Chapter III: Part 3

"As to the Pr---- de C----é, I shall find a way to see him personally; I have received certain information from an intelligent and intriguing priest, which may be of use.

"Remember the name of Poulain, rector of Briantes. He is from Bourges and knows many things, notably concerning the said prince, who is very greedy of money and exceedingly incapable in respect to politics; but he will go where ambition drives him. He can be led on by great hopes, and used as the Guises were, for he has nothing of Condé but the name, and is afraid of everybody and everything.

"He is for that reason more difficult to catch than he appears. Personally he amounts to nothing. His name is still a host in itself. In the hope of becoming king, he is prepared to give many pledges to the most holy I----, reserving the right to retract if his interest demands it. It is said that he would not shrink from making way with the k---- and his brother, and that, if need were, one could strike high and hard by means of that paltry mind and that nerveless arm.

"If in your opinion it is wise to encourage him in this ambition, advise your most humble----"

"Good! good!" cried the marquis. "Here we have the wherewithal to make trouble between our friend Poulain and monsieur le prince, and between them both and the memory of dear Monsieur d'Alvimar. God knows that my choice would be to let that dead man rest in peace; but if they threaten to avenge him, we will let the kind friends who pity him know him as he really was."

"That is all very well," said pretty Madame de Beuvre, "on condition that you can prove that these notes were written by his hand."

"True," replied the marquis, "without that they will not help us. But doubtless Guillaume will be able to provide us with a letter signed by him."

"That is probable; and you must look to it at once, my dear marquis!"

"In that case," said the marquis, kissing her hand as he wished her good-night--for she had risen to retire--"in that case I will return to Guillaume's to-morrow; meanwhile let us be very careful of our proofs and our weapons."

On waking the next morning, the marquis found Lucilio in his room, who handed him a sheet upon which he had written something for him to read.

The poor fellow proposed that he should go away for a time, in order that the storm which threatened them both might not burst upon his generous friend more quickly because of his presence.

"No, no!" cried Bois-Doré, deeply touched; "surely you will not wound me to the heart by leaving me! The danger is postponed, that is clear enough to all of us; and Monsieur d'Alvimar's notes make me feel perfectly secure so far as I am concerned. As for yourself, rest assured that you have nothing to fear from the prince, having so accurately announced the favorite's death. Moreover, whatever risk you may run by remaining here, I think that it would be much greater elsewhere, and only in this province can I protect you effectively or conceal you, as circumstances require. Let us not worry about the unknown; and if you are afraid of adding to the embarrassment of my position, think of this--that without you, Mario's education is a hopeless failure. Think of the service you render me by transforming a lovable child into a man of brain and heart, and you will realize that neither my fortune nor my life can pay my debt to you, for both together are not equivalent to the learning and virtue which we owe to you."

Having, not without difficulty, extorted from his friend a promise not to leave Briantes without his assent, the marquis was about to start for Ars once more, when Guillaume arrived with Monsieur Robin de Coulogne, the latter greatly surprised by what his farmer Faraudet had told him that morning, the former surprised that he had not received a visit from the marquis during the evening, as his servants had led him to expect.

Bois-Doré made his confession and described faithfully the vision he had had at Brilbault, declaring, however, that, until the appearance of D'Alvimar's profile on the wall, he would have sworn that he had not dreamed of the uproar and the shadows, which might well have been perfectly real.

He had the mortification of detecting an incredulous smile on the faces of his two auditors; but when he had told them what had happened previously at the gardener's cottage, and had shown them D'Alvimar's notes, his friends became grave and attentive once more.

"Cousin," said Guillaume, "so far as these notes are concerned, it will be easy for me to authenticate them and to furnish you with specimens of Monsieur d'Alvimar's handwriting and his signature. Meanwhile, I assure you that these pages are in his hand. Put them with your own papers and wait, before announcing the traitor's death, until you are officially called to account therefor."

Such was not Monsieur Robin's advice. He criticised the policy of keeping the fact secret, the precautions taken to conceal the body, and the prolongation of the mystery at a time when everybody in the neighborhood was prepossessed in favor of the lovely Mario, touched by the story of his adventures, and disposed to curse the cowardly assassins of his father.

Bois-Doré would have followed this advice instantly, except for his unwillingness to displease Guillaume, who persisted in his first opinion.

"My dear neighbor," he said, "I would come over to your views and retract the advice I have given the marquis, except for one thought which has occurred to me, and which I beg you to weigh seriously; it is this: that it is unnecessary for the marquis to accuse himself of killing a man who may not be dead at all."

Messieurs Robin and Bois-Doré made a gesture of surprise, and Guillaume continued:

"I have two strong reasons for thinking and saying this: the first is that a man was carried away from La Caille-Bottée's garden, who, although run through by a lusty sword-thrust, may not have breathed his last; the second is that our marquis, whose courage is not of the sort that anyone can doubt, recognized his enemy's face at Brilbault."

