“In the dungeon, where else? He found the count hiding out, right behind our very walls! He snuck in from the fields, into the cellar, down the two corridors—it was the dead of night when he came—and there he plotted mischief against the baron and against all of Prussia. But Bismarck discovered his hiding place, secret though it was to all but the baron, and he threw open the door, and there was the count. ‘Prepare to breathe your last, traitor!’ shouted the premier, and the next instant the evil count lay dead, his blood soaking into the dirt floor of the dungeon, and Bismarck standing above his evil corpse, drawing out his sword and wiping the blood on a towel that lay on the table in the center of the room.”

Eppie stopped, breathing heavily, eyes still wide as the saucers under the teacups of her listeners. The room was quiet as death.

Suddenly a tremendous crash shook the house.

As if in one accord, everyone jumped straight up out of their chairs and the hair on nearly every arm stood out as if suddenly charged with an invisible current of electricity.

The baron smiled. “It would seem the thunderstorm has arrived earlier than I expected,” he said.

Flashes of lightning could faintly be seen through the door that stood open to the corridor, from windows at its end and the guest rooms opposite. More echoes of thunder sounded.

“Go on, Eppie,” said the baron.

“The dungeon was never used again,” she said, “though the chancellor checks it every time he comes.”

“The chancellor—I thought you called him the premier.”

“He was made the chancellor later, after the defeat of Austria and the unification… you should know that, Baron.”

“Ah yes, Eppie—I had forgotten.”

“You must call him the chancellor now—times are not what they once were.”

“I understand.”

“He has his dignity to maintain, Baron.”

“He has been here again?”

“Oh yes, I saw him recently. He always checks to make sure the wicked count is still dead. Sometimes he takes me, so that someone in the house will know the count’s whereabouts in case he tries to cause more trouble. He is a traitor, you know, a spy. He wants the estate for himself. And there’s the gold, you know, as well.”

“The gold?”

“The cache from the Prussian vaults, spirited away for safekeeping during the Prussian war. It is still here, Baron.”

“Where?”

As she spoke, Eppie’s voice lowered to a whisper, and she raised her hand to her mouth so that no one but the baron would hear.

“Somewhere in the dungeon.”

“Have you seen it?”

“No, he never showed it to me.”

“How do you know it is there?”

“He told me he had hidden it safely until he would need it again. Then he would let me know.”

“Then what?”

“We would dig it up together.”

“I see.”

“He said—”

“Who, Eppie?” interrupted the baron.