the bottom of the dry ditch. Faster still, he flew to the second rampart and scaled it as he had done the first, clambering up by means of projecting stones and interstices.

It was just past noon; the sun blazed full upon the scene and every one within the prison stood astounded at the miraculous flight in which Trenck seemed to fairly soar through the air. Those of the soldiers whom Trenck had not overthrown pursued, but with little hope of overtaking him. Their guns were unloaded so that they were unable to shoot after him. Not a soldier dared to risk trying to follow him by the road he had taken, over the ramparts and moats; for, without that passion for liberty which lent wings to the prisoner there was no hope of any of them scaling the walls without killing himself a dozen times over.

They were, therefore, compelled to make use of the regular passages to the outer posterns and these latter being located at a considerable distance from the prisoner’s avenue of escape, he was certain, at the pace he was maintaining, to gain at least a half-hour’s start over his pursuers.

Once beyond the walls of the prison, with the woods close by, it seemed as if Trenck’s escape was assured beyond doubt.