Monsieur Robin reflected in silence; Bois-Doré collected his memories of the preceding night, and tried to disentangle them from the bewilderment that had then taken possession of him; then he said:

"If Monsieur d'Alvimar is dead, he did not die on the field of battle at La Rochaille, nor at the gardener's cottage, but at Brilbault, no later than last evening. He died in I know not what strange and brutal company, but attended by a priest who may have been Monsieur Poulain, and by a servant who must have been old Sancho. There was nothing in the confused shadows which I saw to contradict these suppositions, and the one thing that I saw most clearly and distinctly was a crucifix as sharply outlined as the cross on an escutcheon, and under the right branch of that crucifix the emaciated, fleshless face of Monsieur d'Alvimar. The features seemed somewhat agitated at first, while a voice repeated the prayers for the dying; faint groans, which I had heard throughout the revel, I continued to hear during the prayer. Then the groans ceased, the face became like stone; you would have said that the lines were petrified on the wall which showed me their reflection. The head was no longer bent forward but thrown back, and then----"

"Then what?" said Guillaume.

"Then," said the marquis, ingenuously, "I became weak and idiotic, and I fled to avoid seeing anything more."

"Well," said Monsieur Robin, "however it may be, and whatever may be there, we will go to examine that hovel and ransack it from roof to cellar, if need be, to see what it conceals, and what sort of people it shelters."

Guillaume advised waiting until nightfall, and taking all manner of precautions, in order to make sure of discovering the object of these mysterious meetings.

Faraudet had given Monsieur Robin precise information as to the hour at which the tumult began, and the moment that it became certain that those strange noises were not a pure product of the imagination of terrified peasants, it was impossible not to see, in their regularity and their persistent recurrence, a deliberately adopted plan to spread terror abroad and turn it to advantage in one direction or another.

Monsieur Robin observed moreover that, according to the farmer, this performance had been going on at Brilbault only about two months, that is to say since the time fixed by Guillaume and the marquis as the period of D'Alvimar's death.

"All this," he said, "reminds me that, on the day that I arrived at Coudray, last week, I met at several places on the road, at varying intervals, groups of evil-appearing people, who did not look like peasants or bourgeois or soldiers, and whom I was surprised not to recognize. Ascertain from your servants whether they have not met similar folk in your neighborhood of late."

Several servants were summoned. Bois-Doré's and Guillaume's agreed in saying that, within a few weeks, they had seen many suspicious persons prowling about in the woods and the unfrequented roads of La Varenne, and that they had wondered how those strangers could earn a living in such lonely regions.

Thereupon they remembered numerous thefts that had been committed in farm-houses and barnyards roundabout; and lastly, La Flèche's face had reappeared, with other outlandish faces, at fairs and markets in the towns nearby. At all events they believed that they could swear that a certain mountebank, an irrepressible chatterer, dressed in various disguises, was the same fellow who had prowled about between Briantes and La Motte-Seuilly for several days, at the time of Mario's recovery.

The result of all this information was that they concluded that they had to deal with the most suspicious and artful genus of vagrants and bandits, and they took measures to obtain possession of their secret without giving the alarm.

They agreed to separate at once; for it was very possible that the wretches might have noticed the marquis's visit to Brilbault, and that they had spies on the watch behind the bushes on all the roads.

Guillaume was to return home, take a considerable number of his servants, and pretend to start for Bourges.

Monsieur Robin was to remain at Coudray with his people until the appointed hour.

Bois-Doré was to lie in ambush in the direction of Thevet, Jovelin toward Lourouer.

XLVIII

At nightfall, the servants and vassals, led by these four gentlemen, were to form a large circle around Brilbault and close in rapidly, as in a _battue_ of wolves, each man reckoning the time required to reach the ruin from his starting-point, so that they might all arrive at the time fixed for investing it at close quarters.

That time was ten o'clock. Until then they were to move silently and keep out of sight as far as possible; they were to allow anyone to pass who was going toward Brilbault, but, after the stroke of ten, they were to arrest anyone who should attempt to leave the ruin.

They were strictly forbidden to kill or wound anyone unless they were seriously attacked, the main object being to take prisoners and obtain information.

It was also agreed that each man should start alone from his first position, and the positions were assigned in accordance with the minute strategic knowledge of the country possessed by Guillaume and the marquis.

Thus, Guillaume and his men were to separate at La Berthenoux, and scatter along the Igneraie. Monsieur Robin was to go alone to his farmer's, while his men were to take a score of different paths from Coudray to Brilbault, taking care to cover the whole Saint-Chartier line.

Monsieur de Bois-Doré, meanwhile, was to ride to Montlevic, and thence start alone for the rendezvous, after scattering his escort in the same manner, in order to avoid all suspicion on the part of anyone who might be watching his movements.

When all these arrangements were made, they could count upon bringing into the field about a hundred stout and cautious men, upon whom they could rely. Bois-Doré alone supplied almost fifty, and still left half a score of trusty fellows to guard the château and his lovely guest Lauriane.

In order that the spies who were presumed to be watching him might not suspect him of any design upon Brilbault, the marquis took Mario with him to the château of Montlevic, to pay a visit to his youthful neighbors.

The D'Orsannes were grandsons of Antoine d'Orsanne, who was lieutenant-general of Berry and a Calvinist.

The marquis and Mario passed an hour there; after which Bois-Doré told Aristandre to take the child back to Briantes, while he remounted his horse to ride alone to Etalié, a hamlet on the road from La Châtre to Thevet, at the top of a hill called Le Terrier.

