"Ah! then, it is true, is it? I have just read the 'Kreuz Zeitung.'"

"What have you read, my dear Karl?"

"I read that you fought with a Frenchman and were wounded."

"Hush—not so loud. I am not wounded for the family, only dislocated."

"What does that mean?"

"It means, my dear fellow, that my wife won't think she need inspect a sprained arm, but she would positively insist on examining a wounded one. Now she would die of fright over this wound, while I believe you would rather like to have it. Have you seen many wounds a foot long? I can show you one if you like."

"How so? A skilled fencer like you, who uses his sabre as if he had invented it!"

"None the less, I found my master."

"A Frenchman?"

"A Frenchman."