were filled with disgust and aversion
at the conditions created by the stupidity and stubbornness of Colonel
von Kronau. They testified their sympathy for Koenig on various
occasions. It was owing to all these mitigating facts that Koenig
gradually came to view the future with brighter spectacles, and he
consoled himself with the thought that justice must triumph in the
end; but his patience was sorely tried in the meanwhile, for the
investigation of his case dragged on a long while. If it had been a
case creating sensational interest,--a case of manslaughter or of
cruel abuse of subordinates, perhaps,--there would have been more
promptness, in order to quiet public opinion; but his was a case which
seemed to call for no such speedy action. What difference did it make
if he had to wait for months,--a prey to misgivings and doubts, and
exposed hourly to malignant talk of busybodies?

Six weeks had elapsed before his first preliminary hearing took place.
Koenig, of course, took occasion to explain the whole matter, and to
prove, by means of his ledgers and by oral testimony, how entirely
unjust was the accusation against him.

He was soon undeceived, however, in the hope that the end of the
proceedings against him had now come; for the court was by no means
satisfied with his _ex-parte_ showing. They demanded an expert
examination of his ledgers for the last three years, and this task
required fully three months.

At the trial his innocence of the charge was, of course, fully
established, and an acquittal was the result.

It had been proven that there had been no diversion of funds, but that
the captain's equivocal statement to that effect made to Borgert and
admitted by the captain himself had been a mere pretext. The motive
for this had also been shown to be that, as may be remembered, of
preventing further requests for loans from so bad a debtor as Borgert.
A bald statement of these facts was contained in the finding of the
court-martial.

Koenig had expected no other finding; but in the officers' circle the
acquittal called forth nothing but disappointment.

Some four months later H. M.'s confirmation of the court's finding
reached the little garrison. And that was the signal for another
procedure, for now it became the duty of the Council of Honor to
undertake a new investigation of the same facts, but from a different
point of view,--namely, whether Koenig had failed in any one point
against the professional