When Mario, who was puzzled by all these precautions, asked leave to accompany him, he replied that he was going to sup with Guillaume d'Ars, and that he would return early.

The child sighed as he mounted his little horse, for he had a feeling that something was about to happen, and, by dint of listening to the conversation of gentlemen, the pretty peasant of the Pyrenees had soon become a gentleman himself, in the romantic and chivalrous sense still attributed to that title by the excellent marquis.

Everyone knows how marvellously the child modifies and transforms himself to adjust himself to the environment to which he is transplanted. Mario was already dreaming of noble feats of arms, running giants through and rescuing captive damsels.

He tried to insist after his manner, obeying without a murmur, but fastening his loving and persuasive eyes upon the old man, who adored him.

"No, my dear count," replied Bois-Doré, who understood perfectly his silent prayer; "I cannot leave alone in my château at night the sweet girl who has been placed in my care. Remember that she is your sister and your lady, and that, when I am compelled to be absent, your place is beside her, to serve her, to divert her and, if need be, to defend her."

Mario was vanquished by this exaggerated flattery, and, spurring his horse, rode away toward Briantes at a gallop.

Aristandre followed him, and was to return to the marquis as soon as he had escorted the child back to the château.

The night, like the preceding one, was decidedly mild for the season. The sky, sometimes overcast, sometimes swept clear by gusts of warm air, was very dark when the young horseman and his attendant galloped into the ravine and rode under the venerable trees of the village.

As they rapidly ascended one of the narrow undulating roads, lined with hedges, which served the purposes of streets between the thirty or forty _firesides_ of which the village consisted, Mario's horse, which was leading, shied and snorted with terror.

"What is that?" said the child, sitting like a rock in his saddle. "A drunken man asleep in the road? Pick him up, Aristandre, and take him to his family."

"Monsieur le comte," replied the coachman, who had instantly dismounted, "if he is drunk, you might say he is dead drunk, for he doesn't move any more than a stone."

"Shall I help you?" said the child, dismounting.

He went nearer and tried to distinguish the features of the man, who answered none of Aristandre's questions.

"He may belong hereabout," said the coachman with his accustomed stolidity; "I don't know him; but what I do know is that he is dead or the next thing to it."

"Dead!" cried the child; "right here, in the middle of the village! and no one thinks of helping him!"

He ran to the nearest house and found it empty; the fire was burning brightly, and the tea-kettle, abandoned to its fate, was sputtering in the ashes; the settle was upset across the room.

Mario called in vain, no one answered.

He was about to run to another house, for they were separated from one another by large enclosures thickly planted with trees, when the report of firearms and strange rumbling noises, drowning the clatter of his horse's hoofs on the stones, made him jump and abruptly draw rein.

"Do you hear, monsieur le comte?" cried Aristandre, who had carried the body to the side of the road, and had remounted to join his young master; "that comes from the château, and there's something strange going on there, for sure!"

"Let us hurry!" said Mario, urging his steed to a gallop. "If it's a fête, they are making a great noise over it!"

"Wait! wait!" cried the coachman, doubling his speed to stop Mario's horse; "that is no fête! There wouldn't be a fête at the château without you and monsieur le marquis. They are fighting! Do you hear how they are yelling and cursing? And see, there's another dead man, or a horribly wounded Christian, at the foot of the wall! Fly, monsieur; hide, for the love of God! I will go to see what the matter is, and come back and tell you."

"You are laughing at me!" cried Mario, tearing himself free; "hide, when they are attacking my father's château? What about my Lauriane? let us hasten to her defence!"

He galloped across the drawbridge, which was lowered, a most extraordinary circumstance after nightfall.

By the light of a stack of straw which was blazing merrily in front of the farm buildings, Mario obtained a confused view of a most incomprehensible scene.

The marquis's retainers were engaged in a hand-to-hand conflict with a numerous band of horned, hairy, shiny creatures, "in every respect more like devils than men."--Musket or pistol shots rang out from time to time, but it was not a battle according to rule; it was a mêlée, following a sudden and unfortunate surprise. They saw frantic groups writhe and struggle for an instant, then suddenly disappear, when the flame of the burning straw was obscured by dense clouds of smoke.

The coachman held Mario in his arms, so that he could not rush into the fray. He struggled in vain, and wept with rage.

At last he was forced to listen to reason.

"You see, monsieur," said honest Aristandre, "you prevent me from going and taking a hand yonder! And yet my fist is worth four of an ordinary man's. But the devil could not make me let go my hold of you, for I am responsible for you; so I won't do it until you swear that you will keep quiet."

"Go then," replied Mario, "I swear it."

"But if you stay here, some straggler may see you. Come, I'll hide you in the garden."

And, without awaiting the child's consent, the coachman lifted him from his horse and carried him into the garden, the gate of which was at the left, not far from the entrance tower. He locked him in there, and ran off to throw himself into the mêlée.

Dull and uninteresting as we know mere descriptions of locality to be, we are compelled, in order to enable the reader to understand what follows, to remind him of the general arrangement of the small estate of Briantes. The recollection of many venerable country houses, built upon the same plan, and still existing with slight changes, will assist him to form an idea of the one with which we are here concerned.

