That the king might not doubt the warning thus given, he recalled to his memory his dress, gesture, his sleep in his apartment of Haga in the evening that he had believed himself quite alone.

Such convincing proofs must have struck and intimidated the mind of the prince, but his intrepid soul made him brave, not only the warning, but death: he rose and went to the ball.
VII.
Scarcely had he reached the apartment, when he was surrounded, as he had been warned, by a group of masks, and separated, as if by preconcerted movement, from the body of officers who were in attendance.

At this moment an invisible hand fired at his back a pistol loaded with slugs.
The blow struck him in the left flank above the hip.

Gustavus fell into the arms of Count d'Armsfeld, his favourite.

The report of the fire arm, the smell of powder, the cries of "_fire_," which resounded through the apartment, the confusion which followed the king's fall, the real or feigned anxiety of persons who hurried forward to save him, favoured the escape of the assassins: the pistol had been dropped on the ground.
Gustavus did not lose his presence of mind for a moment.