raised her beautiful head and greeted her royal friend with an
intelligent and friendly glance and a gentle wagging of her tail,
and this salutation was returned each time by Frederick before he
passed on. Finally, and still playing the flute, the king pressed
his foot upon a silver button in the floor of his room, and rang a
bell which hung in Fredersdorf's room, immediately under his own.

A few minutes later the secretary entered, but stood quietly at the
door till the king had finished his allegro and laid aside his
flute.

"Good-morning," said the king, and he looked up at his favorite with
so sharp and piercing a glance that Fredersdorf involuntarily
trembled, and cast his eyes to the ground. "You must have been long
wide awake, you answer the bell so quickly."

"Yes, your majesty, I have been long awake. I am happy, for I have
good news to bring you."

"Well, what is it?" said the king smiling. "Has my god-mother, the
Empress Maria Theresa, voluntarily surrendered to the Emperor
Charles VII.? Have France and England become reconciled? or--and
that seems to me the most probable--has my private secretary
mastered the mystery of gold-making, after which he has so long
striven, and for which he so willingly offers up the most costly and
solemn sacrifices?" The king laid so peculiar an expression upon the
word SACRIFICE that Fredersdorf wondered if he had not listened to
his conversation with Joseph, and learned the strange sacrifice
which they now proposed to offer up to the devil's shrine.