I will suppose that we enter by the drawbridge which spans the outer moat; let us pause a moment at that point.

The _sarrasine_ is raised. Let us examine this system of defence.

The _orgue_, or _sarrasine_, or, as it was then called, the _sarracinesque_, was a sort of portcullis, less expensive and less heavy than the iron portcullis. It consisted of a series of movable stakes, independent of one another, and moving up and down, like the portcullis, in the archway of the gate-tower. More time was required to set in motion the mechanism of the _sarrasine_ than that of the ordinary portcullis made in a single piece; but it had this advantage, that a single person, stationed in the _salle de manœuvre_, or room from which it was worked, could, if need were, raise one of the stakes and admit a fugitive, without making too large an opening of which the besiegers could avail themselves.

This room was a sort of corridor inside the gate-tower and above the arch, with openings which enabled those on guard there to look down upon whoever might attempt to go in or out. These openings also enabled them to fire or hurl projectiles on the besiegers, when they had succeeded in crossing the moat and destroying the _sarrasine_, and the battle was renewed under the archway.

This room communicated with the _moucharabi_, a low, crenellated, _mascherolé_ gallery, which crowned the arch of the portcullis on the outer face of the tower. From that point bullets and stones could be rained upon the enemy to prevent their destroying the _sarrasine_.

The gate-tower of Briantes, which contained these defensive appliances, was a heavy oval mass, built on the edge of the moat. It was called the tower of the _huis_, to distinguish it from the _huisset_, of which we shall speak in a moment. The _huis_, or gate, opened into the immense enclosure which contained the farm buildings, the dove-cote, the heron-yard, the mall, etc., and which was invariably called the _basse-cour_, because it was always on a lower level than the courtyard.

On our left is the high garden wall, pierced at regular intervals with narrow loopholes, from which, in case of surprise, the enemy could be harassed after making themselves masters of the _basse-cour_.

A paved road ran all the way along this wall to the second line of defences, where the second moat, supplied with water by the little stream, extended to the pond at the end of the courtyard.

Over this moat, bordered by its turfed counterscarp, was thrown the stationary bridge, a bridge built of stone, and very old, as indicated by the sharp angle which it made with the tower at its inner end.

This was customary in the Middle Ages. Some antiquaries explain the custom by pointing out that the archers in the assaulting party, when they raised their arms to fire, laid their sides open to the fire of the besieged. Others tell us that this angle broke the force of an assault very materially. It matters little.

The tower of the _huisset_ stood between this stationary bridge and the courtyard. It contained a small iron portcullis and stout oaken gates studded with nails with enormous heads.

This tower formed, with the moat, the only defence of the manor, properly so-called.

When he gratified his own tastes by razing the donjon of his fathers and replacing it by the pavilion called the _grand'maison_, the marquis had said to himself, and justly, that, whether in the shape of a castle or a villa, his country house would not hold out an hour against an attack with cannon. But, against the paltry means of attack which bandits or hostile neighbors could command, the broad, deep moat filled with a swiftly-running stream, the little falconets placed on each side of the _huisset_, and the loopholes cut diagonally in the wall on the _basse-cour_ or farmyard side, were capable of holding out a considerable time. As a matter of comfort and convenience rather than of prudence, the manor was always well supplied with provisions and forage.

Let us add that walls and moats, always kept in perfect repair, enclosed the whole domain--even the garden--and that, if Aristandre had taken time for reflection, he would have carried Mario out of the farmyard, into the village, and not into the garden, which was as likely to become a prison for him as a place of safety.

But one never thinks of everything, and Aristandre never dreamed that the enemy could not be repelled with a turn of the hand.

The honest fellow was not noted for vividness of imagination; it was fortunate for him that he did not allow himself to be excited by the fantastic and truly frightful figures which were presented to his astonished eyes. Being as credulous as other men, he took counsel with himself as he ran, but without slackening his headlong pace; and, when he had struck down one or two of them, he made the philosophical reflection that they were _canaille_, nothing more.

Mario, with his face pressed against the garden gate, throbbing with ardor and excitement soon lost sight of him.

The burning mill had fallen in; the fighting continued during the darkness; the child could follow only with his ears the confused sounds of the changing scenes of the action.

He judged that the arrival of the sturdy and intrepid Aristandre revived the courage of the defenders, but after a few moments of uncertainty, which seemed to him like centuries, he thought that the assailants must be gaining ground, for the shouts and scuffling receded to the second bridge, and, after a moment of ghastly silence, he heard a pistol shot and the splash of a body falling into the stream.

A few seconds later the portcullis of the _huisset_ fell with a great crash, and a volley from the falconets forced the party that had rushed upon the bridge to fall back with horrible imprecations.

One act of this incomprehensible drama was finished; the besieged had been driven back and confined in the courtyard; the invaders were masters of the _basse-cour_.

Mario was alone; Aristandre was probably dead, since he abandoned him in the midst or at least within reach of enemies who might burst into the garden at any moment by breaking down the gate, and take him prisoner.

