light canvas shoes. I had rubbed
myself thoroughly with oil, and I carried a large flask of whisky. The
night was warm, but I might probably be immersed a long while, and it
was necessary to take every precaution against cold: for cold not only
saps a man's courage if he has to die, but impairs his energy if others
have to die, and, finally, gives him rheumatics, if it be God's will
that he lives. Also I tied round my body a length of thin but stout
cord, and I did not forget my ladder. I, starting after Sapt, took a
shorter route, skirting the town to the left, and found myself in the
outskirts of the forest at about half-past twelve. I tied my horse up
in a thick clump of trees, leaving the revolver in its pocket in the
saddle--it would be no use to me--and, ladder in hand, made my way to
the edge of the moat. Here I unwound my rope from about my waist, bound
it securely round the trunk of a tree on the bank, and let myself down.
The Castle clock struck a quarter to one as I felt the water under me
and began to swim round the keep, pushing the ladder before me, and
hugging the Castle wall. Thus voyaging, I came to my old friend,
"Jacob's Ladder," and felt the ledge of the masonry under me. I crouched
down in the shadow of the great pipe--I tried to stir it, but it was
quite immovable--and waited. I remember that my predominant feeling
was neither anxiety for the King nor longing for Flavia, but an intense
desire to smoke; and this craving, of course, I could not gratify.

The drawbridge was still in its place. I saw its airy, slight framework
above me, some ten yards to my right, as I crouched with my back against
the wall of the King's cell. I made out a window two yards my side of it
and nearly on the same level. That, if Johann spoke true, must belong to
the duke's apartments; and on the other side, in about the same relative
position, must be Madame de Mauban's window. Women are careless,
forgetful creatures. I prayed that she might not forget that she was to
be the victim of a brutal attempt at two o'clock precisely. I was rather
amused at the part I had assigned to my young friend Rupert Hentzau; but
I owed him a stroke--for, even as I sat, my shoulder ached where he had,
with an audacity that seemed half to hide his treachery, struck at me,
in the sight of all my friends, on the terrace at Tarlenheim.

Suddenly the duke's window grew bright. The shutters were not closed,
and the interior became partially visibl