And there was no means of escape for him except to scale that gate at the risk of falling into the hands of those demons! There was no exit from the garden except into the _basse-cour_; it had no direct communication of any sort with the château.

Mario was afraid; and then, too, the thought of the death of Aristandre, and, perhaps, of other faithful servants equally dear to him, brought tears to his eyes. Even his poor little horse, whom he had left at the entrance to the _basse-cour_, with the reins on his neck, came into his mind and added to his distress.

Lauriane and Mercedes were safe, doubtless, and there were still many defenders about them, for the deathly silence in the direction of the village indicated that men and beasts had taken refuge within the enclosure at the outset, in order to receive the enemy under shelter of the walls. It was the custom of the period that, at the slightest alarm, vassals should repair to the seignioral château at once, to seek and offer aid. They always took their families and cattle with them.

"But if Lauriane and my good Moor have any idea that I am here," thought poor Mario, "how worried they will be about me! Let us hope that they don't suspect that I have returned! And dear old Adamas--I am sure he is like a madman! If only they haven't taken him prisoner!"

His tears flowed silently; crouching in a clump of trimmed yews, he dared not show himself at the gate, where he might be discovered by the enemy, nor go farther away and lose sight of what he could still see of the scene of confusion being enacted in the _basse-cour_.

He heard the howls of those besiegers who were wounded by the shot from the falconets. They had been taken to the farmhouse, and there were evidently wounded and dying men there belonging to the besieged force as well, for Mario could distinguish voices that seemed to be exchanging reproaches and threats. But it was all very vague; it was a considerable distance from the garden to the farm-house; moreover, the little stream, swollen by the winter rains, was making a deal of noise.

The besieged had opened the gates and sluices of the pond to increase the depth of water in the moat and make it flow more swiftly.

A reddish gleam appeared above the door of the château; doubtless a fire had been lighted in the courtyard, so that they could see one another, reckon up their fighting strength and prepare their defence. The besiegers' fire had ceased to cast more than a sort of ruddy reflection, by which Mario could see many indistinct shadows moving rapidly to and fro.

Suddenly he heard footsteps and voices approaching him, and thought that they were coming to explore the garden.

He kept perfectly still and saw two fantastically arrayed individuals pass the gate, on the outer side, and go toward the entrance tower.

He held his breath and succeeded in overhearing this fragment of dialogue:

"The infernal curs will not arrive before him!"

"So much the better I our share will be all the bigger!"

"Idiots, to think that you alone can capture----"

XLIX

The voices died away, but Mario had recognized them. They were the voices of La Flèche and old Sancho.

His courage suddenly returned, although there was nothing encouraging in that discovery.

It had been impossible to keep Mario long in ignorance of the affair of La Rochaille, and he fully realized that his father's murderer, D'Alvimar's fidus Achates, was thenceforth the deadliest foe of the name of Bois-Doré; but La Flèche's complicity in this bold stroke led the child to hope that Sancho's auxiliaries were the band of gypsies who had been his companions in misery.

He reflected, justly enough, that those vagrants had in all probability joined forces with other more desperate rascals; but even so, an attack of that sort seemed to him much less to be dreaded than a regular raid organized by the provincial authorities, such as they had had reason to fear; and for a moment he had an idea of trying to win over La Flèche, if he could obtain an interview with him alone. But his distrust returned when he remembered the brutal and threatening air with which the gypsy had talked with him on that same spot months before.

Thereupon he began to reflect on the words he had just heard. He felt that he needed all his faculties in order to understand them and take advantage of them at need.

Doubtless the assailants expected reinforcements, whose arrival was delayed too long to suit Sancho. "They will not arrive before him!"--The _him_ could be no other than the marquis, whose return they dreaded.--"So much the better, our share will be all the bigger!" indicated that La Flèche was impelled by the hope of pillage. "Idiots, to think that you alone can capture"--the château presumably--was a confession of the inability of the assailants to maintain a siege of the manor with any chance of success.

In short, Mario, who had seen the besmeared, masked, ghastly, grotesque faces,--disguises assumed by the gypsies in all probability to terrify the peasants of the village and the farm,--and who, despite his courage, had been himself terrified by them, was immensely relieved when he found that he had to do with villains of flesh and blood, rather than with supernatural creatures and mysterious dangers.

Being unable to do anything for the moment except remain in hiding, he waited until the voices and footsteps had died away, before leaving the gate himself to seek shelter from the cold night air in one of the little structures in the garden.

He thought, with good reason, that the labyrinth, with all the windings of which he was so familiar, would enable him to elude any possible pursuit for some time, and he entered it, bending his steps without hesitation toward the little cottage which was metaphorically called the _Palace of Astrée_.

He was no sooner inside than he fancied that he heard footsteps on the gravel of the circular path.

He listened.

"It is either the wind blowing the dry leaves about," he thought, "or some creature from the farm coming here for shelter. But, in that case, the garden gate must be open! If it is, I am lost! O God! have pity on me!"

The noise was so faint, however, that Mario made bold to look out through the curtain of ivy which covered the walls of his retreat, and he saw a tiny person who was looking all about, in apparent uncertainty, as if seeking refuge in the same place.

Mario had not had time to close the door of the cottage behind him; the small being entered, and said in a low voice:

"Are you here, Mario?"

"Why, is it you, Pilar?" said the child, with an involuntary thrill of pleasure, as he recognized his former little companion, whom he had believed to be dead.

But he added sadly:

"Are you looking for me, in order to betray me?"

"No, no, Mario!" she replied. "I want to run away from La Flèche. Save me, my Mario, for I am too unhappy with that accursed man!"

"But how can I save you, when I do not even know how to save myself?--Either go away from here, or else stay here without me, my poor Pilar; for those bandits, when they come to look for you, will find me too."

"No, no; La Flèche thinks that he left me over yonder with the dead man!"

"What dead man?"

"They called him D'Alvimar. He died the other night, and they buried him this morning."

"You are dreaming--or else I don't understand. No matter! You ran away?"

"Yes; I knew that they were coming here to take your château and your treasure; I climbed out of a little bit of a window, like a cat, and I followed them at a distance. I hoped they would kill La Flèche and those wicked villains, who have never had any pity on me."

"What villains?"

"The trick-playing gypsies whom you know, and many others whom you don't know, who have joined them. They made me suffer at Brilbault, I tell you!"

"Where is Brilbault? Isn't it an old ruin near----"

"I don't know. I never went out. They roamed about all day and left me with the wounded man, who was always dying, and his old servant, who hated me because he said I was the one who brought monsieur bad luck and prevented him from getting well. I would have liked to have him die sooner; for I hated them, too, the vile Spaniards! and I made lots of spells against them. At last the youngest one died, in the midst of those wild men, who drank and sang and yelled all night, and prevented me from sleeping. So I am sick. I am feverish all the time. Perhaps that's lucky for me, because it keeps me from being hungry."

"My poor girl, here is all the money I have about me. If you succeed in escaping, it will be of some use to you; but, although I don't in the least understand what you tell me, it seems to me that you were crazy to come here instead of going far away from La Flèche. It makes me afraid that you are acting in concert with him to----"

"No, no, Mario! keep your money! and, if you think that I mean to betray you, go and hide somewhere else; I won't follow you. I am not a wicked girl to you, Mario. You are the only person in the whole world that I love! I came here thinking that, while they were fighting, I might go into the château and stay with you. But your peasants were too frightened; some of them were killed, the others fled into your great courtyard. Your servants defended themselves bravely; but they weren't the strongest! I was hidden under some boards on the inside of the garden wall. I could see everything through a little crack. I saw you come into the courtyard on your horse: I saw a tall man lock you in here. I didn't recognize you right off, because of your fine clothes; but when you started to come to this little house and I saw you walk, I knew your gait, and I followed you."

"And now what are we going to do? Play at hide and seek, as well as we can, in this garden, where they will certainly come and search?"

"What do you suppose they will come into a garden for? They know very well that there's no fruit to steal in winter. Besides the villains have already found plenty to eat and drink in the big buildings yonder. That's the farm, isn't it? I know well enough what they do when they get into a house that isn't defended. I don't need to see them, I tell you! They kill the cattle and prepare the spit; they knock in the heads of wine casks; they burst open closets; they fill their pockets, their wallets and their bellies. In an hour, they will all be mad, they will fight among themselves and maim each other. Ah! if your stupid servant hadn't locked us in here, it wouldn't be hard to escape! But of course there must be a hole that we can crawl through somewhere in this garden wall! I am a bit of a creature and you are not stout. Sometimes you can reach the top of a wall by climbing a tree. Do you know how to climb and jump, Mario?"

"Yes, indeed; but I know that there isn't any hole or any tree that will help us. There's the pond at the end of the courtyard, but I don't know how to swim as yet. It has been so cold ever since I have been here that they couldn't teach me. There's a little boat that they could send us from the château if they knew we were here. But how are we to make them see us? it is too dark; and just listen! the water makes too much noise running over the dam! Ah! my poor Aristandre must be taken or dead, since----"

"No, my dear little count of the good Lord!" said a hoarse voice outside, trying to speak low; "Aristandre is here, looking for you and listening to you."

"Ah! my dear charioteer!" cried Mario, throwing his arms around the great head which was thrust through the low round window of the little cottage. "Is it really you! But how wet you are! _Mon Dieu_! is it blood?"

"No, it's water, thank God!" replied Aristandre, "cold water! But I didn't drink any of it, luckily for me! I was pushed, pushed, carried onto the stone bridge in spite of myself, by our devils of peasants as they fell back on the courtyard. I saw that I was going to be forced into the courtyard with them, and then I couldn't come out again to find you. So I fired my last pistol shot and jumped into the stream. Devilish stream! I thought I never should get out of it, especially as they fired on me from the château, taking me for an enemy. However, here I am! I have been looking for you for a quarter of an hour; I had an idea that you would be in the _affinoire_"--that was Aristandre's name for the labyrinth--"but, although I've known it ten years, I don't know how to find my way in it yet. Come! we must get away from here. Let us try! You must do just as I say. But who in the devil have you there?"

"Someone whom you must save with me, an unfortunate little girl."

"From the village? Faith! never mind, we will save her if we can. You first! I am going to see what is happening in the _basse-cour_; do you stay here and talk low."

Aristandre returned in a few moments. He seemed troubled.

"It is no easy matter to go away," he said to the children. "Ah! those villagers! how they must have bungled to let the farm be taken! And, now that the hounds are drinking themselves stupid, if they should make a sortie from the château, they could kill them like swine to the last man! They think that they have demons to deal with, but I say that they are human beings in disguise, pure _canaille_! Just hear them yell and sing!"

"Well, let us make the most of their carousing," said Mario; "let us cross yonder corner of the _basse-cour_, where there seems to be no one, and run to the tower of the _huis_."

"Oh! the deuce! to be sure! But the beggars have locked themselves in! They know well enough that monsieur le marquis may come during the night, and he will have to lay siege to his own tower."

"Yes," cried Mario, "that is why I saw Sancho go in that direction with La Flèche."

"Sancho? La Flèche? you recognized them? Ah! I have a mind to go by myself and fall upon those illustrious captains!"

"No, no!" said Pilar, "they are stronger and wickeder than you think!"

"But, if they have simply locked the gate, we can open it," said Mario, whose mind worked more quickly than the coachman's. "And if they have left anybody on guard there, why between us, Aristandre, we can try to kill them so that we can pass. Do you hesitate? We must do it, you see, my friend. We must hurry and warn my father. If we don't, our people here will allow the château to be taken, they are so terrified. When the villains have finished gorging themselves, they will try to set it on fire. Who knows what may happen? Come, come, coachman, my good fellow," added the child, drawing his little rapier, "take a stake, a club, a tree, no matter what, and let us go!"

"Stay, stay, my dear little master!" rejoined Aristandre, "there are some tools here; let me look. Good! I have a shovel; no! a spade! I like that better! Now, I am not afraid of any man! But, listen to me; do you know where your papa is?"

"No! you must take me to him."

"If I come out all right, yes; if not, you will have to go all alone. Do you know where Etalié is?"

"Yes, I have been there. I know the way."

"Do you know the _Geault-Rouge_ inn?"

"The _Coq-Rouge_? Yes, I have been there twice. It isn't hard to find, it's the only house in the place. Well?"

"Your papa will be there until ten o'clock. If you arrive too late, go to Brilbault; he will be there."

"Brilbault at the foot of Coudray hill?"

"Yes. He will be there with his people. It's a long way; you will never be able to do it on foot!"

"I will go straight to Brilbault," said Pilar. "I know the way; I have just come from there!"

"Yes," said the coachman; "go, little one; you can warn Monsieur Robin. Do you know him? You don't belong about here, do you?"

"No matter, I will find him."

"Or Monsieur d'Ars; will you remember?"

"I know him, I saw him once."

"Off we go, then! Ah! Monsieur Mario, if I could only lay my hand on your horse! you could go faster and not kill yourself running."

"I know how to run," said Mario; "don't think about the horse, it is out of the question."

"One minute more," continued Aristandre, "and pay attention. The drawbridge is raised; you know how to drop it, don't you? It doesn't weigh much."

"That's very easy!"

"But the _sarrasine_ is down! But don't be alarmed; I will go up into the room where we work it. If there's anybody there, so much the worse for them; I'll strike and kill, and raise one of the stakes! Don't lose time by waiting for me. Pass through, steal away, fly! If the stake falls on the girl, so much the worse for her; you cannot help it, nor I. God guard you! Keep on running, I will overtake you."

"But, if you are----"

Mario stopped short; his heart sank.

"If I am laid out, you mean? Well, it will be of no use for you to grieve, it will not help matters. If you stop to pity me, you will lose your head and your legs! You must think of nothing but running."

"No, my friend, your risk is too great; let us remain concealed here."

"And suppose, while we are hiding, they burn up Madame Lauriane, your Mercedes, Adamas--and my poor carriage horses in the stable yonder! Besides--Look you, I am going alone. When the road is clear you can pass."

"Come on! come on!" said Mario. "Everything for Lauriane and Mercedes!"

He was about to rush out of the garden, when Pilar detained him.

"Remember that other villains are to come here--I know it. If you meet them, hide carefully, for your gold buttons gleam in the darkness like diamonds, and they will kill you just to get your clothes."

"I have an idea!" exclaimed Mario. "I will put on my gypsy rags, which are right here."

The reader will remember the rustic, sentimental and philosophic trophy, which had been suspended in the cottage with great pomp.

Mario hastily took it down, and in two minutes, having laid aside silk, velvet and lace, he was dressed in his former costume; whereupon they proceeded to the _huis_, walking noiselessly and without speaking.

They had only about fifty paces to walks along the wall outside the garden. They walked that distance, without hindrance at least, if not without danger, to the sound of loud laughter, shrieks, blasphemies and hoarse singing from the farm-house.

The tower of the _huis_ was dark and silent. Aristandre placed the two children close to the _sarrasine_, Mario in front, almost touching the first stake at the left. Then he took his hand and placed it on the ring of the chain which held the drawbridge in the air. There was nothing for him to do but to take that ring from the hook set in the wall.

They did not venture to exchange another word. All about them, on the staircase, over their heads, there might be, there undoubtedly were, sentinels, sleeping or careless.

Mario could not press the coachman's hand in his own, for his were clinging to the detached ring and the dragging chain. He put his lips to that rough hand and hurriedly imprinted a silent kiss upon it; perhaps it was an eternal farewell.

Aristandre, deeply moved, abruptly withdrew his great paw, none the less, as if to say: "Nonsense! don't think of anything but yourself;" and, crossing himself fervently in the darkness, he resolutely ascended the short steep staircase to the _salle de manœuvre_.

"Who goes there?" cried a deep voice which Mario instantly recognized as Sancho's.

And as the coachman continued to ascend and approached the left side of the gallery, the voice added:

"Will you answer, blockhead? Are you drunk? Answer, or I fire on you!"

In an instant there was a report; but the stake was raised, Mario let go the chain, darted across the bridge, and fled without looking back. It seemed to him that the alarm was given on the _moucharabi_, and that a bullet whistled by his ears; he did not hear the report, the blood was making so much noise in his head.

When he was out of range, he paused and leaned against a tree, for his strength failed him at the thought of what was taking place between Aristandre and the enemy's sentinels.

He heard a great uproar in the tower, and something that sounded like the blows of a pickaxe on stone. It was Aristandre's spade, which he kept whirling about his head in the darkness; but he prudently kept silent, in order to be taken for a drunken gypsy, and Mario, straining his ears to hear his loud voice among the others, lost hope, and, with hope, courage to fly without him.

The poor boy was thinking so little of himself that he did not even start when he felt a hand on his arm.

It was Pilar, who had run faster than he, and was retracing her steps to find him.

"Well, well, what are you doing here?" she said. "Come, while they are killing him! When they have finished killing him, they will chase us!"

The little gypsy's ghastly sang-froid horrified Mario. Reared amid scenes of violence and bloodshed, she hardly knew what fear meant, and had not the faintest conception of pity.

But, by virtue of some swift sequence of ideas, Mario thought of Lauriane, and all the resolution of which a child is capable returned to his heart.

He ran on once more, and, motioning to Pilar to take the lower road, turned into the road leading to the plateau of Le Chaumois. A few steps farther on he stumbled over an object which lay across the road. It was the second dead body which Aristandre had pointed out to him, but which they had not had time to examine. Feeling the body under him, Mario was bathed in cold perspiration; perhaps it was Adamas! He mustered courage to touch it, and having satisfied himself that the clothes were those of a peasant, he hurried forward.

The sight of the pale sky over the bare fields made him breathe more freely; the darkness was stifling him. He took a bee-line across the fields, but a new terror awaited him there. A pale, indistinct form seemed to be flitting over the furrows. It came toward him. He tried to elude it, but it followed him. It was an animal of some sort chasing him. All the old women's tales about the white greyhound, and the imp that cries: "_Robert is dead_!" flashed through his mind.

But of a sudden the beast neighed and came near enough to be recognized. It was Mario's dear little horse, which had scented him from afar and came to offer him his help.

"Ah! my dear Coquet!" cried the child seizing his mane, "you come in the nick of time! and did you recognize me, poor fellow, in spite of these clothes, which you never saw? You were terribly frightened during that horrid battle, weren't you? You ran off at once, before they raised the bridge, and you were eating dry thistles here instead of your oats! Let us be off! we will both of us sup when we have time!"

As he chattered thus to his horse, Mario rearranged the stirrups, which had suffered somewhat in the bushes. Then, having mounted, he rode away like an arrow.

We will leave him for the moment and return to Briantes, where the plight of the besieged garrison causes us some anxiety.

L

When Mario and Aristandre arrived at Briantes, not a quarter of an hour had elapsed since the bandits had made their sudden appearance there.

Lauriane was about sitting down to supper when she heard confused outcries and the report of firearms in the direction of the village--we might say, according to the custom in the province, the _bourg_, since the little settlement was fortified in very ancient times; but the old Gallo-Roman stone wall was demolished to the level of the ground in many places, and it was a long time since the people had ceased to incur the expense of maintaining gates.

These noises, which the people in the château and those at the farm-house as well, supposed at first to be caused by villagers turning out to hunt some creature that had stolen into their enclosures, speedily assumed a more alarming character.

Everyone seized upon the first weapon that came to hand, and the farmers, brandishing their flails, hurried to the tower of the _huis_. But they were instantly forced back and their efforts paralyzed by the people from the village, who, rushing from all directions, came together at the approaches to the bridge, and in their terror overturned and trampled on the men who were running to their assistance.

And yet the attacking party consisted of only about fifty men, followed by a number of women and children; but it will be remembered that the marquis had ordered out and despatched to the attack on Brilbault all the stout and intrepid men in his little fief, so that the population surprised by the brigands consisted at that moment of women and children, crippled old men, or weak, half-grown boys.

The sight of the horrible masks worn by the bandits produced the effect they had anticipated. A general panic seized the peasants, and fear afforded them only so much strength as was necessary to prevent the loyal retainers from the château from going forth to meet the foe.

One of the dead bodies that Mario found on the road was that of a deformed young man who fell and was trampled under foot by the fugitives; the other, a poor old fellow who alone tried to face the enemy and was struck down by Sancho with the butt of his gun.